Facebook’s New Platform: The New AOL?

When you can’t grow vertically, you have to grow horizontally—or fractally?

After they built the skyscrapers, commercial real estate divided up their spatial distribution to maximize value per cubic foot of space. Facebook – having attracted 750 million subscribers – is now figuring out new ways to maximize the way that they monetize their relationships with their subscribers, as well as locking in these relationships by providing mesmerizing new features.

Their new system reminds us, for some reason this morning, of an old regime: AOL. One of the dinosaurs that already had their heyday.

The astronomical growth of Facebook’s user base over the last 7 years is in large part due to its ability to keep users engaged in a variety of activities. This aspect of the site is still being built upon as the company tries to provide more and more services to its users in addition to providing platforms for other content providers to integrate themselves into Facebook’s network. This mirrors AOL’s attempts to provide a one-stop Internet shop for its customers.

For those not familiar with the history of AOL, allow me to give you a small lesson on the former Internet giant, complete with its iconic “You’ve got mail!” sound byte. AOL, at its height, was an Internet service provider that provided an intuitive, all-in-one Internet access method. Users could visit websites on the Internet at large, websites on AOL’s servers, AOL’s chat rooms, message boards, a one-to-one chat program and a wide variety of games, prompting users to spend most or all of their time online within AOL.

Facebook is attempting to do something similar with its platform, though it isn’t producing all of the content itself but delivering a system through which content providers can reach a massive audience. In the same way that email marketing can be used to tie together a varied Internet marketing campaign, Facebook is setting up its platform to tie together its users’ digital lives, integrating their music, video and game consumption while providing itself with a wealth of information on its users that it can leverage for higher ad revenue. By increasing the amount of services offered through the site, Facebook can engage its users longer, increasing the chances that they’ll respond positively to ads delivered through Facebook’s ad system. When the social aspects of users’ media consumption is considered—users can view music, videos and games that their friends are playing—it’s apparent that Facebook has set itself up as a hub for its users’ digital lives.