In March, a group of researchers inside Facebook Inc compiled a report for one of the company’s most powerful executives, chief product officer Chris Cox. The paper included a series of charts and data highlighting a troubling trend that seemed to be accelerating: Facebook was losing popularity with teens and young adults.
One colourful graphic showed that “time spent” for US teenagers on Facebook was down 16% year-over-year, and that young adults in the US were also spending 5% less time on the social network. The number of new teen signups was declining, and perhaps most concerning was a series of slides showing that young people were taking much longer to join Facebook than they had in the past.