Notice the two developments on Facebook in recent past.
Some days ago Facebook killed “Become a Fan” option and forced on us the “Like” alternative.(Ref1)
Before that about a year ago we used to get updates about which friend became a fan of which site or application. This is history now.
They seriously do not want you to use their platform for free marketing. So all those popular branding and viral advertisement option are being killed. It remains to be seen how long it goes before they kill the remaining free promotion options out there.
As a most recent development some more of free promotion options are being targeted. See the graphic to the right. Its a snap shot from my own profile.
Facebook is Killing profile boxes. We can no longer showcase what cause we are supporting or what books we are reading. It was kinda free promotion for good causes. But probably Mr Zuckerberg does not care if we want to save the girl child in India or I want to tell my friends what books I am reading or I have recently read.
All they need is to make the advertiser pay. The days of free promotion on social media power house -Facebook, is almost over. The Applications that used to enjoy a viral presence are dying now. Yeah if you can carve out a revenue sharing deal with Facebook then that is probably no problem, like Zynga – the makers of Farmville and MafiaWars.
Of course revenue is important but I don’t think this is a very wonderful way of making money. We have loved facebook as a sharing platform. Now they are killing that spirit. Kind of sad to see this approach.