5 ms·

>Facebook has 18 percent increase year over year. They have ~2B users. That's nearly 2/3 of people on the planet with Internet connections, according to estima

by ac29 10y ago

>Facebook has 18 percent increase year over year. They have ~2B users. That's nearly 2/3 of people on the planet with Internet connections, according to estimates by the ITU (approx 3B internet users by the end of 2016) [0]. Even if I believed that user figure, which I dont, there is no way Facebook can grow at the same rate for much longer. [0] http://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Statistics/Documents/facts/ICTFactsFigures2016.pdf http://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Statistics/Documents/facts/ICTFa...

monkmartinez 10y ago
You and I both. Facebook numbers have been a scam for a long time. I look at most social media as I look at multilevel marketing... it's all sunshine and rainbows until it simply collapses. There are no 100 year businesses in social.
- askafriend 10y ago
  I think you're severely underestimating the scale and reach of Facebook. There's a reason it's a ~450B company. It really does have that many users. Even if a solid 20% of them are all fake accounts (which I don't think the percentage is that high), it's still a large part of the connected world. There's a reason Facebook is developing technology to bring the rest of the unconnected world online. It's because they know they'll reach a point where they'll have the whole connected market, and the only way forward is to grow the market to it's full potential. Don't let your hatred of the product or company blind your understanding of its scale and influence on the world (both positive and negative).
  - monkmartinez 10y ago
    It is not hate and you may well be right about the scale and reach of facebook right now. However, I think many people over-estimate the real utility of Facebook. That is, lives would not materially change for the better or worse if facebook fell off the face of the internet tomorrow, imo. Emotional reactions aside, Gajendra from Nepal and Tom from California would continue with life as they did before Facebook was available. The Yellow pages had a similar story not too long ago...
    - askafriend 10y ago
      I really do think that broad, sweeping statements like that can't be used so liberally for a product that billions of people use in so many different ways. The way we use Facebook here in America is not the same as the way people use Facebook in Thailand (in fact, it's extremely different). The way a college student uses Facebook is not the same as the way a mid 30s male uses Facebook. I'll give you one data point. When I was in college, we had a Facebook group for every single class and they were extremely valuable. We also used Facebook events heavily for various on-campus events. This too was extremely valuable. Now that I'm out of college, I have less affinity with those products from Facebook but I gravitate towards different parts of the site now. Either way, you can say that your life would not materially change for the better or worse if Facebook fell off the face of the internet tomorrow. That's a valid opinion to hold. But don't make the folly of generalizing a global product that is so incredibly pervasive in ways that we can't fully understand. I'm not saying that this reality is a good thing, nor am I saying it's a bad thing. However we can have better conversations about the effect Facebook has than "Facebook is useless", "Zuck is a spy", "I deleted my account, fuck FB", "All their metrics are fake", "Something something Myspace". Those simply aren't interesting statements anymore. They just aren't. They're tired and have been repeated year after year for more than a decade.
      - amoorthy 10y ago
        Agree and upvoted. That said, sweeping statements can be useful if they point to a trend. In mature markets, there does appear to be a segment that is turned off by FB and it's not clear if these are being replaced by newer users. If that pattern repeats in newer markets then as the user base ages it portends to trouble for FB.
      - poopsicle 10y ago
        I'm in my 30s and still in school plus other venues where Facebook is used "to get work done". Most of my family and in-laws are overseas (in different parts). I dispute your claims. I'm not convinced that fundamentally usage of Facebook is different in different parts of the world. The memes are different etc etc. But I don't see how it is a critical piece of infrastructure anywhere. I was in college when Facebook didn't exist and then it did - so I've experienced both realities. Somehow I lived. It's very useful now and students gravitate to it because it is pervasive and easy enough. Fine. But if it disappeared tomorrow.. life would go on pretty much as usual. People would find other ways to communicate. You bloviate but your comment is without any real substance or examples.. just hand wavy people do different things with it. Still doesn't change the fact that it is just another ad and meme delivery platform that happens to have some other useful features with less pervasive but usable substitutes. School events and class.. yeah be a bit of a pita for a bit.. but there other ways if it came to that.
  - throwaway91111 10y ago
    So, that valuation means that's the money that facebook will make over its lifetime. Where do you see those revenues coming from?
- skinnymuch 10y ago
  There's no 100 year business for the web period. It's only a few decades old. You can predict all you want about Google or Amazon, but you don't know where they'll be in 50 years.
tuna-piano 10y ago
I don't know anything about this overall, but I have some interesting anecdotes that show the power of Facebook around the world. I've done some pretty substantial traveling throughout Asia, and just about everyone with a smartphone that I've met also has a Facebook account (excluding China). In Myanmar (aka Burma) the strict military government restricted internet usage until they turned over control of the government last year. Most people are (within the last 12-24 months) using the internet for the first time! Most have never used a computer, and they only know the internet from an (Android) smartphone. However, every single person who I talked to there who had a smartphone had a Facebook. The one local I talked to most in depth about this had never used Google! He said he didn't know how to use Google, and he didn't think he needed it. I explained what Google can help with: searching for information, reading news, etc. He showed me that he read news and did searches for things all from within the Facebook app. I saw similar usage of Facebook in other developing Asian countries (Nepal, Thailand, Indonesia), where people used Facebook as a kind of substitute for a web browser / search engine. You and I would never think to use Facebook as our internet portal, but it seems to be a very sticky and powerful tool for many of those just coming online.
- cbhl 10y ago
  Facebook saw the "we're saturating the number of people on the Internet" wall years ago. That's why they zero-rate the app, and integrated SMS notifications and had J2ME and SIM apps.
  - tuna-piano 10y ago
    They also have a "free basics" program which partners with networks (I think primarily developing countries) and gives people access to Facebook with no network/bandwidth costs. Seems like a win-win? https://developers.facebook.com/docs/internet-org https://developers.facebook.com/docs/internet-org
    - nojvek 10y ago
      I envision that Facebook really wants to become the wechat of the world. From the lessons of Trump, if mark becomes the president I see him really pushing FB politically.
usrusr 10y ago
When Facebook can't grow anymore they will have proven retention, which relates to growth like learning to walk relates to learning to crawl.

by ac29 10y ago

monkmartinez 10y ago

You and I both. Facebook numbers have been a scam for a long time. I look at most social media as I look at multilevel marketing... it's all sunshine and rainbows until it simply collapses. There are no 100 year businesses in social.

askafriend 10y ago
I think you're severely underestimating the scale and reach of Facebook. There's a reason it's a ~450B company. It really does have that many users. Even if a solid 20% of them are all fake accounts (which I don't think the percentage is that high), it's still a large part of the connected world. There's a reason Facebook is developing technology to bring the rest of the unconnected world online. It's because they know they'll reach a point where they'll have the whole connected market, and the only way forward is to grow the market to it's full potential. Don't let your hatred of the product or company blind your understanding of its scale and influence on the world (both positive and negative).
- monkmartinez 10y ago
  It is not hate and you may well be right about the scale and reach of facebook right now. However, I think many people over-estimate the real utility of Facebook. That is, lives would not materially change for the better or worse if facebook fell off the face of the internet tomorrow, imo. Emotional reactions aside, Gajendra from Nepal and Tom from California would continue with life as they did before Facebook was available. The Yellow pages had a similar story not too long ago...
  - askafriend 10y ago
    I really do think that broad, sweeping statements like that can't be used so liberally for a product that billions of people use in so many different ways. The way we use Facebook here in America is not the same as the way people use Facebook in Thailand (in fact, it's extremely different). The way a college student uses Facebook is not the same as the way a mid 30s male uses Facebook. I'll give you one data point. When I was in college, we had a Facebook group for every single class and they were extremely valuable. We also used Facebook events heavily for various on-campus events. This too was extremely valuable. Now that I'm out of college, I have less affinity with those products from Facebook but I gravitate towards different parts of the site now. Either way, you can say that your life would not materially change for the better or worse if Facebook fell off the face of the internet tomorrow. That's a valid opinion to hold. But don't make the folly of generalizing a global product that is so incredibly pervasive in ways that we can't fully understand. I'm not saying that this reality is a good thing, nor am I saying it's a bad thing. However we can have better conversations about the effect Facebook has than "Facebook is useless", "Zuck is a spy", "I deleted my account, fuck FB", "All their metrics are fake", "Something something Myspace". Those simply aren't interesting statements anymore. They just aren't. They're tired and have been repeated year after year for more than a decade.
    - amoorthy 10y ago
      Agree and upvoted. That said, sweeping statements can be useful if they point to a trend. In mature markets, there does appear to be a segment that is turned off by FB and it's not clear if these are being replaced by newer users. If that pattern repeats in newer markets then as the user base ages it portends to trouble for FB.
    - poopsicle 10y ago
      I'm in my 30s and still in school plus other venues where Facebook is used "to get work done". Most of my family and in-laws are overseas (in different parts). I dispute your claims. I'm not convinced that fundamentally usage of Facebook is different in different parts of the world. The memes are different etc etc. But I don't see how it is a critical piece of infrastructure anywhere. I was in college when Facebook didn't exist and then it did - so I've experienced both realities. Somehow I lived. It's very useful now and students gravitate to it because it is pervasive and easy enough. Fine. But if it disappeared tomorrow.. life would go on pretty much as usual. People would find other ways to communicate. You bloviate but your comment is without any real substance or examples.. just hand wavy people do different things with it. Still doesn't change the fact that it is just another ad and meme delivery platform that happens to have some other useful features with less pervasive but usable substitutes. School events and class.. yeah be a bit of a pita for a bit.. but there other ways if it came to that.
- throwaway91111 10y ago
  So, that valuation means that's the money that facebook will make over its lifetime. Where do you see those revenues coming from?
skinnymuch 10y ago
There's no 100 year business for the web period. It's only a few decades old. You can predict all you want about Google or Amazon, but you don't know where they'll be in 50 years.

tuna-piano 10y ago

I don't know anything about this overall, but I have some interesting anecdotes that show the power of Facebook around the world. I've done some pretty substantial traveling throughout Asia, and just about everyone with a smartphone that I've met also has a Facebook account (excluding China). In Myanmar (aka Burma) the strict military government restricted internet usage until they turned over control of the government last year. Most people are (within the last 12-24 months) using the internet for the first time! Most have never used a computer, and they only know the internet from an (Android) smartphone. However, every single person who I talked to there who had a smartphone had a Facebook. The one local I talked to most in depth about this had never used Google! He said he didn't know how to use Google, and he didn't think he needed it. I explained what Google can help with: searching for information, reading news, etc. He showed me that he read news and did searches for things all from within the Facebook app. I saw similar usage of Facebook in other developing Asian countries (Nepal, Thailand, Indonesia), where people used Facebook as a kind of substitute for a web browser / search engine. You and I would never think to use Facebook as our internet portal, but it seems to be a very sticky and powerful tool for many of those just coming online.

cbhl 10y ago
Facebook saw the "we're saturating the number of people on the Internet" wall years ago. That's why they zero-rate the app, and integrated SMS notifications and had J2ME and SIM apps.
- tuna-piano 10y ago
  They also have a "free basics" program which partners with networks (I think primarily developing countries) and gives people access to Facebook with no network/bandwidth costs. Seems like a win-win? https://developers.facebook.com/docs/internet-org https://developers.facebook.com/docs/internet-org
  - nojvek 10y ago
    I envision that Facebook really wants to become the wechat of the world. From the lessons of Trump, if mark becomes the president I see him really pushing FB politically.

usrusr 10y ago

When Facebook can't grow anymore they will have proven retention, which relates to growth like learning to walk relates to learning to crawl.