Modern Primate

For the third day in a row, Facebook’s stock prices have taken a steep fall, down another 7% from yesterday. But if you only get your news via social networks and other social-friendly content platforms, you might not have heard the news.

Don’t get me wrong, the social web is great for a lot of things. Many of the people in my network enjoy a similar sense of humor as I do, so when they recommend a piece of content that they enjoy, there’s a fair chance that I might enjoy it too.

But what about the bad news? People aren’t always so inclined to share the bad news. In order to find out the big picture, one must take the initiative to actively search for it. To live one’s entire online life inside Facebook or an equivalent social network is to only get a piece of the whole picture.

A simple Google search for “Facebook stock” provides a wealth of unpopular, not-so-social, not-so-nice takes on the reality of Facebook’s stock performance. The larger, more traditional news outlets (read: those that don’t really need social) are less than optimistic: MSNBC asks “Is Facebook Doomed?” and CNN Money has a listicle of 5 Signs Facebook Hates Their Investors.

But for those who’s livelihood depends on social media, this shit is scary. Having a negative word to say about Facebook today can get you practically excommunicated from the professional social media world. Take, for instance, the reactions to Richard Dreyfuss’ criticisms of Facebook during yesterday’s Webby Awards. Today, social media strategists are clamoring to paint Dreyfuss as an irrelevant drunkard.

So there you have it. We’ve gone from a world where being wary of Facebook’s privacy concerns and questionable ad effectiveness was the norm, to one where criticizing Facebook is heresy. With that said, our own Facebook advertising campaign has been performing decently well, but not so good that they get an uncritical free pass for life.