‘Early-adopters’, people like me who are compelled to sign up to every new web service that comes along, are annoyed.  Why, we wonder, isn’t mainstream society jumping on the latest Social Media tools like Twitter and FriendFeed and using them as voraciously as us?

Every time I use Google Reader to share an interesting story with someone I hope that they’ll look into what the service is, see its value and sign up.  They don’t.  Every time I mention an interesting discussion I had on Twitter I expect my friends will sign up the next time they’re at a computer.  They don’t.   My dad reads my FriendFeed page as it’s an easy way to catch up with what I’m doing, but he doesn’t participate.

As Louis Gray says today, Just Wishing for Something to Go Mainstream Won’t Make It So.  It seems that word of mouth doesn’t work either, or people I know would have signed up to one of these services on my recommendation.  I got one person onto Twitter, but he’s a web developer so hardly ‘mainstream’. 

So, why aren’t these services hitting mainstream use when their users can see the potential and are singing their praises to anyone who’ll listen?  The answer is just one word: Facebook.  Everyone I know between the ages of 18 and 40 has a Facebook page and an increasing number of people older than that are signing up too.

If they can talk to their friends, post photos and pester each other with viral apps on Facebook, why would mainstream users want to go elsewhere?  Every time my girlfriend logs into Facebook I want to say “Get a Twitter account! Sign up to FriendFeed!”.  Her friends are all on Facebook though, so there’s no need to for her to go anywhere else.

Now though, we have ‘new Facebook’.  Yes, the new Facebook design rolled out to all users a couple of weeks ago and the response from many users was clear – they hated it.  People get used to change, though.  They see the value in Facebook so they’ll stick with it.  Over time they’ll get to know and love the best feature of the new design – the improved news feed.

Being updated on everything your friends do on Facebook, being able to import external feeds and being able to comment on everything from right within the feed makes Facebook into the only lifestreaming utility most people will ever need.  While FriendFeed may be far more feature-rich, it lacks the social element that Facebook has at its core.  I may enjoy following interesting people from around the world and catching the latest news and memes each time the screen refreshes, but most people only care about their real social circle – people they know.

Part of me hopes that, as people see the value of lifestreaming, they’ll look for something better and adopt the same tools I like to use.  Deep down though, I know that as great as Twitter, FriendFeed and their ilk are they may never hit mainstream.  Love it or hate it, Facebook already fills most people’s online social needs.