Over the last decade, few platforms have declined quite as rapidly and visibly as Facebook and Instagram. What used to be apps for catching up with your friends and family are now algorithmic nightmares that constantly interrupt you with suggested content and advertisements that consistently outweigh the content of people that you choose to follow.

Conversely, those running Facebook groups routinely find that their content isn’t even being shown to those who choose to follow them thanks to Meta’s outright abusive approach to social media where the customer is not only wrong, but should ideally have little control over what they see.

Over the next two newsletters, I’m going to walk you through the decline of Facebook and Instagram, starting with the events that led to its decay and those I believe are responsible for turning the world’s most popular consumer apps into skinner boxes for advertising agencies.