Social media, plunged into the worst crisis in their history: because they don’t stop falling

The rise of social networks it was related to the rocket of algorithms. This is how these platforms, in the short term, have managed to monopolize traffic, audiences and profits. However, the good times have run out of fuel and in the midst of this debacle Meta (Facebook and Instagram), Twitter, Snapchat and even TikTok seem to be floundering.

The main reasons for this collapse are attributed to the lack of originality: it is enough for a function to be patented for the rest to openly imitate it. And also to the eternal dilemma of intimacy: In which black hole does personal data end up?

This deterioration leads to a loss of audience and a progressive decrease in advertising, which prevents these giants from continuing to grow. at the same rate as in the last decade.

The benefit estimates for the sector have decreased, on average, by 53% in the last year. Hardest hit have been Snap (Snapchat) and Pinterest which, in the last 10 months, have moved from calculating profits to questioning losses.

These days, Snapchat is experiencing dramatic hours on the stock exchange, with annual losses of 81%. Something similar happens to Meta, which resigns at 73% in the year. China’s Tencent (Wechat) and Weibo also drop 57% and 46%, respectively, in 2022.

To end up in this gorge, in most cases, it is because the same patterns are repeated: controversial decisions, wrong investments and lack of medium-term projection.

Meta imbalances

Facebook’s 2022 crisis kicked off in late October with negative results, followed by a flurry of layoffs and an insinuation that Mark Zuckerberg he could abdicate his throne for his lack of perspective.

Thus the shares of Meta Platforms, after recording a sharp drop in their net profits, lost 23% on the Nasdaq and wiped out 80 billion dollars of their market value in one stroke of the pen.

For the first time in 18 years, wild growth has stopped and Facebook, as the New York Times points out, has lost nearly half a million users during the fourth quarter of this year.

The big problem is that Meta is in the midst of an identity crisis. While the compass of Mark Zuckerberg points to the metaversehis faithful march in another direction.

Meanwhile, investors wear out their temper, demand dividends and everyone is spinning in a wheel that has no way out. Something like this happens instagramwaged a war against TikTok that cost it growth and advertisers.

This cumulative usury is the product of reputational crises and scandalous leaks that have occurred over the years in the company environment.

Facebook lived in boycott of advertisersthe incendiary leak of Facebook newspapers and the growing legislative and judicial pressure against Meta and its position in the market, both in the European Union and in the United States.

The internal chaos of Twitter

After a few reverse gears, finally, Elon Musk paid the 44,000 million dollars of this small network (345 million users) when compared with the size of the leaders (Facebook reaches 2,940 million), with a slow growth in the number of users (between 1.3 and 1.6 all ‘year), but very influential in public debate.

The tycoon’s hypothesis has only aggravated the crisis that Twitter has been suffering for some time. His first week in power brought criticism, threats and sackings.

Later, he wanted to reinvent the verification system by charging $8 to get it. She later emailed her entire team saying they had two choices: resign and receive three months’ pay or endure a new “hard” work culture to create Twitter 2.0.

Musk’s excuse for causing these conflicts is that he loses a lot of money and that the way to monetize the network. But her hasty decisions and her lack of consent sink her deeper and deeper into the mud.

The billionaire confessed to his employees that he loses $4 million a day and that “the economic prospects are alarming”. He concluded his statement by saying that “bankruptcy cannot be ruled out”.

In the stock market, these irregular slaps are scary. And while it’s clear that it has many plans in the works, Twitter thrives on its advertisers. And all this lawlessness expels them.

A report published by the Washington Post states that in the last two weeks more than a third of its advertisers -Volkswagen, Carlsberg, REI, United Airlines, General Motors or L’Oreal- have chosen not to appear on the platform.

Adding to the list are cereal maker Kellogg’s, pharmaceutical company Merck, Boston Beer brewery, as well as Jeep and Mars Candy. The latter two ranked among the 10 most important.

Another worrying obstacle is that the new owner is not politically impartial, raising fears of growing disinformation, hate speech, conspiracies and trolls.

The dark side of TikTok

While the pace of advertisers has remained constant, its complications, while seemingly contradictory, are related to everything it hides in its networks and the information it omits.

Research released last week by New York University’s Cybersecurity for Democracy team suggests the platform didn’t leak large volumes of election misinformation in the weeks leading up to the vote.

These fears are compounded by TikTok’s hermetic structure that doesn’t support external audits.

While Twitter and Meta (via their internal search engine called Crowdtangle) make their Application Programming Interface (API) public, researchers can mine data from the platforms.

These questions are not limited to the United States. The European Consumer Organization (BEUC) has filed numerous complaints about alleged privacy violations and points out that its privacy policy, terms and conditions are misleading.

“They don’t inform consumers about the identity of the companies they share their data with. The app has changed its privacy policy. However, most of our main concerns remain. Their practices are not in line with EU laws.

Non-profit organization Mozilla warned on the eve of Kenya’s 2022 election that the platform was “failing its first real test” of curbing disinformation at crucial political moments.

In total, more than 130 videos containing election-related fake news, hate speech and anti-community incitement leading up to the vote were identified, garnering over 4 million views collectively.

“Instead of learning from the mistakes of more established platforms like Facebook and Twitter, TikTok is following in their footsteps,” wrote Odanga Madung, a researcher at Mozilla.

SL