• We’re currently investigating an issue related to the forum theme and styling that is impacting page layout and visual formatting. The problem has been identified, and we are actively working on a resolution. There is no impact to user data or functionality, this is strictly a front-end display issue. We’ll post an update once the fix has been deployed. Thanks for your patience while we get this sorted.

Facebook worth $50B? which makes Napster founder an instant Billionaire?

Page 2 - Seeking answers? Join the AnandTech community: where nearly half-a-million members share solutions and discuss the latest tech.
trmiv said:
Wrong Napster founder. Sean Parker is the one that was involved with Facebook.
Click to expand...

Oh, right. I need to get more sleep (or watch The Social Network).

silverpig said:
It reflects what the company is worth, hence what the shares of stock are worth, hence what he would get if he cashed out today yes. If you own 50% of a $500k house, you get $250k when it sells. And if it was just him trying to cash out now, he could probably get it too. I bet there's $2.5B (or whatever his share is) sitting out there that wants in to facebook.

Last I heard FB was cash flow positive (ie making money). When this happens you have demonstrated that your business is viable. You can then go to investors for a large chunk of cash to support a future expansion plan. The money they got from GS isn't to piss away on salaries, fibre, and fancy meals. They had to show that they had a plan for the money, and that it would generate a significant return.

The plan for the next year for FB is probably to add infrastructure and a bunch of new money-making services so they can make the company look as attractive as possible before the IPO. At that time, Parker will become rich in a cash sort of way.
Click to expand...

Ah, true enough. I was thinking that market valuation is just a valuation, but you're right - if he wanted to cash out, I bet multiple someones would be willing to take his shares off of his hands at that price.
 
JS80 said:
If anyone is willing to put money where their mouth is, I will put up to $1000 to bet FB will be worth more than $50b in 5 years.
Click to expand...

This is one of those rare times JS80 is absolutely right. It never happens when he talks about politics, but in finance he is usually on point (I believe it's his field). I too would bet a grand on FB being worth more than $50b in 5 years.

FB is a monster & isn't going away. MySpace went down in defeat because it was just a friendster clone & their founders just sold out to NewsCorp, who had no fucking clue on what to do with it.

Zuckerberg is an entrepreneurial genius who could have sold out for $1 Billion a couple years ago, but has managed to stay private and make right decision after right decision up to today. He's a Bill Gates or Steve Jobs kind of figure & as long as he's at the helm they'll be fine.

Consider the 'Wall,' which is basically a social RSS feed that average, 'normal' people use. It and twitter are in the process of replacing RSS. If anything RSS won't be around in 5 years.

Their photo hosting is beating out all the other hosting sites, even though the other sites are better for hosting photos. Soon it will be the same for video.

Look at their gaming platform. It's so big that Zynga got $600 million last year.

FB has over 500 million users and is growing. They'll have 1 Billion soon. They're going to be one of the big boys on the net for a long time to come. Look at these numbers: http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics

Statistics
People on Facebook

* More than 500 million active users
* 50% of our active users log on to Facebook in any given day
* Average user has 130 friends
* People spend over 700 billion minutes per month on Facebook

Activity on Facebook

* There are over 900 million objects that people interact with (pages, groups, events and community pages)
* Average user is connected to 80 community pages, groups and events
* Average user creates 90 pieces of content each month
* More than 30 billion pieces of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photo albums, etc.) shared each month.

Global Reach

* More than 70 translations available on the site
* About 70% of Facebook users are outside the United States
* Over 300,000 users helped translate the site through the translations application

Platform

* Entrepreneurs and developers from more than 190 countries build with Facebook Platform
* People on Facebook install 20 million applications every day
* Every month, more than 250 million people engage with Facebook on external websites
* Since social plugins launched in April 2010, an average of 10,000 new websites integrate with Facebook every day
* More than 2.5 million websites have integrated with Facebook, including over 80 of comScore's U.S. Top 100 websites and over half of comScore's Global Top 100 websites
*

Mobile

* There are more than 200 million active users currently accessing Facebook through their mobile devices.
* People that use Facebook on their mobile devices are twice as active on Facebook than non-mobile users.
* There are more than 200 mobile operators in 60 countries working to deploy and promote Facebook mobile products
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
ImpulsE69 said:
Didn't they say the same thing about Myspace until Facebook came along? 😛 I don't use either so I have no idea how Facebook makes money. I assume with ads, but if they are making that much..sounds like way too many ads for me.
Click to expand...

It's not hard to make that much with ads considering they're the second most visited website on Earth. They actually are under utilizing their ad potential.
 
Facebook raked in $1.86 billion in ad revenue in 2010, and most of that dough didn't come from the big name advertisers.

According to an AdAge report that cited revenue estimates from eMarketer, 60 percent ($1.12 billion) of Facebook's earnings came from smaller companies. These are companies that are likely to produce ads themselves as opposed to using an ad agency. AdAge said that a year ago, companies of this size accounted for closer to 50 percent of Facebook's ad sales.

"Those advertisers are really juicing Facebook's growth," Debra Williamson, an eMarketer principal analyst, told AdAge. "They buy advertising in bulk. They've done it for years on Google, and now they're taking that expertise to Facebook."

By contrast, Facebook earned $740 million from big-name companies such as Coca-Cola, Proctor & Gamble, and Match.com in 2010. In fact, AT&T and Match.com are still the two biggest advertisers on the site.
Click to expand...

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2375926,00.asp
 
aldamon said:
How long have they said that about Google? FB is a different animal now.
Click to expand...

this. I remember people constantly saying google was worthless with the same argument: "do they even make money?".


JS80 said:
If anyone is willing to put money where their mouth is, I will put up to $1000 to bet FB will be worth more than $50b in 5 years.
Click to expand...

I don't think you'll get any takers here. I completely agree with you and I'd do the same bet.
 
Yeah FB is entrenched and growing robustly. MySpace was really only a bunch of goth teens and crappy bands with flashing bug-ridden nasty pages, whereas FB has parents, employers, grandparents, everybody on there. Love it, hate it, be indifferent to it, doesn't change the fact that it's just a sheer titan in the game, and it's just going to keep getting bigger.
 
Arkaign said:
Yeah FB is entrenched and growing robustly. MySpace was really only a bunch of goth teens and crappy bands with flashing bug-ridden nasty pages, whereas FB has parents, employers, grandparents, everybody on there. Love it, hate it, be indifferent to it, doesn't change the fact that it's just a sheer titan in the game, and it's just going to keep getting bigger.
Click to expand...

don't bring logic into a discussion about facebook hate.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Back
Top