I just watched a video clip by Motley Fool, on Microsoft's rumored investment into Myspace.
Facebook is being valued at dot com pricing ($10 billin dollars). Is there really a revenue model working yet? How many of you have actually spent money while clicking on facebook. Will these sites bestuck now with a complete advertising model to drive revenues? While revenue growth should be linked with member growth, are these sites leaving money on the table by not charging fees?
We can tell that there is a great facebook economy, as individuals collaborate and build relationships within facebook. Facebook, however does not seem to have a way to capture money from those deals or relationships without risking alienating is member base.
LinkedIn,to some extent, has this problem. LinkedIn charges some power users to connect with others, but then also disables accounts for those that reach out to those they don't know well, but may like or need to meet. LinkedIn has driven away much traffic due to a punitive environment.
Once facebook takes on an corporate investor, will we see tiered levels of paid membership? Is this one reason, facebook is moving to an older demographic -- so that business professionals will be more willing to pay to play. If magazines, newspapers and other traditional media are having a hard time sustaining a revenue model, how does facebook get a "pass" on having enough long term viability.
Should Microsoft, Google or Yahoo purchase facebook? what is the penalty on Wall Street for the companies which don't grab a share in this social networking space.
Since MTV networks lost out on purchasing MySpace and pulled content from Google (YouTube) to put on their own Joost platform, are they possible suitors as well to reconnect with their college audience and to connect with the social action website they just announced.
Interesting times!!
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Sunday, September 23, 2007
fbFund - 10 million dollars to spur innovation
Facebook this week announced is fbFund. This fund will provide capital to companies and individuals interested in building applications for the "facebook economy".
Facebook is taking out its checkbook and joint venturing with Accel Partners to offer "micro" or "angel" investments. The interesting part is that to avoid conflict of interest or future "non-compete" or "confidentiality" issues, Facebook is not taking equity in any of these companies.
The upside for Facebook is that these applications will cause more "stickyness" to its site, more pageviews and attraction of specialized niches.
The only risk for the developer of the application will be the natural tendency of facebook to find these great ideas and begin to develop them for themselves. Some companies will be fortunate and eventually may be purchased by facebook, others who don't have much intellectual property protections, may be out of luck if and when facebook incorporates those features directly into its applications.
I personally saw this close up for years in the world of ACT! contact management. Small companies would develop products and addons, only to see some of their ideas in corporated in the next release of ACT!. Like any speculative endeavor, there are risks and rewards.
However, since facebook is fronting this money, the risks are lower and seems like a good win-win situation. Join the facebook goldrush.
Facebook is taking out its checkbook and joint venturing with Accel Partners to offer "micro" or "angel" investments. The interesting part is that to avoid conflict of interest or future "non-compete" or "confidentiality" issues, Facebook is not taking equity in any of these companies.
The upside for Facebook is that these applications will cause more "stickyness" to its site, more pageviews and attraction of specialized niches.
The only risk for the developer of the application will be the natural tendency of facebook to find these great ideas and begin to develop them for themselves. Some companies will be fortunate and eventually may be purchased by facebook, others who don't have much intellectual property protections, may be out of luck if and when facebook incorporates those features directly into its applications.
I personally saw this close up for years in the world of ACT! contact management. Small companies would develop products and addons, only to see some of their ideas in corporated in the next release of ACT!. Like any speculative endeavor, there are risks and rewards.
However, since facebook is fronting this money, the risks are lower and seems like a good win-win situation. Join the facebook goldrush.
Join Our "Classes" on Facebook
Facebook is a conversation. A way for individuals to share ideas and information. Since Facebook was originally developed for the college crowd, I decided to develop a series of "classes" on facebook for various levels of user and specialized interest.
Think of these groups as classrooms where we can have a dialog about our experiences and where you can have multiple "teachers". The next step for these "classes" is to move them into webinar and teleclasses. If that is something you may be interested in, please join these groups and share this with your "friends".
Here is a list of the groups below that are available for you to join. Just click on the link below to join a "class" discussion.
Facebook 101 - The Basics
Facebook 201 - Intermediate
Facebook 301 - Advanced
Facebook 401 - Building and Marketing Applications
Facebook 501 - Entertainment - Promoting Books. Music, Movies and TV
Facebook 601 - Politics and Campaign 2.0
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