Zuckerberg said last week that he’s sensitive to how users react to advertising in general. He plans to limit the amount of ads people see to about one for every 20 updates. That would comprise about 5 percent of a user’s news feed.
Why do I think people won’t like these.
Facebook Inc said on Tuesday it now has 1 million active advertisers globally who used the platform in the last 28 days, a milestone for the company that is seeking to revive its revenue growth.
That is just a mind-boggling number of active advertisers.
Matt Drance:
Do you enter uncharted territory, make your own mobile operating system, and hope people switch?
Of course not. You make your competitor’s system yours — overnight. Facebook Home is a trojan horse designed to steal the Android experience, and the Android user base, right out of Google’s hands.
It’s a brilliant move by Facebook, especially since Google is trying so hard to compete with Facebook. I chuckle every time I think about it.
Dan Frommer:
My guess is that many — most? — of these people are Facebook users, and could easily see some utility in having Facebook features highlighted on their phones. And — bonus — Facebook’s software looks good. Much better than the junk that ships with typical low-end Android devices.
I agree with Dan. Facebook has a lot of users that couldn’t care less about what phone they have. They check email and Facebook — that’s who they are going after with Facebook Home.
MG Siegler sums it up nicely.
Rian van der Merwe:
Tech journalists can write about privacy and the virtues of quitting Facebook all day long. The rest of the world won’t even hear about it, because they’ll be too busy getting immersed in the lives and identities of the friends they agree with.
He’s right.
You can watch Mark Zuckerberg introduce Facebook Home.
Michael Mulvey’s wife’s reaction when he told her about Facebook Home.
Om Malik:
In fact, Facebook Home should put privacy advocates on alert, for this application erodes any idea of privacy. If you install this, then it is very likely that Facebook is going to be able to track your every move, and every little action.
Very true.
Christina Bonnington gives us a rundown on all the new terms you’ll need to know in order to understand Facebook Home. My favorite is “Chat Heads.” And by “favorite” I mean I don’t really give a shit.
And there you have it — Google and Facebook just want to serve us ads. I still believe it could work out for Facebook.
Jordan Golson for MacRumors:
Facebook claims users turn on their phone 100 times per day, and, among other things, is redoing the lock screen on the Android phone to give users a slideshow of photos and updates from their Facebook News Feeds.
This isn’t a bad idea for Facebook and it’s users. Facebook is making itself the center of the user experience and that could work very well for them.
Kevin C. Tofel:
There’s little doubt that Facebook will unveil a new phone on Thursday, but the star of the show will be software, not hardware, in this battle between Facebook and Google for user engagement.
It seems clear by the invite that their entering the mobile space in one way or another.
One important thing that I’ve noticed is this – I wasted a ridiculous amount of time on a site that I couldn’t wait to leave. Since I’ve stopped visiting, I’ve actually noted that I have more time in my day.
I still contend that Facebook is a great network for personal relationships — keeping up with old friends and the lives of people we care about. It’s not something pros really get much out of though.
Joe Caiati outlines his reasons for pulling the plug on Facebook, including the ability to use Twitter to keep up-to-date. If I had to choose between Twitter and Facebook, I’d probably make the same choice, but there are plenty of people that still get a lot out of Facebook. I think it’s the people that use it as a small personal network of friends instead of trying to build a massive network of people they don’t know.
Om Malik:
Facebook’s Poke app, a copy of red-hot Snapchat rose almost to the top of the iTunes appstore on launch. A few days later it has tanked, making me wonder: can Facebook really invent any new Internet behavior or is it destined to be a copycat forever?
It seems to me that Zuck did great creating the concept of Facebook, but that’s where things stopped. The ability to invent or create beyond that initial concept has escaped everyone at Facebook.
Facebook (FB) announced on Tuesday that it will begin opening Facebook Messenger to consumers who do not have a Facebook account, starting in countries like India and South Africa, and later rolling out the service in the United States and Europe. This is a belated acknowledgement of a staggering strategic mistake Facebook made two years ago. That is when the messaging app competition was still wide open and giants like Facebook or Google (GOOG) could have entered the competition.
In my mother, one found a moral clarity that I think can only be compared to John Wayne, who unfriended people by shooting them dead.
In 2004, Mark Zuckerberg launched Facebook (FB) from his Harvard University dorm room, hoping to see what his classmates were up to on campus. The following eight years brought international fame, unimaginable wealth, a hit Hollywood movie, a disastrous initial public offering, a sagging stock price—and one unprecedented achievement. On Sept. 14, the company reached 1 billion active users.
It is amazing.
The social network earned a non-GAAP 12-cent profit, on target with expectations, on revenues of $1.18 billion, the latter up 32% and a tad above estimates.Facebook suffered a net loss of $157 million, or 8 cents a share, largely because of accounting for employee stock plans post-IPO.
So overall, not a bad first quarter as a public company. It met analyst expectations and if not for the stock plans, it would have reported a profit.
My guess is that Apple will keep things simple with at least the initial Facebook/iOS integration. Beyond authentication, there will probably be a Facebook button in the existing share screen which will allow you to share something to your Facebook Wall.
Sounds like the Apple way to do it.
Facebook is no better at advertising than ValueClick or any other online ad network. They just happen to be able to correlate their customers slightly better than everyone else. That’s not the formula for a $100 billion business, just click through rates closer to 1%.
Gruber on why Facebook released a camera app after buying Instagram.
Sam Gustin for Time:
Facebook’s Wall Street investment banks warned top clients of new doubts about the social network’s financial prospects just days before the company’s IPO, according to a series of reports that emerged Tuesday. After receiving briefings from Facebook executives, analysts at the banks lowered their financial forecasts for big institutional clients, some of whom scaled back plans to buy Facebook stock, even as the banks raised the IPO price and number of shares amid a frenzy of hype.
Om Malik on Facebook back in the day:
when asked how the company will make money, Mark apparently said the company isn’t currently focused on monetization and will be looking to extend their platform’s reach. He doesn’t have to – if Facebook Connect works, the money will follow.
U.S. Senators on Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin’s decision to renounce his citizenship to avoid paying taxing:
“It’s infuriating to see someone sell out the country that welcomed him and kept him safe, educated him and helped him become a billionaire,” said Senator Charles Schumer at a news briefing. “We plan to put a stop to this tax avoidance scheme.”Facebook plans to raise billions of dollars in an initial public offering that could leave Saverin, still a part-owner of the social networking company, with a big capital gains tax bill, estimated to be $67 million.
It has been fun to see Mark Zuckerberg go from being the awkward college dude to being a mega-billionaire.
Om Malik:
Facebook says it is launching an app store that will allow people to get access to social apps on the network, without much heavy lifting. The company made the announcement in a blog post today. The company is hoping that the new app store will make it easy for apps to be discovered on the platform.
Oh great, just what we need.
Dustin Curtis:
I think Facebook is terrified of the usage transition from desktop PCs to mobile. A billion dollars for Instagram, as an insurance policy to guarantee that the company will have an anchor in content creation on mobile, is worth every penny.
That’s exactly what I think about the deal.