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> I figured that if Mark Zuckerberg decided it's worth pivoting his entire company towards that goal, he surely must have some data to back that up. I am quite

> I figured that if Mark Zuckerberg decided it's worth pivoting his entire company towards that goal, he surely must have some data to back that up. I am quite sure he had the data that growth with Facebook, Insta, etc. was limited and threatened by TikTok and others. The Meta stuff was an attempt to break out of that I to a different space, where they could be the early mover. And then being blinded by own fascination for the space. I think many share the assumption that Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook never really understood what users actually want and had luck their platform matched the spirit for some time.

Waterluvian 4y ago
I wonder how brands like Nike manage to stay “cool” for generations but basically every social tech brand has a shelf life.
- ModernMech 4y ago
  Nike makes shoes and other sports related stuff. If you don't want Nike, don't buy Nike. FAANG on the other hand aspires to infect every single facet of my life, and they have some glib self-serving narrative about how not only are they right to do so, they have the moral imperative. And so what do they do? They track every single aspect of my life that they can, the invade my privacy, they leak my data, they bilk me for cash at every opportunity. Dark patterns, bad UI, run arounds on the phone, locking out of accounts. I'm sorry but this entire industry is completely fucked, and it's only getting worse. As someone who has been in tech since the 80s, the scene is done. It's been overrun by vultures, bankers, and billionaires with more money than ethics, and they think you are just an NPC in their world, where they are celebrities, kings, and gods. That is why social tech brands have a shelf life, because none of them can resist the dark side. Nike has a dark side, but at least when I take them off my shoes aren't trying to take over my life.
- NickC25 4y ago
  I think one of the reasons is that as others have said - they know their lane and stick to it - sports apparel. Nike doesn't try to take over all your interactions, doesn't try to own your life and doesn't grow beyond its domain. Shit, even within its own domain, it's failed with some projects long-term (Nike Golf clubs come to mind). They stay relevant by signing young upcoming athletes, some of whom go on to become known worldwide in sports that are popular worldwide like Soccer, Basketball, and Tennis. Nike does not have a platform, and in a roundabout way also benefits from their competition doing well (the more people that are active, the larger the potential customer base is). FB/Meta does not have that luxury - to them, if you're not on their platform, you're useless. Nike does not have that problem. Nike wants to own the experience when you're doing something athletic or casually physical (walking around). There's a limit to that as even pro athletes aren't physically active all the time. Since so much of our lives have a technology component to it, Meta wants to own that whole ecosystem , which is much more ambitious than anything Nike ever tried or will try.
- PeterisP 4y ago
  One aspect is that brands like can "rotate" their product and sell new stuff to a new generation, but social tech is stuck because (if it's good) it keeps the existing users, which inherently makes it uncool for new users. The social tech that your parents use can't be cool, by definition, no matter how good it is, the fact that your parents (and grandparents!) generation is already there is a big drawback to coolness. But social tech companies are reluctant (for obvious practical reasons) to periodically create new generations of social networks to capture a new generation of users by intentionally providing them "not your parents' social network".
- luckylion 4y ago
  They are tools you can use to signal status because they are expensive. You can't do that with Facebook etc. Social media is ultimately not selling status though, they make money by reaching as many people as possible and you have to lower the entry fee to achieve that.
  - Waterluvian 4y ago
    That makes sense. And a business whose only moat is, "we have the most people" will always be a fleeting one.
- johannes1234321 4y ago
  Many fashion brands come and go, only few stick. Some go through deep valleys of pain in between. Fashion brands use marketing, in the sports market to sponsoring. For Nike the relationship to Michael Jordan for instance certainly was a major driver. For Adidas Kanye West became a major pain. Social Media platforms try the same. They try to get famous people on their platform. Instagram seems to do quite well in that space (I don't have an account there) while Twitter on the one side and TikTok, YouTube and Twitch on the other try to get people on their platforms. But then it's different: In sports sponsorship you can focus on one side of the person, their atheltic skills. On social media they eventually shout out their views on things, which might upset people and damage reputation. Of both, the person and the platform.
  - jollofricepeas 4y ago
    Fashion brands remain relevant by leveraging scarcity and tightly controlling supply. They also cycle their top talent. Facebook does neither of these. If LVMH were to design social networks, they’d look nothing like what Facebook has developed and more like members only clubs with glass windows.
- hoseja 4y ago
  Nike sells product you can buy and there is a limit to how good a shoe you can make that we've been exploring for the past couple millennia. Socials need to find worse and worse ways to advertise so line can go up and there are new paradigm-shifting features invented all the time.
bluepizza 4y ago
Staying ahead in this game by pivoting to metaverse was very silly. Even if there is no growth in Facebook/Instagram/WhatsApp, it could remain a stable cash cow for years. Not to mention that Facebook was a perfectly fine and popular social networking platform until Facebook itself poisoned it with the engagement algos that put politics and fake news on top, and drove people away. All of Meta's current issues were self inflicted.
- idrios 4y ago
  Sure it would remain a cash cow if Meta decided never to take another risk again, but Zuck was trying to avoid Facebook becoming the next Oracle or IBM -- companies with consistent revenue but thay have lost their ability to innovate. I also don't think the metaverse was doomed to fail from the start -- still not sure if it's doomed now. Based on John Carmack's resignation & letter about how hard it was to get anything done, it sounds like there are some serious cultural or bureaucratic issues getting in the way of progress though
  - danaris 4y ago
    > Zuck was trying to avoid Facebook becoming the next Oracle or IBM -- companies with consistent revenue but thay have lost their ability to innovate. Such sad tales, companies that only make billions of dollars a quarter, with a solid chance of continuing to do so for the rest of our lives... This obsession with growth is deeply unhealthy. "Innovation" can be great, and we certainly need it happening somewhere, but the idea that it's something that any given company needs to be doing or it will die is preposterous, particularly when applied to an established industry giant like Facebook.
  - ModernMech 4y ago
    > Sure it would remain a cash cow if Meta decided never to take another risk again, but Zuck was trying to avoid Facebook becoming the next Oracle or IBM -- companies with consistent revenue but thay have lost their ability to innovate. At some point, I think society is going to have to admit that companies have a lifecycle, and that sometimes a company should die, maybe long before it runs out of money. If the only outcomes are "grow forever" and "become IBM", then I think we should prefer the IBM route, because at least that provides value. Leave the innovation to smaller companies and allow them to thrive or die on their merits. This whole thing where fossils long past their innovative prime are able to control the entire industry, through boondoggles that are kept afloat indefinitely through trillion dollar cash reserves, rent seeking activities, and strategic acquisitions, is just not good for anyone except the people who are able to exit. You want innovation, get FAANG out of the way.
klik99 4y ago
Exactly this - it's a real startup move, done by a company that probably shouldn't be doing startup pivots at this stage. I think he got the thrust right - Facebook will continue losing share if they continue the 90s MS buy all your competitors strategy which it is obvious at this stage wasn't working for them, and Meta was an attempt to get ahead again rather than just try to scoop up from behind. This approach will necessarily be built on some kind of intuition rather than data, but should have been a well funded skunkworks project instead of gambling many peoples livelihood on something that will take a while to pay off. I'm probably one of the few that thinks the pivot overall isn't a bad idea, but it was just done in such an irresponsible way and they're paying the price now. We've seen this many times (notably Uber, WeWork, Google, and arguably Apple until Jobs returned from his exile with a new skillset), but the best person to start a company is often not the best to run it when it's established. But Mark has been so good at keeping equity and control that Facebook will fail unless he learns how to adapt. It usually takes a real low point for people to get out of established mindsets. Just putting this out there so I can point to this in 10 years: If I were to predict the future, I'd say Facebook stock plummets and everyone writes it off, and Mark wises up, bringing it back much stronger. I don't particularly like him, but I think he's got it in him.
- johannes1234321 4y ago
  The "buy all your competitors strategy" couldn't work. After acquiring wahtsapp and Instagram and all the political games around Facebook there was too much regulatory, anti-cometition, ... attention on them for them to strike any serious deal. While my impression regarding Metaverse was that Mark Zuckerberg was purposely imprecise on what exactly Metaverse was, hoping to find a company they can acquire, which then in a retcon made that exactly what the vision ever was.
  - kevinventullo 4y ago
    Not to mention that TikTok wasn’t selling.

Waterluvian 4y ago

I wonder how brands like Nike manage to stay “cool” for generations but basically every social tech brand has a shelf life.

ModernMech 4y ago
Nike makes shoes and other sports related stuff. If you don't want Nike, don't buy Nike. FAANG on the other hand aspires to infect every single facet of my life, and they have some glib self-serving narrative about how not only are they right to do so, they have the moral imperative. And so what do they do? They track every single aspect of my life that they can, the invade my privacy, they leak my data, they bilk me for cash at every opportunity. Dark patterns, bad UI, run arounds on the phone, locking out of accounts. I'm sorry but this entire industry is completely fucked, and it's only getting worse. As someone who has been in tech since the 80s, the scene is done. It's been overrun by vultures, bankers, and billionaires with more money than ethics, and they think you are just an NPC in their world, where they are celebrities, kings, and gods. That is why social tech brands have a shelf life, because none of them can resist the dark side. Nike has a dark side, but at least when I take them off my shoes aren't trying to take over my life.
NickC25 4y ago
I think one of the reasons is that as others have said - they know their lane and stick to it - sports apparel. Nike doesn't try to take over all your interactions, doesn't try to own your life and doesn't grow beyond its domain. Shit, even within its own domain, it's failed with some projects long-term (Nike Golf clubs come to mind). They stay relevant by signing young upcoming athletes, some of whom go on to become known worldwide in sports that are popular worldwide like Soccer, Basketball, and Tennis. Nike does not have a platform, and in a roundabout way also benefits from their competition doing well (the more people that are active, the larger the potential customer base is). FB/Meta does not have that luxury - to them, if you're not on their platform, you're useless. Nike does not have that problem. Nike wants to own the experience when you're doing something athletic or casually physical (walking around). There's a limit to that as even pro athletes aren't physically active all the time. Since so much of our lives have a technology component to it, Meta wants to own that whole ecosystem , which is much more ambitious than anything Nike ever tried or will try.
PeterisP 4y ago
One aspect is that brands like can "rotate" their product and sell new stuff to a new generation, but social tech is stuck because (if it's good) it keeps the existing users, which inherently makes it uncool for new users. The social tech that your parents use can't be cool, by definition, no matter how good it is, the fact that your parents (and grandparents!) generation is already there is a big drawback to coolness. But social tech companies are reluctant (for obvious practical reasons) to periodically create new generations of social networks to capture a new generation of users by intentionally providing them "not your parents' social network".
luckylion 4y ago
They are tools you can use to signal status because they are expensive. You can't do that with Facebook etc. Social media is ultimately not selling status though, they make money by reaching as many people as possible and you have to lower the entry fee to achieve that.
- Waterluvian 4y ago
  That makes sense. And a business whose only moat is, "we have the most people" will always be a fleeting one.
johannes1234321 4y ago
Many fashion brands come and go, only few stick. Some go through deep valleys of pain in between. Fashion brands use marketing, in the sports market to sponsoring. For Nike the relationship to Michael Jordan for instance certainly was a major driver. For Adidas Kanye West became a major pain. Social Media platforms try the same. They try to get famous people on their platform. Instagram seems to do quite well in that space (I don't have an account there) while Twitter on the one side and TikTok, YouTube and Twitch on the other try to get people on their platforms. But then it's different: In sports sponsorship you can focus on one side of the person, their atheltic skills. On social media they eventually shout out their views on things, which might upset people and damage reputation. Of both, the person and the platform.
- jollofricepeas 4y ago
  Fashion brands remain relevant by leveraging scarcity and tightly controlling supply. They also cycle their top talent. Facebook does neither of these. If LVMH were to design social networks, they’d look nothing like what Facebook has developed and more like members only clubs with glass windows.
hoseja 4y ago
Nike sells product you can buy and there is a limit to how good a shoe you can make that we've been exploring for the past couple millennia. Socials need to find worse and worse ways to advertise so line can go up and there are new paradigm-shifting features invented all the time.

bluepizza 4y ago

Staying ahead in this game by pivoting to metaverse was very silly. Even if there is no growth in Facebook/Instagram/WhatsApp, it could remain a stable cash cow for years. Not to mention that Facebook was a perfectly fine and popular social networking platform until Facebook itself poisoned it with the engagement algos that put politics and fake news on top, and drove people away. All of Meta's current issues were self inflicted.

idrios 4y ago
Sure it would remain a cash cow if Meta decided never to take another risk again, but Zuck was trying to avoid Facebook becoming the next Oracle or IBM -- companies with consistent revenue but thay have lost their ability to innovate. I also don't think the metaverse was doomed to fail from the start -- still not sure if it's doomed now. Based on John Carmack's resignation & letter about how hard it was to get anything done, it sounds like there are some serious cultural or bureaucratic issues getting in the way of progress though
- danaris 4y ago
  > Zuck was trying to avoid Facebook becoming the next Oracle or IBM -- companies with consistent revenue but thay have lost their ability to innovate. Such sad tales, companies that only make billions of dollars a quarter, with a solid chance of continuing to do so for the rest of our lives... This obsession with growth is deeply unhealthy. "Innovation" can be great, and we certainly need it happening somewhere, but the idea that it's something that any given company needs to be doing or it will die is preposterous, particularly when applied to an established industry giant like Facebook.
- ModernMech 4y ago
  > Sure it would remain a cash cow if Meta decided never to take another risk again, but Zuck was trying to avoid Facebook becoming the next Oracle or IBM -- companies with consistent revenue but thay have lost their ability to innovate. At some point, I think society is going to have to admit that companies have a lifecycle, and that sometimes a company should die, maybe long before it runs out of money. If the only outcomes are "grow forever" and "become IBM", then I think we should prefer the IBM route, because at least that provides value. Leave the innovation to smaller companies and allow them to thrive or die on their merits. This whole thing where fossils long past their innovative prime are able to control the entire industry, through boondoggles that are kept afloat indefinitely through trillion dollar cash reserves, rent seeking activities, and strategic acquisitions, is just not good for anyone except the people who are able to exit. You want innovation, get FAANG out of the way.

klik99 4y ago

Exactly this - it's a real startup move, done by a company that probably shouldn't be doing startup pivots at this stage. I think he got the thrust right - Facebook will continue losing share if they continue the 90s MS buy all your competitors strategy which it is obvious at this stage wasn't working for them, and Meta was an attempt to get ahead again rather than just try to scoop up from behind. This approach will necessarily be built on some kind of intuition rather than data, but should have been a well funded skunkworks project instead of gambling many peoples livelihood on something that will take a while to pay off. I'm probably one of the few that thinks the pivot overall isn't a bad idea, but it was just done in such an irresponsible way and they're paying the price now. We've seen this many times (notably Uber, WeWork, Google, and arguably Apple until Jobs returned from his exile with a new skillset), but the best person to start a company is often not the best to run it when it's established. But Mark has been so good at keeping equity and control that Facebook will fail unless he learns how to adapt. It usually takes a real low point for people to get out of established mindsets. Just putting this out there so I can point to this in 10 years: If I were to predict the future, I'd say Facebook stock plummets and everyone writes it off, and Mark wises up, bringing it back much stronger. I don't particularly like him, but I think he's got it in him.

johannes1234321 4y ago
The "buy all your competitors strategy" couldn't work. After acquiring wahtsapp and Instagram and all the political games around Facebook there was too much regulatory, anti-cometition, ... attention on them for them to strike any serious deal. While my impression regarding Metaverse was that Mark Zuckerberg was purposely imprecise on what exactly Metaverse was, hoping to find a company they can acquire, which then in a retcon made that exactly what the vision ever was.
- kevinventullo 4y ago
  Not to mention that TikTok wasn’t selling.