Memories...

Somewhere in the back of a cupboard is a small box that contains photographs that sort of chronicle my childhood. I say sort of because the pics are few and far between, and the time lapses are great.

It's almost as if my folks either didn't bother printing out snapshots, or just didn't have the time to shoot them in the first place. That box is the sum total of my childhood - as what I can no longer remember is long gone, because my dad has a memory like a sieve and my mom left us almost 20 years ago.

Vital questions like: when did I get my first tooth, what was my first word, when did I take my first step... have answers that have all been lost to the mists of time.

I am one of those parents who went as far as to break Facebook's age limit rule and set up a page for my little one.

Nicola Mawson, deputy news editor, ITWeb

Fortunately, the post Facebook generation - those who gravitated to the social media site after its 2004 launch - will never experience these lost memories. Either they will write them up themselves, in between what was eaten for lunch, or over-enthusiastic parents will do it for them.

I am one of those parents who went as far as to break Facebook's age limit rule and set up a page for my little one. It documents many important moments in her life: coming home from hospital, her first swim, first Christmas, and sports days.

That page is there for her forever, and also captures some of the rather cute things she has said over the years, like referring to herself in the third-person as a princess. It's also there so that I can share her precious moments with people who live in far-flung places, like Canada.

I know quite a few other people who have done likewise - either on their own page or through dedicated accounts. Hopefully, when she's big enough, all her questions will be answered, and her life is laid out in as much detail - and as often - as is humanly possible.

But then there is the big “what if”.

Does anyone remember the first social media site, SixDegrees, or even still play in Second Life? Will anyone remember MySpace? What about Friendster and other Internet wannabes?

SixDegrees.com, a forerunner of many social media sites, was a social network service Web site that lasted from 1997 to 2001, and was based on the 'Web of Contacts' model of social networking, according to Wikipedia.

While MySpace was once the most popular social network in the world, valued at $12 billion at its peak in 2007, it failed to innovate at the same level and speed as its competitors, and ended up being sold to advertising agency Specific Media, and pop star Justin Timberlake, for $35 million last year.

In February, MySpace could be getting out of its downward spiral, following an announcement by the social network that it has had over a million new sign-ups since launching its music player in December.

Friendster, which hit the Internet a decade ago, grew to tens of millions of users over the years, but failed to make the big time. It was re-launched as a “social discovery and gaming platform” and then binned as a sharing service.

Fortunately, people had the chance to go and fetch their stuff before it disappeared into cyberspace, which was not the case with Megaupload, as people lost tons of information with that shut down.

There's a whole list of spectacular failures right here.

Technology changes and people want different ways to interact with each other - innovative ways of connecting. Advertisers are also changing the way they want to communicate, and sites must meet those needs to turn a dollar. Social media that do not keep up with consumers and advertisers, or shape-shift to suit needs, will be left behind.

I'm not saying Facebook won't cut it, but, because it is bigger than the bulk of social media groups that have failed, if it collapses, almost a billion people will lose out on - in many cases - a lifetime of memories. That's a population about the same size of Africa, and would make Facebook the third-largest country in the world.

But users do not always translate into a healthy income stream. Facebook has been under earnings pressure, and it is still battling to turn mobile users into a revenue stream.

While revenue in the second quarter to June increased from $895 million in the first three months to $1.18 billion, it made an operating loss of $743 million compared with a gain the previous quarter of $407 million, based on generally acceptable accounting principles.

The network is increasingly seeing people moving to mobile, which is causing worries over its ability to turn users into revenue, especially as advertising accounts for the bulk of its turnover. Mobile-only user numbers have increased 23% since March and now account for about a tenth of its monthly base.

The growing move to mobile is also affecting the group's ability to expand its payment business, which only grew 3.6% quarter-over-quarter, rising from $186 million in the first quarter to $192 million in the second three months.

Facebook is trying to diversify its revenue stream, through the launch of its new applications centre, and also sees mobile as a “huge” opportunity, but only time will tell whether these two ideas turn into money - a traditional problem with social media entities.

Facebook may not be in a world of trouble, and it could well escape the fate that has befallen other social media sites, but the lack of interest in its share price could be an omen of things to come.

Shares in the group fell sharply after its quarterly results signaled a slowdown in growth and it didn't provide an earnings forecast - a look at how executives feel the company will fare in the near future and a guideline for investors.

If it collapses, the 955 million people, who use it every month to store images, create timelines and reconnect, will all be “defriended”. So, the moral of the story - don't keep all your eggs in one basket. The technological age moves so fast that even DVD backups will become obsolete when the disc is done away with.

I don't want my kid to look back and have the same gaps in her memory that I do, just because I trusted a site to timeline it all, and it failed to be commercially viable.