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Zuckerberg struggles to name a single Facebook competitor
- tannranger 9y agoGoogle+? duh
- neo4sure 9y agoSocial networks are baked in. What more can you invent? Unless another major technology is invented Facebook is here to stay...
- jeffchuber 9y agoThis article has 0 insight. This was the most strategic answer. - A: facebook does a lot of things and it's true it competes across many categories - B: Admitting competition is bad for wall street, legitimizes them, and turns the narrative into whether that is true or not (you don't want that to happen either) - C: The senator was obviously trying to bait Mark into saying that they have no competition... why? Easy anti-trust/regulation. He avoided that as well. Mark took the most strategic path. Sure - it could have been delivered better.
- tdewitt 9y agoI've been listening. His attempted answer was reasonable. Facebook doesn't have a single competitor because they don't have just a single product. Name the "biggest" competitors for Siemens or SAP or Google or Microsoft or Honeywell. They're companies of companies and each unit may have a single biggest competitor but asking for just one feels intentionally misleading. Disclaimer: I hate Facebook and twitter and Pinterest and Snapchat and whatever the hell else and have no personal investment in this whatsoever. I'm listing purely for the entertainment value of watching zuck squirm.
- tabeth 9y agoI fail to see what's misleading about asking for a competitor to Facebook. Microsoft's competitors are Apple on the hardware and software front, Google on the search engine front, Atlassian on productivity tools front, GitHub on the repository/code storage front, AWS on the cloud storage front, etc. I assume Microsoft's core solutions are their OS, their productivity tools and cloud. Google's competitors are Yahoo, Bing and Duckduckgo on the search front. Garmin, TomTom and others on the map front, etc. And perhaps everyone on the email front. Here I assume Google's core tools are search, email, and maps. Facebook's competitors are... Instag- oh right. Uh, Snapchat, I guess?
- function_seven 9y agoSnapchat and Twitter on the social media front. Google on the ads front. Telegram and Apple (iMessage) on the IM front. (Not sure this one really counts, though. Is IM a "front"?)
- tabeth 9y agoI agree that Google is competitor, but I'm not talking in terms of monetization spaces, I'm referring more to the core solution. In fact I'd amend my statement and say Snapchat isn't really a competitor, either. Facebook is basically a rolodex with messaging and storage built in. I don't see anything like it.
- crowbahr 9y agoInasmuch as IM is monetized I think it's a front. It's another aspect or facet of social media and we're already making the distinction between microblogging (Twitter Vs Facebook) and photo sharing (snapchat Vs Insta) so I don't see why not?
- dmoy 9y agoWhat's misleading is that the senator kept insisting on a single competitor, not N competitors. The answers you gave for MS / Google would have gotten the same kind of interruption from the senator.
- basch 9y agodumb. they didnt let him answer the question. he asked for clarification. were they asking about tech companies, messaging companies, or something else (advertising companies and publishers? they never got to the other categories) BUT had they been able to ask a clear question, they could have gotten to the point that he doesnt have many messaging competitors (wechat/snapchat/google/skype.) more importantly they could have gone a more standard protocol/decentralization approach and asked him about going back towards intra-messenger inoperability. should facebook messenger be able to talk to skype and hangouts? ALL email providers talk to each other (within reason) and if i leave gmail i can go somewhere else and CHOOSE not to email other people with gmail. this question should have been about anticompetitive acquisitions and closed/open platforms.
- sjg007 9y agoMaybe an inquisitive Congressional staffer reads HackerNews and can get their boss to ask the question tomorrow.
- thaumasiotes 9y agoWhy? If the boss wanted information, they could get it the normal way. The point of calling someone to testify before Congress is to embarrass that person, and that point is generally not well served by asking sensible questions.
- sjg007 9y agoIs it? I think the point is to get more information, to ask questions that have not been asked and decide if the government needs to take further action. They do this by introducing legislation. I think the electioneering has them spooked as well.
- drivingmenuts 9y agoThe point of most Congressional hearings is to make it appear that Congress is interested and involved in solving a problem. It's theatre. Yes, there may be genuine concern and a desire to get something done, but that isn't going to happen in front of the cameras - it's going to happen in committee meetings and discussions. What happened today was the political equivalent of WWE and just about as useful.
- battalgazi 9y agoHe probably didn't want to promote Google Plus, VKontakte, Diaspora and others by mentioning their names.
- newsbinator 9y agoI wonder if he's heard of Diaspora?
- anaxag0ras 9y agoOf course he knows. He once even donated it. https://www.wired.com/2010/05/zuckerberg-interview/ https://www.wired.com/2010/05/zuckerberg-interview/
- oconnor663 9y agoIt's a weird question. If you're posting photos on FB, then Flikr/Yahoo is a competitor. If you're messaging people, then Google is a competitor (in 9 different partially overlapping ways :p). But saying "Google is Facebook's biggest competitor" is weird, cause FB doesn't have a search engine.
- sjg007 9y agoTheir product is ads... so you would define competitors as anyone that takes away marketshare in advertising.
- oconnor663 9y agoFacebook's arch nemesis: turning off your computer and going outside :)
- eesmith 9y agoYou joke, but Coca-Cola's biggest competitor is water. Any guesses on who sells bottled tap water for a huge markup, and who is part of the marketing effort to convince us to buy bottled water? (Blame is not solely on C-C of course. Look to the Spectrum Stadium as an example of what happens when water is seen as a profit center, not a basic necessity.)
- ElCapitanMarkla 9y agoWhat's the correct answer here? I get where the senator is going with his questions but there are plenty of alternatives out there, just no one wants to use them. To quote the senator - "If I buy a Ford, and it doesn’t work well, and I don’t like it, I can buy a Chevy." but to put that into perspective here - "If I buy a Ford, and it doesn’t work well, and I don’t like it, I can buy a skateboard with two wheels."
- payne92 9y agoFacebook's biggest competitor is the US government. I'm not being flippant.
- c-smile 9y agoHe should answer: vk.ru / vk.com :) ( as that's really functional equivalent of fb ) And to amplify the impression to mention "Putin" somewhere. That might stop all further questions to Mark. Or even start procedure of canonization [1] of fb.com in general and Mark in particular by Congress. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonization
- newsbinator 9y agoFunctionally and visually... down to the color scheme, logo, etc. Although the music integration is better.
- lostlogin 9y agoAt first I thought you were meaning the church and Facebook, then I looked at vk.com and now I can’t tell.
- newsbinator 9y agoOops, not sure if GP edited their post about church, or if I missed it. I meant VK.com is visually and functionally similar to Facebook (because it started as a clone). Now if you live in a Russian-speaking country, it's unusual not to have a VK account.
- spullara 9y agoI wonder why he didn't say Google? They compete for online ad dollars and that is clearly his biggest competitor.
- spullara 9y agoI wonder if he was worried about the follow up question: Senator: "But that is just for advertising. What about competitors for your customers that use the social networking product?" Zuckerberg: "Oh them. They aren't our customers, they are the product."
- sjg007 9y agoWe can't be a monopoly because we compete with everyone.
- csours 9y agoA better analogy would be to road networks, not car companies. If you don't want to use roadways, what is the alternative? Flying? Railroads? Boats? Other roadways?
- DimitarIbra9 9y agorenren.com wechat
- birthcert 9y agoFacebook has effectively a monopoly on social networking. Even further: Facebook can be seen as an essential service for maintaining your social life. Not using it puts you at a severe disadvantage. I don't think monopolies are necessarily a problem that needs fixing, but call it what it is. Facebook makes decisions based on their understanding of dominance. If you don't like Ford, you can buy a car that you can't drive on most public roads and even fewer gas stations offer you the type of gas you need.
- qume 9y agoI dont use it and I see that as a severe advantage.
- birthcert 9y agoI never had an account, and due to this, lost out on many social gatherings (exclusive Facebook) and lost the ability to stay in touch with old friends or get all updates on my family (parents mostly). The good outweighs the bad for me, but it hurts nonetheless. If you fare better, all the more power to you, but do note: out of sight, out of mind. You may not fully realize what you are giving up by not having a digital social network, from not being able to use Tinder, to more serious stuff, like not knowing a childhood friend has died. Not being on social media is the equivalent of not having a mobile phone 10 years back. The "essential"-part of Facebook (and other companies, like Google) actually plays a role in European directives. It is why Google has to clean its index on request, and a small niche search engine does not have this responsibility.
- StudentStuff 9y agoI have an account, but I ceased using it 5 years ago. My "friends" were essentially all people I had met in highschool and rarely talked to, and upon a recent visit (over Tor of course) I was wholly unimpressed with my news feed. The only benefit was reconnecting with a former exchange student we had hosted, luckily she already had Signal! Besides that, my feed was just tales of woe from people I used to have a coincidental connection to. Perhaps I'm an oddball, but my SO is banned from Facebook (real name policy), parents consider Facebook to be spyware, and extended family has held it in poor regard (not of my doing surprisingly) for a decade thus far. Getting lots of pressure to join a Mastodon server though, seems the extended family is all on that. Not what I'd expect from a bunch of mid-westerners!
- camgunz 9y agoIt was really more like: > LG: Are there any other social platforms that reasonably compete with Facebook? > MZ: Don't really want to say no because that's clearly a monopoly, but don't really want to cop to our core business being a data farm and not a social network, so... here is some convoluted non-answer. > LG: Didn't expect that to be a stumper....
- 40acres 9y agoThis reminds me of a point well made in Peter Thiel's 'Zero to One'. Monopolies make it seem like they have a lot of competitors to avoid anti-trust and companies that are in a dog fight like to make it seem like they are monopolies in a niche area.
- staunch 9y agoOnly a group of politicians could make Zuckerberg look like the human one. These senators are a disgrace. Their questions and statements are ignorant, intellectual dishonest, and bullying. They're mostly shitty people. We do not need these ignoramuses making decisions about social networking technology. They're as clueless as it gets. We just need users to become aware of the value of data privacy and then demand it. Technology will deliver. I'm not worried because I think users will support the right things in the end.
- notfromhere 9y agoThe best description of MZ i've ever read was "a wax doll cursed into life"
- user5994461 9y agoInstagram. The answer is Instagram! Go to a high school and you'll notice that young people are more on Instagram than Facebook.
- dnob 9y agoFacebook owns Instagram.
- thejerz 9y agoThe answer is: Twitter. Similarities are... - Social media platform (you are the content). - Advertisers pay for eyeballs. - Hashtags and groups collect similar users. - Privacy settings control who sees your content. - Text, pictures, videos, & polls. - People leave Facebook for Twitter, & vice versa. I'm not sure why he didn't just say "Twitter". In some very abstract way, Facebook overlaps with Apple. But that wasn't the question. The spirit of Lindsey Graham's question was to determine if consumers have a choice, and the answer is yes, they do: Twitter.
- dfxm12 9y agoThe spirit of Lindsey Graham's question was to determine if consumers have a choice While this may or may not be true, part of Graham's job here is to make sure that the meaning of his questions can be ascertained by the actual wording of the question with no interpretation required, unless he's intentionally trying to confuse Zuck or get him to misspeak. If Graham wants to determine if consumers have a choice, he should ask consumers if they have a choice. I'm sure the fine folks of South Carolina would be glad to help him out with that one. That would get him a more accurate answer than asking Zuck's opinion on the matter.
- fuzzieozzie 9y agoYou define a business based on customers and costs: 1. Facebook's customers are advertisers. 2. Facebook's costs are for IT systems development, infrastructure and operations. As such it competes with other advertisers: e.g. Google, TV broadcasters, et.c. The fact that it does this using a "social network" has nothing to do with the question!
- eesmith 9y agoAnti-monopoly has a different set of criteria to determine the relevant market, where a company with market power might be able to abuse that power. The three points listed at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relevant_market https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relevant_market are 1) demand-side substitution, 2) supply-side substitution, and 3) potential competition. If FB were to change its fees or policies, can 5%-10% of the advertisers who are currently using FB switch to Google, TV broadcasters, etc. to get a roughly equivalent service? If not, that would suggest FB is also in a more specific market than 'advertising', and has market power in that market.
- havetocharge 9y agoSurprised to see no one mention LinkedIn. On LinkedIn it's popular to comment on objectionable content with "This is not Facebook".