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They lose tens of millions each year because they are relying on cheesy display ads. That is not a sound business model. Ads are not going to support users on

• alaskamiller 18y ago
  Are you familiar with their financials? Their sales decks? Their full range of advertising products? Are you aware of the revenue for other social networks? MySpace is going to clear $1 billion in revenue this year, a year faster than Google did. Facebook isn't doing the same numbers but they could, they limit the advertising in order to increase user experience and pursue non-traditional advertising to avoid having their site end up as a friendster. These are strategic decisions, and if it takes them 10 years to fulfill it then, great. That's on them. Maybe that sort of investment secures them 25 or 50 years of high margin profits. There is no textbook time-line for companies to follow.
  • unalone 18y ago
    Yeah. I kind of understand the argument that Facebook wasn't running a very good system for revenue: until they released their targeted ad system, they were fairly hit-and-miss and their ads never seemed interesting. Now, they've done what Google did: they made their ads relevant and very much part of their bigger system. I've clicked a few ads, now, because I'm seeing things that I want to click. That's a big breakthrough for Facebook.