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I would strongly disagree with this. I used to feel this way about Mark Zuckerberg, but not anymore. Just consider these observations about facebook: 1) When i

I would strongly disagree with this. I used to feel this way about Mark Zuckerberg, but not anymore. Just consider these observations about facebook: 1) When it started, there were already many social networks 2) Because it positioned itself as a social network for college students, it got the early growth and adoption any "social" website needs to survive 3) They've grown REALLY fast since then, and have started to really lock in the users 4) It's not unthinkable for them to have a billion users. Once they have all the users they want, they can pick and choose their business model. 5) Mark Zuckerberg can't be removed from the CEO position, and probably holds more than 20% of the company 6) Facebook is hiring top talent, on par with Google and probably better than Microsoft. These things don't just happen out of the blue. For someone who has consolidated power in a company that could rival Google, I don't think Zuckerberg gets enough credit. If I were pg, I would have put him in my top 5.

brandonkm 18y ago
> For someone who has consolidated power in a company that could rival Google I think you may be getting ahead of yourself on that one.
- kennyroo 18y ago
  Facebook/Google comparisons always strike me as way off base. It's like comparing a Central Park (busy, no money) with Disneyland (busy, big money).
  - mingdingo 18y ago
    Central park isn't a business. If it were a for-profit venture, it would be fairly easy to monetize, purely because it's so popular.
    - deleted 18y ago
      [deleted]
    - Frazzydee 18y ago
      > it would be fairly easy to monetize, purely because it's so popular. Why? Popularity as a free service doesn't necessarily imply that said popularity will be retained upon introduction of a monetary fee.
      - mingdingo 18y ago
        The monetization need not be direct (i.e. charging people to use the site). It could be better ad placement, a search engine that knows more about you than google does, monetary transactions (auctions, payments), as well as other stuff... Like it or not, facebook has real utility (just like central park), and people are willing to pay for real utility in one way or another.
        gaius 18y ago
        What I'm surprised they haven't done already is extend their event planning mechanism to partner with ticket agents, train companies/airlines, cinema chains, restaurant booking systems, pizza delivery, etc etc.
    - briansmith 18y ago
      "Central park isn't a business." A lot of people don't think Facebook is a business either.
tokenadult 18y ago
It's still trivially easy and often very enticing to bail out of Facebook entirely. I still don't see anything that Facebook is doing that successfully locks in customers, not even in the way that Amazon locks in book-buyers and certainly not in the way that Google becomes most people's default approach to Web search. Moreover, if every user loses money for Facebook, what's the financial model of the company? Even if I like Facebook, if I'm not providing it with cash flow, when it does it have to bail out of its business?
- chris11 18y ago
  It is not as easy as it seems. I use facebook because it easily allows me to see what is going on in a lot of people's lives. There are no huge technical or design hurdles to beating Facebook. The problems are social. Only sites with a lot of users, like Myspace, could quickly become a threat to Myspace. Facebook has surpassed a critical mass of users, so they probably would have time to respond to any technical challenges.And Myspace seems to have a different and less successful focus than Facebook that would need to be changed. I don't really care about telling everyone who my top friends are, designing my page, or using Myspace as a blog. Basically, I just want to quickly and easily find out the major events in my friend's lives. It does not matter how brilliantly designed a site is, I cannot adequately meet my needs with a site until it has a good portion of my friends as users. So to go against Facebook successfully, a company would need to start in an extremely small niche and grow, or provide value unrelated to social networking. It is a lot easier to reach critical mass in a very small niche. And if you aren't solely in social networking, people are going to be using your network before it provides decent social value.
  - ashot 18y ago
    ala twitter, sf geek crowd
    - unalone 18y ago
      Don't compare Facebook to Twitter. It's enormous in comparison. Twitter may be getting lots of press, but my friends who've tried it have nearly all abandoned their accounts.
gnaritas 18y ago
> For someone who has consolidated power in a company that could rival Google You're out of your mind.
- wheels 18y ago
  I'd have said the same about Google and Microsoft when Google was Microsoft's age. Google didn't get their business model (ads) until they were a year older than Facebook. Looking at things now I wouldn't say that Facebook would rival Google, but it's definitely not out of their mind to imagine that they could.
baguasquirrel 18y ago
What's the point of #6 if you don't do anything with that talent?
chollida1 18y ago
> 5) Mark Zuckerberg can't be removed from the CEO position, and probably holds more than 20% of the company Really? I've never heard this. Is there a condition in the companies charter that forbids it? Usually all you need is a majority of the board to vote the CEO out and since he only has one vote and there are more than 2 people on the facebook board it seems like he could be voted out.

brandonkm 18y ago

> For someone who has consolidated power in a company that could rival Google I think you may be getting ahead of yourself on that one.

kennyroo 18y ago
Facebook/Google comparisons always strike me as way off base. It's like comparing a Central Park (busy, no money) with Disneyland (busy, big money).
- mingdingo 18y ago
  Central park isn't a business. If it were a for-profit venture, it would be fairly easy to monetize, purely because it's so popular.
  - deleted 18y ago
    [deleted]
  - Frazzydee 18y ago
    > it would be fairly easy to monetize, purely because it's so popular. Why? Popularity as a free service doesn't necessarily imply that said popularity will be retained upon introduction of a monetary fee.
    - mingdingo 18y ago
      The monetization need not be direct (i.e. charging people to use the site). It could be better ad placement, a search engine that knows more about you than google does, monetary transactions (auctions, payments), as well as other stuff... Like it or not, facebook has real utility (just like central park), and people are willing to pay for real utility in one way or another.
      - gaius 18y ago
        What I'm surprised they haven't done already is extend their event planning mechanism to partner with ticket agents, train companies/airlines, cinema chains, restaurant booking systems, pizza delivery, etc etc.
  - briansmith 18y ago
    "Central park isn't a business." A lot of people don't think Facebook is a business either.

tokenadult 18y ago

It's still trivially easy and often very enticing to bail out of Facebook entirely. I still don't see anything that Facebook is doing that successfully locks in customers, not even in the way that Amazon locks in book-buyers and certainly not in the way that Google becomes most people's default approach to Web search. Moreover, if every user loses money for Facebook, what's the financial model of the company? Even if I like Facebook, if I'm not providing it with cash flow, when it does it have to bail out of its business?

chris11 18y ago
It is not as easy as it seems. I use facebook because it easily allows me to see what is going on in a lot of people's lives. There are no huge technical or design hurdles to beating Facebook. The problems are social. Only sites with a lot of users, like Myspace, could quickly become a threat to Myspace. Facebook has surpassed a critical mass of users, so they probably would have time to respond to any technical challenges.And Myspace seems to have a different and less successful focus than Facebook that would need to be changed. I don't really care about telling everyone who my top friends are, designing my page, or using Myspace as a blog. Basically, I just want to quickly and easily find out the major events in my friend's lives. It does not matter how brilliantly designed a site is, I cannot adequately meet my needs with a site until it has a good portion of my friends as users. So to go against Facebook successfully, a company would need to start in an extremely small niche and grow, or provide value unrelated to social networking. It is a lot easier to reach critical mass in a very small niche. And if you aren't solely in social networking, people are going to be using your network before it provides decent social value.
- ashot 18y ago
  ala twitter, sf geek crowd
  - unalone 18y ago
    Don't compare Facebook to Twitter. It's enormous in comparison. Twitter may be getting lots of press, but my friends who've tried it have nearly all abandoned their accounts.

gnaritas 18y ago

> For someone who has consolidated power in a company that could rival Google You're out of your mind.

wheels 18y ago
I'd have said the same about Google and Microsoft when Google was Microsoft's age. Google didn't get their business model (ads) until they were a year older than Facebook. Looking at things now I wouldn't say that Facebook would rival Google, but it's definitely not out of their mind to imagine that they could.

baguasquirrel 18y ago

What's the point of #6 if you don't do anything with that talent?

chollida1 18y ago

> 5) Mark Zuckerberg can't be removed from the CEO position, and probably holds more than 20% of the company Really? I've never heard this. Is there a condition in the companies charter that forbids it? Usually all you need is a majority of the board to vote the CEO out and since he only has one vote and there are more than 2 people on the facebook board it seems like he could be voted out.