This metaphor is helpful in terms of thinking about how users interact with the service and how advertisers and vendors might try to get at these users. The ve

This metaphor is helpful in terms of thinking about how users interact with the service and how advertisers and vendors might try to get at these users. The very large problem with this metaphor is that you are not taking into barriers to entry. Beaches are valuable in the real world because it's impossible to change the ocean and extremely costly to remove rocks, import sand, bring in wildlife, build access points and accommodations, etc. to suit the needs of the beachgoers. The digital beach market has low barriers to entry. If Snapchat ruins its beach with advertisements, pollution, and annoying fruit vendors, then users can very easily and very quickly move to another beach of similar or higher quality that can be built in a matter of days.