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Facebook acquires Instagram

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Re: Facebook acquires Instagram

#251

Post by xorbyte »

aminozuur wrote: post #211
kylec wrote: post #18

Some of you might find this useful: https://instagram.com/accounts/remove/request/

You can still post to Instagram without sharing the photo on Facebook. So this "paranoia" - if I may call it that - is only because Facebook now has acces to all of Instagrams information? And Facebook will abuse this position why, exactly?

The current trend with buyouts seems to be eventual integration. Google recently did this with their privacy policy, and it was received with mixed feelings. I see no reason to expect Facebook's acquisition of Instagram not to change how the latter operates: it must become profitable to FB somehow (beyond talent), and data is the most straightforward way. The two blog posts announcing the acquisition aren't legally binding with respect to the future of the products, and nobody should be surprised if a 180º shift happens in a few months. Facebook is in the business of monetizing user data after all.

Re: Facebook acquires Instagram

#252

Post by kevinqualters »

wallawe wrote: post #167
jimmyvanhalen wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and keeping Instagram away from Google. it's a good move.

But back to the original proposition, is this indicative of a bubble when you drop 1 Billion, or >1% of your estimated market cap on a preventive/defensive measure?

There is not really a clear cut metric for deciding if we are in another bubble or not.

Re: Facebook acquires Instagram

#253

Post by knowsnothing613 »

dirtyaura wrote: post #232
knowsnothing613 wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yeah, but they paid $1 BILLION dollar for a company with NO business model. This buy was just another way for connected Silicon players to cash out on the facebook IPO, since the IPO window for web 2.0 is closed.

Google bought YouTube for $1.65B when YouTube didn't have business model. It was critiqued a lot because of this, but it established Google as a dominant player in video space and it's ripest fruits might be seen in coming years when media consumption moves more and more to mobile. I grant that $1B sounds a lot for Instagram and it is harder to see similar commercial value in photos than in videos. My personal take i…

yeah, and Yahoo bought Flickr for hundreds of millions. And Flickr never became a profit center for yahoo. Now, Yahoo is laying off thousands of workers, and is close to dead poool, because of all its malinvestment in web1.5 (flicker, geocities, delicious, etc).

Video has a higher value proposition than photos. Look @ how hard flickr has struggled turning photos into a sustainable business model.

I'm comparing apples to apples. You're comparing apples to oranges.

Re: Facebook acquires Instagram

#254

Post by scott_s »

admiralpumpkin wrote: post #198
untog wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems ominous for Google, which spent $12.5bn for Motorola to stake a shaky claim in mobile I was under the impression that Google paid that price (and, indeed, bought Motorola at all) for patents. Google is doing just fine out of Android. iOS may be better marketed, but there are a hell of a lot more Android phones out there.

This is untrue, but often assumed. Total iOS devices: 315M (as of 2012-03-07) Total Andriod devices: 300M (as of 2012-02-29) http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/07/tim-cook-talks-ios-device-s... http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/appsblog/2012/feb/29/an... Android is selling faster, but it has yet to have a larger installed base. It will likely happen soon, but iOS had a large lead in terms of start time and the iPad is…

tptacek's point was about profits, not install based.

Re: Facebook acquires Instagram

#255

Post by karpathy »

xorbyte wrote: post #251
aminozuur wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can still post to Instagram without sharing the photo on Facebook. So this "paranoia" - if I may call it that - is only because Facebook now has acces to all of Instagrams information? And Facebook will abuse this position why, exactly?

The current trend with buyouts seems to be eventual integration. Google recently did this with their privacy policy, and it was received with mixed feelings. I see no reason to expect Facebook's acquisition of Instagram not to change how the latter operates: it must become profitable to FB somehow (beyond talent), and data is the most straightforward way. The two blog posts announcing the acquisition aren't legally b…

Exactly. Imagine one day just browsing Facebook casually and enjoying the free services they provide when all of sudden you see an ad on the side that is about an ukulele star throwing a little concert in your home town. Except, you only ever mentioned learning ukulele on Instagram!

I can barely endure the thought.

Re: Facebook acquires Instagram

#256

Post by RexRollman »

nodesocket wrote: post #166
marcamillion wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For 2 main reasons that I can think of: a) You don't know if the acquisition will actually happen. Therefore if it doesn't, you aren't left with nothing. b) It gives you a stronger bargaining chip to increase the price of the acquisition because you literally have a strong alternative. Instagram could tell FB to screw off, they are already getting $50M.

I wonder if the investors (Sequoia, Greylock) knew of the pending acquisition offer from FaceBook when they put forth the 50M investment? If they did, that was the easiest investment ever.

If they did, was it legal?

Re: Facebook acquires Instagram

#257

Post by lucasgonze »

knowsnothing613 wrote: post #253
dirtyaura wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google bought YouTube for $1.65B when YouTube didn't have business model. It was critiqued a lot because of this, but it established Google as a dominant player in video space and it's ripest fruits might be seen in coming years when media consumption moves more and more to mobile. I grant that $1B sounds a lot for Instagram and it is harder to see similar commercial value in photos than in videos. My personal take i…

yeah, and Yahoo bought Flickr for hundreds of millions. And Flickr never became a profit center for yahoo. Now, Yahoo is laying off thousands of workers, and is close to dead poool, because of all its malinvestment in web1.5 (flicker, geocities, delicious, etc). Video has a higher value proposition than photos. Look @ how hard flickr has struggled turning photos into a sustainable business model. I'm comparing apples…

Flickr was in the tens of millions, on the order of $30 million. That was the blog buzz around the price, anyway.

Re: Facebook acquires Instagram

#260

Post by Domenic_S »

dkrich wrote: post #230
marcamillion wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the mere fact that they just raised $50M @ $500M valuation is the reason that this price is so high. Those investors in that round had to at least double their money...if the price was indeed $1B, that's all they did. Just 2X. Although, the argument can be made that a 2X return in 1 - 2 months isn't bad...but then again, VC funds don't have a 2 month life, so over the long-term value (i.e. 10 years most-times…

Are you joking? You don't think a 100% gain is good for a 1-2 month timeframe? The most successful hedge funds in the world have money thrown at them if they can average 50% gains over the course of a year. And that is an outstanding year! I realize the economics of hedge funds and VC funds are different in that VC's take a shotgun approach and hope that one out of ten investments makes up for all the losers, but on…

> if they can average 50% gains over the course of a year

That's the point, this isn't what happened. Given the choice between 2x return in 2 months or 10x return in 120 months, there's no contest at all. That initial investment that returned 2x is now out of play for the life of the fund. If the fund's life is 10 years, the return is 1.1x, not 2x.

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