Why Facebook is headed for a terrible 2018

Facebook’s also trying to preempt concerns about problematic advertising and offensive content by hiring 1,000 reviewers. But even if Facebook hired in 100,000 people, they’d have trouble policing the sea of effectively anonymous content produced by 2 billion users, an unknown number of which are bots and paid trolls. The obvious solution is to enforce Facebook’s user policy (which says people can only post under their real names) and hold them responsible for what they publish. But that would cause Facebook’s user base to shrink, which would alarm investors.

A third line of attack is likely to become important soon, perhaps as soon as next year. Former Facebook executive Antonio Garcia-Martínez argued earlier this year that Facebook’s ad targeting based on data collected from users is essentially unethical (and also that Facebook oversells its targeting ability). This resonates with politicians and privacy advocates.

Even if new legislative curbs on data gathering and ad targeting don’t arrive soon, standards may start shifting thanks to the efforts of people such as Brendan Eich, the creator of Javascript and the Firefox browser. Eich’s latest start-up produces a browser that effectively blocks all ads — and that will next year offer an entirely new advertising model built on revenue sharing with consenting users.

The social networks’ carefree years of unregulated, untaxed growth are coming to an end. Facebook will probably remain a major force in the attention market, especially given its foothold in the messenger app market and the popularity of Instagram with young people. It may keep rowing against the tide and offering meaningless concessions, but that’s not an endless path.

Eventually — likely soon — it’ll have to submit to rules and popular attitude changes that will cut its ambition down to size and perhaps force it to rethink its business model.