Adapting Facebook to Monastic Life: Users, First Release and Success Metrics

You are a product manager at Meta. Design Facebook for monks: a version of Facebook, or a set of Facebook features, built for people who live a monastic life. Explain which users you would serve and why, the problems you would solve for them, what the first release would include, and how you would judge whether it works. ```hint Start from the rule of life Monastic communities deliberately limit time, speech, possessions and contact with the outside world, and the limits differ between traditions. Before adding features, ask which parts of today's Facebook would help a monastery and which would work against the way its monks have chosen to live. ``` ### Clarifying Questions - Is this a separate app, a mode inside Facebook, or new tools for the Pages and Groups that monasteries already run? - Which monks are in scope: a single tradition, such as Buddhist or Christian monastics, or every tradition and region? - What does Meta want from this product: reach and community in line with its mission, engagement, or revenue? Can it carry ads? - Are the people around a monastery (lay supporters, students, retreat guests, monks' families) users too, or only the monks themselves? ### What a Strong Answer Covers - Recognition that monastic values clash with engagement-driven design, and a product goal and definition of success adjusted to fit. - Segmentation across traditions, roles inside a monastery and the lay community around it, with a reasoned choice of focus. - Pain points specific to monastic life, and solutions that respect each community's rules on time, contact, money and who speaks for the monastery. - A prioritized first release with explicit trade-offs, such as a mode inside Facebook versus a separate app. - Success metrics that suit users who want less screen time, with guardrails for impersonation, privacy and conflicts with community rules. ### Follow-up Questions - Meta's business runs on attention and ads, and this product asks for less of both. How would you justify building it? - How would your design change between an enclosed contemplative community that keeps long periods of silence and a monastery whose monks teach lay visitors every week? - How would the product stop people from impersonating monks or monasteries to solicit donations?