4 ms·

Change my mind, Facebook was never invented by Zuck's genius All he's been responsible for is making it worse

sebmellen 1y ago
He’s an incredible operator and has managed to acquire and grow an astounding number of successful businesses under the Meta banner. That is not trivial.
tene80i 1y ago
He definitely has horrible product instincts, but he also bought insta and whatsapp at what were, back then, eye-watering prices, and these were clearly massive successes in terms of killing off threats to the mothership. Everything since then, though…
- alex1138 1y ago
  I know but isn't "massive success" rubbing up against antitrust here? The condition was "Don't share data with Facebook"
svara 1y ago
Almost every company in Facebook's position in 2005 would have disappeared into irrelevance by now. Somehow it's one of the most valuable businesses in the world instead. I don't know him, but, if not him, who else would be responsible for that?
- vintermann 1y ago
  We were very confident by ca. 2008 that Facebook would still be around in 2025. It's no mystery, it's the network effects. They had started with a prestige demographic (Harvard), and secured a demographic you could trust to not move on to the next big thing in a hurry, yet which most people want contact with (your parents).
ergocoder 1y ago
Who gives a shit about who invented what? Social network wasn't even novel at the inception of FB. MySpace, Friendster, and Hi5 were already popular with millions of users. Zuck operated it well and was able to grow it from 0 to what it is today. That is what matters.
- HarHarVeryFunny 1y ago
  It didn't even start as a social network - it started off as a site to vote on the hotness of female Harvard students based on stolen photos. It just so happened that he does appear to have some leadership and business talent, but IMO the company is still as creepy as it ever was.
  - alex1138 1y ago
    In fairness it was apparently both genders
nQQKTz7dm27oZ 1y ago
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He’s an incredible operator and has managed to acquire and grow an astounding number of successful businesses under the Meta banner. That is not trivial.

tene80i 1y ago

He definitely has horrible product instincts, but he also bought insta and whatsapp at what were, back then, eye-watering prices, and these were clearly massive successes in terms of killing off threats to the mothership. Everything since then, though…

alex1138 1y ago
I know but isn't "massive success" rubbing up against antitrust here? The condition was "Don't share data with Facebook"

svara 1y ago

Almost every company in Facebook's position in 2005 would have disappeared into irrelevance by now. Somehow it's one of the most valuable businesses in the world instead. I don't know him, but, if not him, who else would be responsible for that?

vintermann 1y ago
We were very confident by ca. 2008 that Facebook would still be around in 2025. It's no mystery, it's the network effects. They had started with a prestige demographic (Harvard), and secured a demographic you could trust to not move on to the next big thing in a hurry, yet which most people want contact with (your parents).

ergocoder 1y ago

Who gives a shit about who invented what? Social network wasn't even novel at the inception of FB. MySpace, Friendster, and Hi5 were already popular with millions of users. Zuck operated it well and was able to grow it from 0 to what it is today. That is what matters.

HarHarVeryFunny 1y ago
It didn't even start as a social network - it started off as a site to vote on the hotness of female Harvard students based on stolen photos. It just so happened that he does appear to have some leadership and business talent, but IMO the company is still as creepy as it ever was.
- alex1138 1y ago
  In fairness it was apparently both genders

nQQKTz7dm27oZ 1y ago

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