Facebook is infrastructure. It provides the connections out to your personal network. Facebook's staying power comes from its ability to say "This is the best way to communicate with your personal network at any time". "File hosting" is just one subelement of that, because one of the things that you may want to share is a file.
Couldn't the whole internet be generalized as "file hosting with a bunch of links"? A "file host" is a company whose primary purpose is for you to upload a file and give the link to someone else; they're a middleman that exists only because a more convenient/direct means of distribution to the intended network isn't available. This does not make the company nearly loud enough to establish its own identity/user base.
Facebook has always been its own repository of people intelligence. It was never just an "upload your photos here". Such platforms, like Photobucket or Imgur, sometimes prosper for a while, until the communication channels that reach the intended audience directly offer something easier. (imgur is going down now as reddit introduced its own image host last year)
Couldn't the whole internet be generalized as "file hosting with a bunch of links"? A "file host" is a company whose primary purpose is for you to upload a file and give the link to someone else; they're a middleman that exists only because a more convenient/direct means of distribution to the intended network isn't available. This does not make the company nearly loud enough to establish its own identity/user base.
Facebook has always been its own repository of people intelligence. It was never just an "upload your photos here". Such platforms, like Photobucket or Imgur, sometimes prosper for a while, until the communication channels that reach the intended audience directly offer something easier. (imgur is going down now as reddit introduced its own image host last year)