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It's not necessarily a mistake to focus on growth instead of revenue, especially in the business they're in. It was certainly right to focus on growth initiall

by pg 18y ago

It's not necessarily a mistake to focus on growth instead of revenue, especially in the business they're in. It was certainly right to focus on growth initially. At some point there is presumably a threshold where revenue becomes more important. Are you sure you know better than Zuckerberg where that threshold is? I'm not. I wouldn't want to bet their strategy has been optimal, but I wouldn't want to bet against it either. At the (very coarse) precision at which I can judge, their strategy seems optimal. Can you judge with finer precision?

tdavis 18y ago
If I had a 150MM users, I'd start worrying more about how to monetize them than I would about getting more. Facebook has been around 5 years, has taken over 500MM in funding and still requires a yearly influx of investor capital to keep running. To me, that signifies a problem (or, if not a problem, at least an early warning bell). I cannot judge with any finer precision, but from my perspective the strategy is no longer optimal. I suppose sometime within the next decade we'll find out who was right. Although, given the choice, I will pretty much always bet against a bread-and-butter social network like FB. Statistically it's a really safe bet.
- pg 18y ago
  In a market where there's a tendency toward centralization, what matters is the percentage of users you have, not the absolute number. Facebook only passed Myspace in traffic last month. Surely it's at least reasonable to believe the threshold for when to put revenue first might be in the future.
  - axod 18y ago
    Do you have to be the #1 in a sector to make a lot of money though? Plentyoffish has just overtaken match as top dating site in the US - some parallels with facebook. Difference is, plentyoffish has been massively profitable for years... Why hasn't facebook? Do they need 10,000+ servers and all those staff? The big fancy expensive offices? Facebook seems like a tech bubble in itself to me.
    - staunch 18y ago
      Zuckerberg is taking the road less traveled. Most sane people would have cashed out $100MM and walked away as soon as they could have. I would have. He's trying to turn Facebook into a billion+/year revenue company by utilizing an as of yet proven (or identified?) business model. Worst case scenario is that he could do what MySpace did. Put horrible ads all over the site and milk it for everything it's worth. Should turn profit if they then cut back on spending (and fire 80% of their staff).
      - tdavis 18y ago
        "Everything it's worth" being the sum total of office supply costs for Fox last fiscal year.

by pg 18y ago

tdavis 18y ago

If I had a 150MM users, I'd start worrying more about how to monetize them than I would about getting more. Facebook has been around 5 years, has taken over 500MM in funding and still requires a yearly influx of investor capital to keep running. To me, that signifies a problem (or, if not a problem, at least an early warning bell). I cannot judge with any finer precision, but from my perspective the strategy is no longer optimal. I suppose sometime within the next decade we'll find out who was right. Although, given the choice, I will pretty much always bet against a bread-and-butter social network like FB. Statistically it's a really safe bet.

pg 18y ago
In a market where there's a tendency toward centralization, what matters is the percentage of users you have, not the absolute number. Facebook only passed Myspace in traffic last month. Surely it's at least reasonable to believe the threshold for when to put revenue first might be in the future.
- axod 18y ago
  Do you have to be the #1 in a sector to make a lot of money though? Plentyoffish has just overtaken match as top dating site in the US - some parallels with facebook. Difference is, plentyoffish has been massively profitable for years... Why hasn't facebook? Do they need 10,000+ servers and all those staff? The big fancy expensive offices? Facebook seems like a tech bubble in itself to me.
  - staunch 18y ago
    Zuckerberg is taking the road less traveled. Most sane people would have cashed out $100MM and walked away as soon as they could have. I would have. He's trying to turn Facebook into a billion+/year revenue company by utilizing an as of yet proven (or identified?) business model. Worst case scenario is that he could do what MySpace did. Put horrible ads all over the site and milk it for everything it's worth. Should turn profit if they then cut back on spending (and fire 80% of their staff).
    - tdavis 18y ago
      "Everything it's worth" being the sum total of office supply costs for Fox last fiscal year.