Ello, good-bye. Stick to @Path or settle for Facebook.

Ello seems to have captured everyone’s attention with the promise of a better social network that addresses the challenges facing Facebook for many users. I don’t have access to Ello yet but based on what I can glean from the Ello site, it isn’t anything to get excited about. Here is an extract from my article on htxt titled “Is Ello the answer to Facebook privacy concerns, or is there another Path?“:

The hype around Ello reminds me of another social network that promised relief from Facebook’s unblinking gaze: Path. Like Ello, Path doesn’t use personal data to inform ads on its network. Path has no ads and, instead, relies on paid premium features to generate revenue to fund its operations. Unlike Ello, Path is private by design. If you are looking for a social network which is not being indexed by search engines and where you can share your personal stuff with a select group of friends with meaningful control over who can see your stuff, then Path is your better bet.

Ello isn’t really solving a problem that hasn’t been solved. Path is a far better bet for privacy conscious users. The real challenge isn’t finding an alternative to Facebook, it is persuading enough people to switch to the Facebook alternative to make the alternative a viable social network. Ello may be a far superior experience (I don’t have my invitation yet so I don’t have first-hand experience with Ello) but it will fail to gain enough traction to make a dent in Facebook’s userbase for one simple reason: everyone is using Facebook and it works well for them.

If anything, Ello inspires more faith in the Path vision:

The more I think about it, the more I realise that #Ello’s model highlights how much more thought @davemorin put into @Path’s privacy model.

— Paul Jacobson (@pauljacobson) October 2, 2014

Read the full article for more.