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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 rainbo

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 9y 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 9y 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 9y 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 9y 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 9y 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.
  - sah2ed 9y ago
    For a lot of people, Facebook as addictive as watching TV so I don't think they'll be disappearing anytime soon. In fact this is how I think of them and their business interests; they are nothing more than merchants of human attention (like Google). After all, the bulk of their revenues comes directly from ads. VR may be toy-like tech for a lot of people today, but Zuckerberg is betting on it to be the next big frontier for computing similar to how they doubled-down on mobile with the emergence of touch screens heralded by the iPhone.
  - sbov 9y ago
    For a large portion of the population, Facebook IS the web. You say it adds no value. I say it adds a ton: Facebook is their Google. Without "a google" - something to make sense of this mess of trillions of pages, the web is damn useless. Google might be your Google, but Facebook is their Google, and becoming more people's Google every day. Sure, you can slot another company into Facebook. But you could do the same for Google too. Doesn't mean they're useless or scams.
    - usrusr 9y ago
      Most importantly, Facebook is the small town local web that never really happened anywhere. Or rather: that happened everywhere, but only exactly once, being outdated ever since, complete with mandatory "under construction" gifs and a forum where the last post is an advertisement for some polyphonic ringtone scam.
  - skinnymuch 9y ago
    You could make that argument for any web or tech company.
- throwaway91111 9y 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 9y 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.

askafriend 9y 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 9y 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 9y 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 9y 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 9y 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.
- sah2ed 9y ago
  For a lot of people, Facebook as addictive as watching TV so I don't think they'll be disappearing anytime soon. In fact this is how I think of them and their business interests; they are nothing more than merchants of human attention (like Google). After all, the bulk of their revenues comes directly from ads. VR may be toy-like tech for a lot of people today, but Zuckerberg is betting on it to be the next big frontier for computing similar to how they doubled-down on mobile with the emergence of touch screens heralded by the iPhone.
- sbov 9y ago
  For a large portion of the population, Facebook IS the web. You say it adds no value. I say it adds a ton: Facebook is their Google. Without "a google" - something to make sense of this mess of trillions of pages, the web is damn useless. Google might be your Google, but Facebook is their Google, and becoming more people's Google every day. Sure, you can slot another company into Facebook. But you could do the same for Google too. Doesn't mean they're useless or scams.
  - usrusr 9y ago
    Most importantly, Facebook is the small town local web that never really happened anywhere. Or rather: that happened everywhere, but only exactly once, being outdated ever since, complete with mandatory "under construction" gifs and a forum where the last post is an advertisement for some polyphonic ringtone scam.
- skinnymuch 9y ago
  You could make that argument for any web or tech company.
throwaway91111 9y 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 9y 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.