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After Facebook fails

blogs.law.harvard.edu

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Re: After Facebook fails

#131

Post by jackalope »

mike-cardwell wrote: post #102
cletus wrote: post #44

Here's my take on Facebook (disclaimer: I work for Google, these opinions are purely my own and not representative of the company, yadda yadda yadda). Display advertising works best when you have sufficient, quality inventory (publishers whose sites serve ads) such that you attract advertisers in sufficient quantity and quality. Targeting in display ads works because from the publishers, the intermediary has informat…

"Visit any Like-enabled site and you see a small piece of content from Facebook that tells Facebook all the sites you visit. It's a tracking cookie like any other and personally I have no problem with that" I understand that you work for Google and that not holding this opinion would mean that you have to conclude that your employer is also very much in the wrong. But how do you justify it? It's clearly not informati…

Agreed on all points, but websites that feature Like buttons or Analytics are complicit in this dubiously ethical behaviour. Webmasters should also be doing more to protect the privacy of their users. Sadly, even the ones that are supposed to be operating within FERPA or HIPAA restrictions in the US ignore this duty.

Re: After Facebook fails

#132

Post by rbn »

ktizo wrote: post #9

I could see facebook being replaced by nothing more fancy than a web design app with a social webring gizmo.

You heavily under estimate the network effect. If that was true, terrible sites like eBay and Craigslist would have been replaced a long, long time ago. specially ebay which is hated among even it's most loyal sellers refuse to leave ebay, because they have buyers. The network effect is even stronger with Facebook. I highly doubt that we are going to see another social network get 900 million users anytime soon.

Re: After Facebook fails

#133

Post by Jgrubb »

revorad wrote: post #127
Jgrubb wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He wasn't actually predicting failure for Facebook. The last thing he wrote was "It's still valuable but it will take some time to figure out exactly how much it's worth". Don't be so quick to lash out at people because they're not sitting in front of you or because you didn't read the comment.

My last sentence was more in response to the OP, than cletus.

That's what it sounded like. For lashing out at you for lashing out at him, I apologize.

Re: After Facebook fails

#134

Post by rbn »

pyoung wrote: post #80
soup10 wrote: post #66

I have a crazy idea, why doesn't Facebook charge for premium accounts? They would really only need to get what? Maybe 10% of their users to sign up to some kind of premium subscription service to justify their valuation. It's funny how this option is rarely ever mentioned, as if selling a service to consumers is some kind of taboo for internet companies.

It's been mentioned plenty of times (at least in discussion forums). Also Facebook has been experimenting with sponsored posts in NZ, where people pay to have their status posts featured more prominently in peoples news feeds, which is essentially a 'pay for premium' service. From what I understand, it's not going too well.

This is a good idea in my opinion. Lets say I'm having a party, launching a an app, selling something..ect. I think people would pay $1-$5 to use that feature.

Re: After Facebook fails

#135

Post by revorad »

Jgrubb wrote: post #133
revorad wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My last sentence was more in response to the OP, than cletus.

That's what it sounded like. For lashing out at you for lashing out at him, I apologize.

Heh, no worries. It's just Sayre's law - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sayres_law

Re: After Facebook fails

#136

Post by gvb »

mike-cardwell wrote: post #102
cletus wrote: post #44

Here's my take on Facebook (disclaimer: I work for Google, these opinions are purely my own and not representative of the company, yadda yadda yadda). Display advertising works best when you have sufficient, quality inventory (publishers whose sites serve ads) such that you attract advertisers in sufficient quantity and quality. Targeting in display ads works because from the publishers, the intermediary has informat…

"Visit any Like-enabled site and you see a small piece of content from Facebook that tells Facebook all the sites you visit. It's a tracking cookie like any other and personally I have no problem with that" I understand that you work for Google and that not holding this opinion would mean that you have to conclude that your employer is also very much in the wrong. But how do you justify it? It's clearly not informati…

It is MUCH more than a tracking cookie. The more useful XFBML version is a snippet of JavaScript. JavaScript can do a lot more than a cookie.

http://developers.facebook.com/docs/reference/plugins/like/?...

   
   (function(d, s, id) {
     var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];
     if (d.getElementById(id)) return;
     js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id;
     js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1";
     fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);
   }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));
Go to http://connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1 and be horrified.

Re: After Facebook fails

#137

Post by JabavuAdams »

adventureful wrote: post #105

He leads with an extraordinarily false claim: "The daily and stubborn reality for everybody building businesses on the strength of Web advertising is that the value of digital ads decreases every quarter" The value of Google's ad network, including the average cost per click, increased for 14 years in a row, roughly speaking. Google certainly isn't suffering from any supposed value decrease per quarter, and if that e…

Read the linked MIT article. There's a clear difference between Facebook-style display advertising, and Google-style search advertising. Google ads are much more profitable because people already have the intent to buy.

Re: After Facebook fails

#138

Post by maxerickson »

jonnathanson wrote: post #122
cletus wrote: post #44

Here's my take on Facebook (disclaimer: I work for Google, these opinions are purely my own and not representative of the company, yadda yadda yadda). Display advertising works best when you have sufficient, quality inventory (publishers whose sites serve ads) such that you attract advertisers in sufficient quantity and quality. Targeting in display ads works because from the publishers, the intermediary has informat…

The botttom line with Facebook is that it went public far too early. It doesn't have its footing on solid ground as far as revenue growth, stability, and profitability are concerned. Its advertising model, dependent as it is on these much-maligned targeted display ads, is promising -- but has a lot of kinks to be worked out. The more I look at the Facebook IPO, the more I don't see the conventional narrative, i.e., t…

So by saying that you think they went public too early, you are maybe implying that they could have made much more money later, or maybe implying that public perception of the stock will interfere with their ability to operate.

Are either of those things true? Is there some other difficulty?

Re: After Facebook fails

#139

Post by brudgers »

cletus wrote: post #44

Here's my take on Facebook (disclaimer: I work for Google, these opinions are purely my own and not representative of the company, yadda yadda yadda). Display advertising works best when you have sufficient, quality inventory (publishers whose sites serve ads) such that you attract advertisers in sufficient quantity and quality. Targeting in display ads works because from the publishers, the intermediary has informat…

"A common misconception from fearmongers is that your data is being sold. It is not."

I'm calling "Srawman" on this.

The correct conception is that it could be sold and the Market Economics Fairy has predicted that it will be sold as soon as a willing buyer and willing seller agree on a price. Indeed, if Facebook fails, all their data will almost certainly be sold along with the rest of their assets.

Likewise, Google has an increasingly strong incentive to sell user data as its perceived value increases and the cash flow per "unit" decreases. That Google sees this as a distinct probability is clear from their privacy policy which gives them the right to use user data "to develop new services." No one should be surprised by this because failing to reserve rights to a potential revenue stream would be irresponsible behavior by Google management.

If the thesis of the article is correct, sale of data is increasingly likely as the online advertising model pivots away from personalized advertising and the attractiveness of creating alternative revenue streams from the data increases.

Re: After Facebook fails

#140

Post by Tichy »

mike-cardwell wrote: post #102
cletus wrote: post #44

Here's my take on Facebook (disclaimer: I work for Google, these opinions are purely my own and not representative of the company, yadda yadda yadda). Display advertising works best when you have sufficient, quality inventory (publishers whose sites serve ads) such that you attract advertisers in sufficient quantity and quality. Targeting in display ads works because from the publishers, the intermediary has informat…

"Visit any Like-enabled site and you see a small piece of content from Facebook that tells Facebook all the sites you visit. It's a tracking cookie like any other and personally I have no problem with that" I understand that you work for Google and that not holding this opinion would mean that you have to conclude that your employer is also very much in the wrong. But how do you justify it? It's clearly not informati…

I guess this blocking by the browsers will eventually happen. But then it is not impossible to move the tracking to the server of the web site, instead of the client. I guess that is what would happen over time, although I admit it would require more effort by the site owners.
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