Face supposedly crossed over the 500 million user mark. While this may or may not be surprising, the data surely has to be misconstrued somewhere. Let's dive a little deeper into what I think the claim is about.
First off, how exactly does Facebook measure the number of users? Is it per verified email address? If that's the case, Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo Mail accounts are a dime a dozen and eazy to create multiple accounts. This is a bad way to measure total users.
Second, I'm thinking 'pages' are being classified as accounts/users. Any joe blow with a single Facebook account can make 'pages' that are linked to their accounts, yet look like a total different account. This doesn't work either for measuring total users.
Third, dormant accounts are not removed. I had one of the original Facebook accounts when you had to have an email account at an educational facility with a top level domain ending in .edu. I haven't used that particular login in over 3 years. I decided to try it tonight, and I logged right in and saw everything that was there 3 years ago. While it is a legit account, stagnant unused accounts should be removed to keep the ecosystem within Facebook clean. I know, I know. It's all about data collection. I believe to get accurate data on your users, you need to report the number of real 'user' accounts that are ACTIVE say within a 6 month to a year time span. This shows your site is interesting. It shows recent activity. It also shows that these are real people behind the keyboard.
Fourth, this one bugs me. Spammer accounts. They are fairly easy to point out. You report spam to Facebook, and if enough people complain, the account gets disabled. Disabled? Why not purged? This is also tallying up their bloated over exaggerated user counts.
So, to end this brain dump about Facebook, let's recap a little.
Users based on unique email addresses doesn't mean anything. 'Pages' that look like user accounts but are not shouldn't be counted. Old accounts should be purged from the system on a scheduled time of inactivity. Spam is best when fried, diced up and mixed with scrambled eggs...not all over the Facebook pages.
Please comment with your ideas. Correct me on my assumptions. I would like to see what you all think of this. Thank you for reading
-John
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