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Bought all the platforms people were going to jump to. The "Onvao Protect" traffic snooping VPN to identify what up and coming products people were using was o

Bought all the platforms people were going to jump to. The "Onvao Protect" traffic snooping VPN to identify what up and coming products people were using was one particularly shady part of this strategy.

mrkramer 6y ago
You didn't need any traffic snooping to notice millions of Instagram and WhatsApp users. Acquisitions were no brainer for Facebook.
- Shared404 6y ago
  > Acquisitions were no brainer for Facebook. And hindsight is 20/20.
  - dopamean 6y ago
    At least in the case of instagram you didnt need hindsight to know it was a good deal. Lots of people thought they price they paid was incredible value on the day it was announced. Plenty of ink has been spilled that year about facebook potentially being in trouble with mobile and instagram seemed at the time to be an obvious solution to the problem.
    - romanhn 6y ago
      That is not my recollection whatsoever. A quick read through the HN reactions that day (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3817840 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3817840) shows a mix of bewilderment and belief that this is a defensive play. Very few people actually opined that Instagram represented much actual value.
      - jyrkesh 6y ago
        Yeah, I admit completely that I thought they were massively overpaying for Instagram at the time. I also shared the highest OP's sentiment that I didn't think FB was a good investment for the same reason (that people would migrate from FB to the next thing as fast as folks moved off of MySpace). I was absolutely and utterly wrong on both accounts. Part of it was definitely wishful thinking, though, as I dislike FB by one or two orders of magnitude more than any other software company. But yes, I'd say their acquisitions were not completely obvious slam dunks. They also tried to be Snap, ofc, but my recollection is that Snap refused. Interestingly, folks have probably flip-flopped over the last few years in wondering whether that would've been good or bad for FB.
      - Calamity 6y ago
        Wow, thanks for providing that link. It really amazes me to see how much we don't even realize we attribute to hindsight.
  - jonplackett 6y ago
    So true - a lot of people (me included) thought a billion dollars for Instagram seemed insane at the time. But it was possibly the deal of the century.
- sulam 6y ago
  I would posit that you don't use that data to decide whether or not you should buy Instagram. You use that data to decide if you should clone Stories, build an events platform, etc. IOW, it's incredibly valuable to be able to see aggregate user behavior, which is why Amazon's ownership of so much of the commerce experience makes their introduction of competitive "Basics" so interesting/anti-competitive.
- JohnJamesRambo 6y ago
  And it was a no-brainer that it was something that should never have been allowed to happen due to antitrust regulations. T-mobile had to jump through hoops to buy decrepit Sprint but tech companies get to buy whoever and whatever they want that allows them to expand even outside their niche and where their niche is going.
- wlesieutre 6y ago
  I don't have any inside info here, but they could have gotten much more granular information than how many people were using Instagram and WhatsApp. For instance, daily time spent in using Instagram on a per-user basis, whether that use was associated with a drop in Facebook use, and how patterns in that relationship broke down across demographics. I didn't think they were no-brainer acquisitions at the time, but they've certainly turned out to be in hindsight. Was Facebook just smart or lucky, or did they have a lot more data than we did to judge those decisions?
nerevarthelame 6y ago
Funnily enough, the co-founder of Onavo (Guy Rosen) is now Facebook's "VP of Integrity," which probably speaks to FB's (lack of) commitment to integrity.
- WhompingWindows 6y ago
  Wow, thank you for the hearty laugh!

mrkramer 6y ago

You didn't need any traffic snooping to notice millions of Instagram and WhatsApp users. Acquisitions were no brainer for Facebook.

Shared404 6y ago
> Acquisitions were no brainer for Facebook. And hindsight is 20/20.
- dopamean 6y ago
  At least in the case of instagram you didnt need hindsight to know it was a good deal. Lots of people thought they price they paid was incredible value on the day it was announced. Plenty of ink has been spilled that year about facebook potentially being in trouble with mobile and instagram seemed at the time to be an obvious solution to the problem.
  - romanhn 6y ago
    That is not my recollection whatsoever. A quick read through the HN reactions that day (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3817840 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3817840) shows a mix of bewilderment and belief that this is a defensive play. Very few people actually opined that Instagram represented much actual value.
    - jyrkesh 6y ago
      Yeah, I admit completely that I thought they were massively overpaying for Instagram at the time. I also shared the highest OP's sentiment that I didn't think FB was a good investment for the same reason (that people would migrate from FB to the next thing as fast as folks moved off of MySpace). I was absolutely and utterly wrong on both accounts. Part of it was definitely wishful thinking, though, as I dislike FB by one or two orders of magnitude more than any other software company. But yes, I'd say their acquisitions were not completely obvious slam dunks. They also tried to be Snap, ofc, but my recollection is that Snap refused. Interestingly, folks have probably flip-flopped over the last few years in wondering whether that would've been good or bad for FB.
    - Calamity 6y ago
      Wow, thanks for providing that link. It really amazes me to see how much we don't even realize we attribute to hindsight.
- jonplackett 6y ago
  So true - a lot of people (me included) thought a billion dollars for Instagram seemed insane at the time. But it was possibly the deal of the century.
sulam 6y ago
I would posit that you don't use that data to decide whether or not you should buy Instagram. You use that data to decide if you should clone Stories, build an events platform, etc. IOW, it's incredibly valuable to be able to see aggregate user behavior, which is why Amazon's ownership of so much of the commerce experience makes their introduction of competitive "Basics" so interesting/anti-competitive.
JohnJamesRambo 6y ago
And it was a no-brainer that it was something that should never have been allowed to happen due to antitrust regulations. T-mobile had to jump through hoops to buy decrepit Sprint but tech companies get to buy whoever and whatever they want that allows them to expand even outside their niche and where their niche is going.
wlesieutre 6y ago
I don't have any inside info here, but they could have gotten much more granular information than how many people were using Instagram and WhatsApp. For instance, daily time spent in using Instagram on a per-user basis, whether that use was associated with a drop in Facebook use, and how patterns in that relationship broke down across demographics. I didn't think they were no-brainer acquisitions at the time, but they've certainly turned out to be in hindsight. Was Facebook just smart or lucky, or did they have a lot more data than we did to judge those decisions?

nerevarthelame 6y ago

Funnily enough, the co-founder of Onavo (Guy Rosen) is now Facebook's "VP of Integrity," which probably speaks to FB's (lack of) commitment to integrity.

WhompingWindows 6y ago
Wow, thank you for the hearty laugh!