It's an allegedly age-old question challenging users of Facebook to this day, even to this hour and minute. In fact at this very second somewhere a pirate is facing a ninja in a battle beyond our understanding.
And some dumbass programmer thought it'd be a good idea to add an application to Facebook about it.
Since Facebook's development platform went live in May, a plethora of other programmers added their entertaining but mostly useless utilities to the pages of the social networking giant. Adonomics, a venture company studying Facebook analytics, said almost 800 million installations of applications have taken place. As the Inside Facebook blog said, at 60 million active Facebook users, that's an average of 13 applications a profile.
That statistic is based on every user taking advantage of applications, and surely not everyone does. So, to those of you displaying 43 applications with everything from Chuck Norris quotes to pictures of cute animals: Thanks for taking the load off everyone's backs.
I digress. Acknowledging an increase in user complaints about cluttered and slow-performing profiles, Facebook drew the line.
In a blog to developers Jan. 10, Facebook said a "profile clean-up" tool would be added to assist users in creating an "extended profile." This tool allows you to keep 12 applications in addition to Facebook staples like your wall and mini-feed. The rest will be accessible via an extended profile link at the bottom of a profile, the blog said.
With the popularity of these applications, some copyright holders are paying close attention to the rip-offs of their popular brands. Toy-makers Hasbro and Mattel are cornering Facebook in a squabble over Scrabble, the BBC reported Wednesday. The playful companies' lawyers say the Scrabulous Facebook application is an infringement on their rights and want it removed, the BBC said.
This has some Scrabulous fans using "W," "T" and "F," as they start protesting the toy makers and Facebook for immunity. So far Mattel, Hasbro and Facebook are keeping their mouths shut on the issue.
Look at the Entourage application. This resource-intensive sucker loads a small image of every friend a user has and displays it within the profile. If you enjoy fast-loading Facebook profiles, you've likely disabled this application or minimized its presence on your friends' pages.
About 230,000 people are listed as active users for this application and nearly 5.8 million people have installed it, Adonomics said.
On behalf of everyone not using the application, screw all 230,000 of you who are using it. I really couldn't give two pokes how "deep you roll." If I did, I'd look at your friends list. You know, that thing that's been in place since Facebook started.
This is the most frustrating thing about the Facebook platform: So many of the applications serve no purpose or relevance whatsoever. When applications started rolling off the line like graham crackers Facebook turned into a hot mess. Some of the most inane ("How Stupid Are You?"), irrelevant ("How Will You Die?") and lewd ("Penis or Vagina?") applications made center stage on our profiles.
Slowly but surely we - the Facebook community - have realized this. We're slowly backing down. Adonomics lists the top applications by active users and as of writing they are, from first to fourth: Fun Wall, Super Wall, Top Friends and Movies.
Look for the trend. We Facebookers are looking for utility not just entertainment in our applications. These applications are things that additional functionality to our profiles - features we didn't have before we installed the application.
The Entourage application is listed by Adonomics as growing in value, but its active users are down from a mid-November peak of more than 411,000. We're voting with our actions, and our actions indicate a hunger for function.
That function need not be one-sided either. The beauty of the Facebook Platform is that it allows programmers to create applications not only within the site but outside of it. A wide world of widgets, desktop applications and mobile products await development - things that could actually improve your Facebook experience.
It's all about demand, however, and that demand starts at your mouse.
While this profile clean-up tool does provide a solution to the cluttered profiles, it certainly does not end the debate over pirates and ninjas. Though Adonomics statistics do not support my theory, that answer is simple.
Chuck Norris.
Write to Dave at heydave@bewilderedsociety.com
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