When FB came along it was the first service that made connecting with both your close friends and acquaintances fairly convenient. Myspace had a thing going for sure but if I remember my experience was connecting with my closest friends (which we could already do with chat or email) + randoms.

FB actually found your friends and acquaintances for you. In the beginning, that was the only thing you saw too… not a page full of ads and people you don't know.

As we all know it's gone. That's why we've all stopped going there to connect. It's gone and the information we posted to share with friends was used inappropriately.

There is also nonstop pressure coming from potentially disruptive social startups. The people have fractured into many many different apps now.

But I don't see a problem with that. The total number of people online is higher then ever. Old phpBB forums were awesome with only a few thousand users, and something like that will come again. We don't need Facebook groups that are filled with adspam.

Seems like there's a ripe opportunity for a federated group system.