Is Facebook dying? That’s what a London professor and anthropologist seems to believe, according to a recent article in the Australian publication, The Age. The professor, one Daniel Miller from the University College London, wrote an article claiming that Facebook’s decline was imminent, with younger users coming to see the social media network as something “uncool.”

Over the years, what began as a networking tool on an exclusive number of university campuses has expanded outward to include first all colleges, then high school students, then finally everyone else. On paper, Facebook is more powerful than ever: in May, Yahoo News reported that the social media website had 1.11 billion registered users and was still growing. That number was only at 500 million in the summer of 2010, and has likely grown considerably this year alone.

But while numbers are just fine, researchers like Professor Miller say that the cracks are showing elsewhere in Facebook’s facade. Miller doesn’t expect Facebook’s user base to drop off just yet: the site is still the most comprehensive social media network out there, allowing for relationship monitoring, photos, job title updates, messages, statuses, and more. In essence, Facebook conquered the social media world by going for sheer maximalism, and other successful social media sites have developed not by going bigger, but by focusing on one single component of the social media experience. For example, Twitter is all about statuses and stream of consciousness, while Instagram and Snapchat have focused largely on pictures – with the latter adding IM services into the mix.

In other words, Facebook is still going to be the default social media network, but Miller says that kids are going elsewhere to interact with their friends and are only keeping their Facebook profiles intact to stay in touch with family members and older friends. Many teenagers are cutting back their use of Facebook because the website is overrun with parents, teachers, and other adults. Newer and simpler social media apps, from Twitter to SnapChat to a popular new messaging tool called WhatsApp, are the way of the future for younger users.

Miller isn’t wrong. A recent research endeavor, called the Global Social Media Impact Study, monitored teenagers between the ages of 16 and 18 in their use of social media. The researchers were situated in eight countries and carried out their study for 15 months, finding that, across the board, Facebook use was in decline. Miller is exaggerating when he suggests that Facebook may be “dead and buried,” and it’s nearly unquestionable that the website will do just fine for years to come with its billion plus users. But it is likely that Facebook will never again be the ubiquitous force among young people that it was during the latter half of the 2000s.