- is online social networking a fad or has it become a lifestyle def not a fad…I still have a hola hoop 2. is the target audience confined to a specific age group (15-35 perhaps?) FB is not bounded by age…the great thing about its user friendly interface is that anyone can use it 3. does it have what it takes to become a dominant online advertising platform, which is a multi billion dollar business (just look at how much google were willing to pay for facebook) Only time will tell…I think FB has the potential though…MSFT buying into it does not lend FB credibility…they just wanted to be the first (before GOOG namely) to get in.
i’ll try. 1. Online Social Networking i believe is here to stay. It has become a lifestyle, as many of the people who have grown up with this will start to use it for various aspect of their life other then posting pictures and sending out party invitations. Companies have developed their own pages to recruit/hire people on facebook. Many people in their early 20’s and below have always been on these sites, and facebook is just the most current one. I can’t say facebook will be here forever. But the Social Networking idea will always be here. 2. The current target audience is probably 30 to 15. As this is probably the age group who have seen social networks all their life, and have grown up using it. As well, these are the people that generally gather huge friend list due to their high interaction with a large volume of people in schools and other activities. However older age groups have seen and started using facebook. But they have yet to embrace it fully because the functionality is not currently geared towards them. Like what the wii is doing to the gaming community, see that happening to social networks soons. 3. Yes, advertising will become very efficient in social networks, but i believe they have to evolve their marketing strategies to beyond simple advertisements on pages. There is a lot of potential. However they should avoid stepping on their users’ toes, like facebook has in the past.
The target audience is much broader I feel. Although I believe you have to be at least 16 to join myspace or facebook I know my younger sister has been on there since she was 10. I wouldnt be surprised if kids as young as 7 or 8 regularly use accounts. Before you know it they will just set you up with an account at birth. I can see advertisers finding a way to reach these younger users which opens up a whole new avenue for revenue.
The most important feature of facebook I think, is the open source style of development that allows users and 3rd parties to develop their own apps. This feature will allow facebook to grow and develop as the the interest of the masses change. This is one thing that will help them still be relevant tomorrow. The power of collaboration across the internet is the new wave.
nice work guys, very good points as for the open source code base, I agree its an advantage, but at the same time, its also a disadvantage, quality control and system security becomes paramount when you let users add whatever they want to your system and allow it to be distributed to everyone on your network, this can be controlled, but it’ll be an ongoing challenge. as for the advertising format, they were trying to push beacon, but that didn’t go so well with all the security concerns I guess what I was trying to say is facebook does not have any distinctive advantage that is proprietary to them that can make them pretty much invincible to competition like google does, and without that, its barrier to entry is low and we could be 1 wicked social networking site away from totally burying facebook in our backyard
yea i totally agree with you Liaaba. I don’t see facebook being the last one to survive. But it has been one of the best organized social networks so far. And has made significant waves and innovations to bring social networks mainstream. another thing that should be noted is that facebook took a long time to become popular. I remember getting facebooks requests a good 2 to 3 years before facebook started catching people’s eyes. I simply disregarded it as spam until it became popular and stayed with a local social network that is currently dieing out. so in a sense there is a slight advantage because of branding, and will most likely not be toppled until someone develops a more cleaner and efficient network with stronger ideas.
I almost puked when I heard someone refer to Zuckerberg as a “Billionaire”. I mean, I understand the basis of the comment, but let’s be serious.
HoldSideAnalyst Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I almost puked when I heard someone refer to > Zuckerberg as a “Billionaire”. I mean, I > understand the basis of the comment, but let’s be > serious. He could have been if he sold out at the right time instead of waiting for the $10 billion valution or whatever the hell he was looking for…
CFA_Halifax Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > HoldSideAnalyst Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > I almost puked when I heard someone refer to > > Zuckerberg as a “Billionaire”. I mean, I > > understand the basis of the comment, but let’s > be > > serious. > > He could have been if he sold out at the right > time instead of waiting for the $10 billion > valution or whatever the hell he was looking > for… They sold a 1.6% stake in Facebook to MSFT for $250MM, implying a $15B valuation. While this certainly seems excessive, it’s a small price to pay for MSFT (with 24B in cash on the B/S) to keep GOOG out of the deal.
Anyone remember “Friendster”? This could be facebook in two years. First Friendster was the rage, then myspace, now facebook. Realistically, there is a limit to how much people will use these things…basically it’s most useful for posting pics, connecting with people you barely know in superficial ways, and looking up girls you met when you were drunk to get a sense of what they look like without beer goggles. Social networking is here to stay, but the programs will constantly change. If it were a stock, I’d ride the wave another 12 months and then dump it. Z
Didn’t Microsoft’s deal with face book involve making Microsoft FB’s exclusive third-party advertising provider? That contracts gotta have some value… I suspect a large part of the $240m was paid because of the exclusivity…which would mean facebook is valued at lower than $15b!
I agree with DirtyZ. It kind of sickens me how people think this social networking garbage is super-important and useful. It’s another way to extend meaningless relationships, share pics and spy on others, as well as a way to blow time. How else would one discover whether the doofus they dated for 2 years in college is really making a go of that heavy metal band? Friendster was just a passing fad, as LinkedIn, Facebook and Doostang will soon be. Yeah, Facebook has super-cool stuff and whatever, but some other upstart will come along and outdo it.
ya, I think that’s what he meant, microsoft did it to keep google out, nothing more, which means they probably paid a huge premium for it (one which is like a drop in the bucket to them so they don’t really mind) anyhow, either Zuckerberg really has something up his sleeves or he’s ill-advisedly waiting for that 10 bil offer from someone
Syd_RE Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Didn’t Microsoft’s deal with face book involve > making Microsoft FB’s exclusive third-party > advertising provider? > > That contracts gotta have some value… > > I suspect a large part of the $240m was paid > because of the exclusivity…which would mean > facebook is valued at lower than $15b! Exactly, which is when between that fact and the fact that the investment went into the company, not into Zuckerberg, means calling him a “billionaire” when he’s probably got a liquid net worth under $10M is ridiculous.