

Is Facebook Temporary? - yarapavan
http://52weeksofux.com/post/2712763697/is-facebook-temporary

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nobody_nowhere
Everything's temporary. The question is the timeframe. The peak for facebook
doesn't come until kids move to something cooler, and even then it can be a
pretty long slide into irrelevancy.

What's the next cool thing that's going to draw people away?

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Vieira
I agree. Facebook will have challenges. How long they survive will depend on
how fast they can react to these challenges. They have, however, a '600
million users' advantage...

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dclaysmith
I doubt that Facebook will be temporary in the way that Friendster and MySpace
have proven to be but I think that they will peak and decline (in the US) in
the not-too-distant future.

I think they have 2 strengths. Photos and the Social Graph.

Their dominance in photos seems to be nearly accidental but it will serve to
prevent a MySpace/Friendster type decline. Tho there are ways to extract your
photos, it's never going to be something most users are comfortable with.
People won't want to walk away from their years of memories and will keep
their Facebook accounts somewhat active as a repository for their photos.

The social graph is their biggest asset but I don't feel like they are
capitalizing on it enough. I don't really play games so I only use Facebook to
occassionally read my News Feed and, every month, I'm less and less interested
in what I read there. They haven't created anything I NEED.

Their Facebook Connect/Single Sign On system is their attempt to make us
dependent on the social graph but I don't think it's succeeded. Twitter,
OpenID, Google, etc all have similar products and most websites have
implemented more than one of them.

If I were Facebook, I'd buy or build a proper email product, an online
productivity suite (Zoho, etc), and encourage 3rd parties to develop and
promote apps that operate WITHIN Facebook and utilize the social graph to be
interoperable/collaborative. (Right now, Facebook apps are mainly games and
marketing efforts). Facebook as a place to "hangout" is going to decline but
they might be able to offset their losses their with increases in other areas
(work, education, etc).

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brudgers
> _"Yet social media is itself as temporary as any social gathering, nightclub
> or party."_

Five years ago, that was as true as "The internet is for computer geeks" was
more or less true 12 years ago.

Facebook was a special place years ago when only college students could be
there. Facebook's timing was such that today, there's a good chance your
parents have an account. There's more planning of high-school reunions, than
keg parties on Facebook these days. Yes, the cool kids may leave but Facebook
no longer relies on the cool kids any more than Linkedin(even if Linkedin is
relegated to the same scrap heap as Compuserve by the author).

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drpancake
Agreed - this argument about the 'cool kids' moving away from Facebook because
it now serves such a broad demographic just hasn't materialised. My parents
have been Facebook users for ~2 years now, and that's not unusual amongst
those I know.

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petercooper
_Yes, a social networking site is now worth $50 Billion Dollars. With a B._

Many of the same points could be made about Google (yes, a mere _search
engine_ is now worth $200 Billion Dollars. With a B too!).

A lot of talk about Facebook recently seems to be incredulous or disparaging
but social networks are now no lesser an application or business model than
anything else.

I could be wrong but I think Facebook has "pulled a Google" and turned a
previously flaky app model into a serious, sustainable industry (Remember
search pre-Google? It was hideous..). I think Facebook is as "temporary" as
Google now.

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ggordan
I don't think Facebook can in any way be compared with Google.

Google has a sustainable business model (for now), Facebook doesn't. Google
isn't limited to one product, they're no longer just a search company.
Facebook on the other hand, would have a mountain to climb to expand into
areas other than 'social'. By the time Google was Facebooks age, they were
making money which was able to sustain the business. They didn't need outside
investment (I assume).

For some reason, I think Facebook doesn't want an IPO because it would show
the world how much money they're actually making, at which point everyone
would lose faith. Let's not forget, Facebook is 6 years old.

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petercooper
Facebook's profit in its 6th year of operation has been put at $220m (of $770m
revenue) [1]. Google's profit in its 6th year was $342m (of $1.4bn revenue).

Facebook is not entirely a slouch in the money-making business and shows a
gross profit margin higher than that of Google in its same stage of
development.

I'd also suspect Facebook's revenue is more diversified than Google's which is
primarily from one form of advertising. For example, the numbers suggest
10-15% of revenue comes from "virtual gifts" [2] - even that small amount of
diversification would be enough to trump Google's one trick pony.

Of course, Facebook is a private company and the numbers could be wrong, as
you imply. That would leave some rather big names, sources, and publications
with egg on their faces though..

    
    
      [1] http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/01/06/goldman-unit-passed-on-earlier-facebook-investment/
      [2] http://www.businessinsider.com/how-does-facebook-make-money-2010-5

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motters
Based upon the Google trends I estimate that Facebook will peak either at the
end of this year or some time in the next.

    
    
      http://www.google.com/trends?q=facebook
    

Facebook isn't particularly good as an application, so anything which comes
along which has more customisability and better privacy will not find it
difficult to poach users from Facebook, just as Facebook did from MySpace.

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noelchurchill
That's just search volume data. Maybe it's peaking, or maybe people just type
the domain name or have it bookmarked.

Better data, such as hitwise or comscore, does show Facebook growth is
leveling off. So you might be right anyway.

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Estragon
No, Facebook will persist beyond the heat-death of the universe.

Silly title. Everything's temporary.

~~~
joeyh
As a data black hole, presumably.

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chailatte
This is what I see Facebook in 3 years: a place where older women play casual
games.

Everyone else has already moved on to mobile apps, doing group texting,
picture taking, video conferencing, game playing, and event meeting. Away from
their parents.

And Facebook has no clout on mobile. They're but one of many social apps on
Google and Apple's platform. In fact, you're seeing the beginning of the end
of facebook, with instagram/hashable/groupme/etc picking up momentum.

~~~
markkat
Agreed. Facebook can't forever be what people want it to be. At some point, we
will want something that is different enough, that FB can't adopt or morph
into it.

