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The Facebook IPO - Because "This Time It's Different"
While first day jumps in IPOs make for great TV and everyone is anxiously awaiting their allocation to the 'greatest IPO of all time' this week, we thought it might be useful to look at some of the larger and more recent tech IPOs to get some perspective on how close to the moon we will get when Facebook is released. Looking at eight of the larger and more media-promoted IPOs of the last year or two (GRPN, ZNGA, LNKD, P, YOKU, DANG, AWAY, and FFN) we find, aside from the potential for an average 50% pop from the lucky allocation / untradable IPO price, the man in the street that bought the IPO in the market on Day 1 now faces an average loss of 54% with incredibly only 1 of the 8 names (ZNGA) still holding on to gains (+11%) having managed to rally 15% in the last week. We assume that the underwriters will price FB for a nice pop and given the euphoria we hear from talking head after talking head, it doesn't matter where it actually opens, it will be bid to infinity and stay there as unlike all these other well-hyped IPOs (and paradigm changers of the past eh hem YHOO), this one will be different.
From very close to Day 1, the average of these eight large IPOs never saw green again. Of course individual names have ebbed and flowed.
The last week or so has seen some of the more recent US tech IPOs get a lift on the back of simply the fact that Facebook is coming to market.
Source: Bloomberg
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Facebook = CIA data bank
Zuck: Yeah so if you ever need info about anyone at Harvard
Zuck: Just ask.
Zuck: I have over 4,000 emails, pictures, addresses, SNS
[Redacted Friend's Name]: What? How'd you manage that one?
Zuck: People just submitted it.
Zuck: I don't know why.
Zuck: They "trust me"
Zuck: Dumb fucks
Will another government staged 9/11 attack be required to cover up the next dot-com bubble bust?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ThJ0wxKZnI
FBI, Feds collect Facebook, social media data; Why are you surprised?By Larry Dignan | March 17, 2010, 5:59am PDT
Summary: The Feds have training courses on gathering information on social networks, identifying relationships, chasing the bad guys and going undercover, according to documents obtained by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. The biggest surprise: That this would surprise anyone.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation and Internal Revenue Service have training courses on gathering information on social networks, identifying relationships, chasing the bad guys and going undercover, according to documents obtained by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. The biggest surprise: Social networking users are surprised by any of this government activity.
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/btl/fbi-feds-collect-facebook-social-media-data-why-are-you-surprised/31996
EFF Posts Documents Detailing Law Enforcement Collection of Data From Social Media Sites
EFF has posted documents shedding light on how law enforcement agencies use social networking sites to gather information in investigations. The records, obtained from the Internal Revenue Service and Department of Justice Criminal Division, are the first in a series of documents that will be released through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) case that EFF filed with the help of the UC Berkeley Samuelson Clinic.
One of the most interesting files is a 2009 training course that describes how IRS employees may use various Internet tools -- including social networking sites and Google Street View -- to investigate taxpayers.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2010/03/eff-posts-documents-detailing-law-enforcement
Criminal Social Networking Information Gathering Justice Department March 2010
https://www.eff.org/files/filenode/social_network/20100303__crim_socialnetworking.pdf
breaking news, DEBKA.COM reports facebook dollars to be added to sdr basket of currencies....more later...
...NOOO TYLER, PLEASE, NOT THE BANISH BUTTON, PLEEEEASEEE NOOOOO!!!
The communist assholes had good files before the fall of the USSR. These fucking fascist have a date stamp on their forheads-2018.
They still have not filed and the market environment seems pretty good.. do they know something?
Buy Day 1, Sell Day 2, Short Day 3?
More or less what I'm going to do. Gawd, the way a brand name make people silly to lose their cash....
Try some accuracy:
Zynga $10 closed 1/31 at $10.49
Groupon $20 closed 1/31 at $20.39
Pandora $16 closed 1/31 at $13.19
Linkln $45 closed 1/31 at $72.15
Oh they are supposed to outperform the hysteria price of the first day close?
GMAFBA
How's that GM IPO coming along? (Today's close $24.37)
Great, now you tell me. I knew I should have never clicked the like "Terrorism" button...
As long as you don't say bombardier in an airport or on an airplane it'll all be good.
Twitter too...
I guess our guys are even I scanner darkly in Europe
Caution on Twitter urged as tourists barred from US
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-16810312
I have visions of the shortsleeve and tie g-men feverously reading tweets from every moron on the planet. Soon they will be paying us visits for misused grammer and spelling errors.We are about to witness an IPO @ 35x - 50x earnings for a company that has no product outside of the bankrupt consumer-driven economy we no live in. Yeah sign me up for that....
Facebook - allegedly reported to have seen gross revenue of anywhere from 220 to 400 million last year.
Given that it has yet to be required to report its accurate numbers, it could have very well lost money, like Living Social did - LivingSocial lost $558 million in 2011
And that's with the Facebook rebellion already underway, with users fleeing it as they voice concerns about privacy and also feel it makes their web experience less pleasant - if Facebook can't figure out a way to profitably monetize the activity of a billion people or so who use its services, wtf.
Facebook is no Google.
If Facebook were to institute a fee-for-use model it would cease to exist.
Yet it's IPO backers (snake oil pitchmen) claim a valuation that is in the neighborhood of 100 billion.
If this isn't the watershed-type moment that we've seen so many times before, such as 1999, 2007, where the lunacy has peaked, and gravity reasserts its mighty hammer, we're not far away from that defining moment.
*Let me reiterate that Living Social datapoint:
Think about this; they lost twice their revenue.
LivingSocial lost $558 million on revenue of 225 million in 2011
If anyone goes to google and types in "how to permanent" it will give you one of the top searched request which is "how to permanently delete a facebook account"
Hah. Awesome. That's just a tad bit more difficult than the other big Google search: "how to turn bullshit into gold"
Yeah, but look what happened to homegrocer.com.
nah we need another lastminute.com which went public with its aptly named self right when it all crashed
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Lastminute.com_stock_price.png
In the case of both Google and Facebook, three talented students in their 20's came out of obscurity to establish multi-billion dollar enterprises. Do you suppose they had some help?
Mark Zuckerberg is one of the most ''successful entrepreneurs'' in the last decade. Having made a fortune through his Facebook empire, he reaches more than 500 million people worldwide. It seems like a fairytale. A student creates a new interface to connect the people throughout the world. Well, it sounds great doesn't it? It would, if it were true.
Let's look at headlines that should cast no doubt about the true character of CIAbook:
Facebook's Zuckerberg Says The Age of Privacy is Over -
Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg says privacy is no longer a 'social norm'
Facebook - the CIA conspiracy
The Face of Facebook - (Pay particular notice to the IMs that got leaked and confirmed to be true by the New Yorker)
Facebook & Social Media: A Convenient Cover For Spying -
If we think about it, Facebook is nothing but a big Orwellian spy grid. All Facebook's offerings ultimately lead to being tracked.
ssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh now - time for your meds...
The Government already has all your details - i handed them over to them
you're one of those conspiracistic people - they have a cure.
Best concentrate on NDAA rather than facebook
Ok, so we have figured out these entities are CIA operations. Now we need to discuss that the CIA is a Scull and Bones operation. What is Scull and Bones? Figure that out, and you figure out the game plan. You figure out the game plan, you figure out the end game.
Does this include pictures of my sisters horse?
I agree with you. Twitter is also a weak spot.
Biggest database coimpany in the world is Oracle. Who did Lord Larry Ellison work for before he founded Oracle? Who was he building the Oracle database for? Starts with a C and ends in an A.
Gasp! Canada, how could you?!
I can't wait until the sordid details of Zuckerberg's personal life are splattered across the pages of "Star", "National Enquirer" and all the other gossip rags.
maybe the Facebook Timeline covers are different. The rest is almost the same.
I read that the FBI has asked certain companies to develop software it can use to survey Facebook for potential terrorists/criminals. The technology required for the FBI surveillance needs doesn't yet exist, but I have no doubt it will soon enough, and there will no doubt be fools who will get snagged in sting operations.
I have never invested in a dotcom and never will. It 's just not real enough for me.
the SEC asked for some trannypic queries
You forgot to add Mossad.
And AIPAC?
As a friend?
My IPO of my site which was like the combination of twitter, Utube and facebook, failed miserably. Maybe it was the name... U-TWIT-FACE.
I hope facebook falls flat on it's face on the first day. Zuck is a F**k and everybody knows it.
put your money in..... and its gone!!!
I think we should all go "all in" at the opening and dump everything after 24 hours!
That will teach those sheep bagholders!
When did Corzine start working for Facebook?
A brief review of just how far down the value harvesting food chain IPO buyers will be:
http://www.breakingviews.com/facebook-ipo-will-put-public-markets-to-shame/20046068.article
always love an article that can employ the words "hoi polloi"
I'm short already.
i'm 6'4 but willing to give this "short" thing a try
I'm going to short the Farmville Farmer's Market.
Cyber-vegetables are highly nutritious to us robots! :>D
IT'S AN INSIDER'S TRAP TO THE TRADING IDIOTS.
PLEASE, ANYBODY,
DO NOT FALL FOR IT. DO A FAVOR TO YOURSELF AND PISS ON IT.
And it's gone......
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RAKsMnAM8vk
$100 BILLION
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Seriously - $100 BILLION
Makes it as valuable as McD's
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
I laughed so hard I laughed myself off the page!
But surely virtual farming is going to be a significant part of the economy in the future???
...and virtual farms will need good manure - virtual horseshit - which is where facebook comes in.
The algo driven robots need something to eat.
Makes it as valuable as McD's
"Right, and you can't even eat it..like you can an iPad." - Dudley
You can lick your monitor after you grow your virtual vegetables.
haha... but given what happens in front of 99.9% of computer monitors there is no way in hell I'm licking it! :)
HEY! - who downed me?
has someone pre-bought or something? WHO ARE YOU? SHOW YOURSELF!
FED plant or long laugh line Nazi.
Remind you of anything?
http://news.cnet.com/Worldwide-Fiber-plans-IPO/2100-1033_3-236145.html
I must be the only person in the world that does not get the Facebook thing. Niether is its interface comfortable, nor its purpose clear. Navel gazing on steroids...but I understand the company might be worth $100 billion. Ummmm....sold to you.
Then again, I also struggle to understand how a 1500 calorie starch bomb burrito is "health food."
"but I understand the company might be worth $100 billion"
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
I heard that too!!
1500 calorie starch bomb..
too funny.. thx Cdad.
Cdad- what's not to understand. I'll spell it out for you>
First, sign up and give them ALL your personal data, a few photos of you and the dog or whatever. You can add bank numbers, soc. sec. # if you like (although they'll be able to get that info anyways).
Good so far?
Now, the second step is that they sell all of your valuable information to marketing companies, the gubment, and anyone else with enough money and make a profit (presumably)
Next, you need to keep updating your account so that everybody knows exactly what you're doing and when -yes, even when going to the bathroom (oh wait, scratch that, that's for Twitterers) forget the bathroom unless you're gorgeous and naked.
They then go and sell this additional information and bingo, in a couple very repeatable steps they can make millions of dollars on yours and everybody else's information.
Sound good? Great. Just go to Facebook.com or your local FBI and sign up.
At $100 billion, it would be priced at 25 times revenues - not earnings, revenues. Yikes!
Just imagine the revenue when the Martians get Facebook!!! Alpha Centauri???
Post this article/link - on facebook.
Done.
Where have all the companies that make things gone?
Uh...China?
Drop the "The".....just "Facebook IPO".....it's cleaner.
Seriously Tyler, thou art so certain of the guaranteed drop in Facebook shares from its IPO price, so thou shouldst be starting a $SHORT IPOX fund. Put thy money where thy mouth is!
Don't be so stubborn! Go for it, perfect timing. They should be praised, giving HF an opportunity to pick up steam.
F Facebook
F Facebook
the man in the street that bought the IPO in the market on Day 1 now faces an average loss of 54%
ha ha!!! like those 99 percenters mean anything!! ha ha ha!!!!!! they are better than an insinkerator!!! no mess, no spills, just dump our leftovers through to them!!!!
+1 for mentioning an "Insinkerator".
I think those are still made in the U.S., but the quality blows. I had to replace one because the bottom corroded and was leaking, and it was a 1/2 hp, and only 3 years old.
Wow, I installed a 1/2 hp twelve years ago and it is going strong (except when I grind up a shot glass in it).
Maybe they are getting the "steel" from China?
Something happened with the new units, because it's a common problem with the bottom rotting out prematurely.
I never had nor heard of a problem with the older units.
Check out this link for just a sampler of the complaints (exactly the problem I had), with claims they used corrosive steel near the bottom seal, which rusts through quickly.
how to mend it .com - Drip leak from bottom of Insinkerator Badger 5Idiots Purchasing Option
It might just be me but I can't stand fucking Fakebook.
What a waste of time.
I constantly badger my wife when she is on it. I mean there are dishes to do for Christ sakes!
hahahahahahahahaha!
+1
And jesus christ when my wife asks for a new watch.........theres a perfectly good clock on the stove!
Yep, facebook blows. I'm trying to downsize
But how 'bout that awesome business model?
http://acrossthestreetnet.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/facebook-ipo.png
Facebook is the easiest way for the Government to get information about you and your activities. Be warned...
I would argue that google has done a far better job in that arena.
I'm a Facebook hater. I don't have a Facebook account and I think the Zuck is evil.
That said: Facebook is not the same as the last few tech IPOs. It is a Google not a Groupon.
Does this mean that one should buy the IPO? Of course not... it's a sham.
The thing about "tech" these days is that most of it isn't tech... instead it's advertising/media wrapped in tech clothing. Facebook's primary revenue model = advertising. Same as Google, same as most of the other stuff out there.
Thus, Facebook as new Juggernaut will not create much... instead it will just cannibalize the ad revenue that is currently going to Google and other media.
Yep. But Google and Facebook will have a battle royal for other "techs" causing valuations of iEatShit.com to skyrocket. FREE MONEY FOR ALL!!!!!!!
Agreed. Funny I've never heard anybody say, "My business has really taken off now that I advertise on Google!"
Facebook will provide a new outlet for advertisers to waste their money.
Facebook?????
What the fuck man....this is what its come to???
Off to my local "real money dealer....
Fuck mother fuckin Facebook.....
A stolen Idea ..
FUCK YOU Facecrook!
CORRECTION: - it will END UP as a stolen idea.
easily copied - easily beaten
Ron Jeremy is suing Zuck - that's the rumor.
He claims Zuck stole the whole idea from Ron's sitonmyfacebook.com idea he had years ago.
+1
I laugh when I hear people refer to facebook as a "technology" company. Remind me, precisely what technology did facebook invent, develop, produce, and bring to the market again?
Bloody sheep.
it developed the technology of 'idiot entrapment'
world leaders.
You're on a roll writing. Funny stuff all the way down-thread.
Doesn't facebook have walls?
I hear those walls have ears.
ori
Buy in the second market and flip into the public market.. easy easy money...that is of course ONLY if you are accredited (read 1%) and are allowed to invest in such "risky" instruments like "private placements" by law... because if you dont have a net worth of $1 milly or havent made a quarter milly for the passed two years you are unworthy of easy money and will dilute the pool of nimrods being flipped into.. oh uh.. I meant, are not sophisticated enough to understand such a complicated asset as a private placement... its for your protection of course.
Buy Groupon, get pooped on. Wash, rinse and repeat. Applies to all of these full of hot air and hype type of shitburgers.
When the entire purpose of an IPO is just to make insiders money instead of growing a business, the market has lost its purpose.
As private corporations maybe 1 or 2 out of the S&P could actually make it.
The question is, Does Facebook actually make any money?
Well page views have been considered profit, just like revenue even if everything is sold at a loss. How insane is it that other internet corps would go up in value just because Facebook is going to file for an IPO?
Wait I get it, because in order to grow Facebook is going to need to use all its IPO cash to buy up every other dotcom out there. THAT'S THE GAME!!! Just like Biotech. Make a bet and hope someone buys out your investment for triple the value.
Watch for all the Google vs Facebook news stories and buyout rumors.
Hey now, just a second, don't deny those insiders and vulture capitalists their pounds of flesh. They are the "job creators" after all.
Hey, that's not fair. My roomate in college who never went to class on time, almost failed out twice, and cheated on every term paper got a good paying job at Google designing "User Experience".
What the fuck does that have to do with being a venture capitalist and getting to buy into the provate equity before it is flipped to the retail crowd and extracting 10x your wealth regardless of whether the company succeeds or fails?
You do have to wonder who is buying this stuff, and pray to God it's not the guy managing your company's retirement fund.
Oh it's the guy managing your retirement fund.
FB = Nothing more than a glorified message board. Gaybook.
CALPERS and your insurance company.
I definitely would not recommend investing in this IPO.
Pandora Style Beads
The same group of numbnuts who bought bundled subprime mortgages.
Virtual Space Time: Intro
So, VIX is signaling depression, and Corporate is at TDC (greatest profit, producing no marginal taxes, and the individual tax base has already rolled over). What goes in that chamber, through thought taxation, determines the outcome. You don’t want the spoil going back into the chamber on the margin at TDC. What is talent to labor to retained earnings to capital, at space time, aggregated?
On the derivative side, it’s a stage; on the integral side, it’s a laboratory. Why does it surprise anyone that the country is running backwards at infinite QE? They already have negative relative interest rates. Is it a change of direction to extend QE infinitely in stages? Make them explicit; see what happens. The empire burns on anxiety.
DC and Seattle are the most “educated” cities. They are also the most irrational. That’s it; build a “bunker buster” to dive deeper and deeper into the crust, and drop it on a target built for the occasion, and pay slaves to build the communication platform that controls the prison around it. Does it get any dumber than Boeing and Apple?
Anyone who has ever entered university knows it’s a political farce. The empire manages garbage. Of course it wants as much garbage as possible, so it creates a positive feedback looking glass. If you tell the empire nothing, it can only see itself. America built the best university, fed by the best k-12 groupthink feedback system, to the end of the most disposable economy in History, which was rolled out globally, consuming everything in its path. Run as it might, its originator will not escape.
Under DC architecture, memory competes against itself, losing every time, which makes perfect sense in an economic activity world, with a “free” market for select executives coming out of the university cohort, funded by slave labor and directed by trusts, with a conformance-based filter, which now begins at birth, all projecting future surpluses as the means to current deficits, including deleveraging interest on past debt. By all means, hand your children over to the State.
The problem is the solution. They run in pairs, across the looking glass. It is the direction of money you care about at TDC, the resulting backlash of implicit credit at the implicit community level. As Tip provided, all politics is local (aggregated).
Human behavior cannot be changed at the aggregate level in real time, except through distilled backlash, by changing the perception of time, what future participants pay attention to on the margin of their current event horizons. The older empires did not “die” for lack of resources. They were replaced to increase circulation.
Language is the constraint, not oil. The pundits are using their new words, not that they understand them now. The equations come later. It’s always a sh**-show.
I thought the problem was that Universities are driven by student demand, rather than employer demand. That they increase the funding for what's popular, rather than what's productive. But I suppose that's me stuck in my industrialist thinking.
my 25 yrs experience says that they are driven by energy consortiums, to the benefit of trusts, with various characters like healthcare downstream, but opinions vary...my experience revolves around military engagement...I don't think student demand is the 800 lb gorilla in the room...
Faceplant ...
100 billion for a social web site. What has happened to this once great country. And how many jobs will this farce produce, 100, 1000, or none.
What a waste.
Oh, it'll produce some jobs alright. Are you telling me that your employer hasn't hired a "Social Media Consultant" yet? What are you, in the stone age? Humanities majors who spent the past four years on Facebook and Twitter have to work somewhere!
Oh, it'll produce some jobs alright. Are you telling me that your employer hasn't hired a "Social Media Consultant" yet? What are you, in the stone age? Humanities majors who spent the past four years on Facebook and Twitter have to work somewhere!
Would not be complete without special mention of Quepasa, the Latino-based social network. Came out in June 1999 at $240/share, went through a 1-20 reverse split in 2003 making the adjusted IPO $12, and currently trades at roughly $4.50.
Markets are efficient. All risk priced in. Outlook bullish.
Disclaimer: I bought Apple when it was trading a $.10 a share. I am long Groupon and long Zynga.
Apple and Facebook will mitigate any future oil supply problems because it will keep people occupied on their lazy asses.
These products are more saviors to humanity han anything else. Buying them makes you a patriot.
I think it's far too expensive, but honestly, compared to most of the internet companies out there (with the exception of google?) facebook has a ton of potential revenue. For hundreds of millions of people, it's a depressingly large part of their lives. People are already spending an insane amount on ridiculous games through facebook- like Farmville. If they can't figure out how to make money from having access to 500million+ potential customers/ad revenue they shouldn't be in the business.
it's all hype and marketing. hype is good. need to raise awareness and sell shares. make sure everyone knows. come to think of it, i dont' believe i've ever read a positive comment about anything on zero hedge. just negative drone. you watch, this ipo will rock.
Gold, bitchez
A lot f IPOs rocked out of the gate. The Street.com sound familiar.
As those UK tourists learned in LA recently, our beloved government has been reading and remembering 600 tweets per second.
800,000,000 dossiers on Facebook? Go long storage.
How are MySpace, AOL, and Netscape doing?
don't forget prodigy, they were a contender once
What the fuck is a Zynga?
They are a game developer.
game copier.....
http://www.theverge.com/2012/2/1/2763232/zynga-ceo-mark-pincus-copycat-accusations-nimblebit
They developed Farmville, aka the only reason Facebook is still in business.
So I should sell FB and buy ZNGA then. See? Trading is easy.
Other than Zynga is pissing off its users by adding more and more content without resolving any problems with the existing content.
How long does it take from IPO before a stock can be shorted again?
Disclaimer: I use FB to stay in touch with people, but don't play the games or buy Facebook Bucks.
Why wouldnt I invest in Facebook? Its called Friendster. Look it up.
Friendster? Hell, I remember eCircles. Don't know if they were able to go public before their implosion. I give Facebook a few more years before its user base erodes as the young kiddies start flocking to something else which doesn't include their parents.
http://www.cww.org/ecircles/index.html
I know a lot of Facebook users and when the topic comes up I always like to find out if they click on the adds. Nobody has ever answered yes to that question. Everybody likes to use it for the free stuff.
surprised no-one has started Assbook yet, it would be a perfect mix of narcissism, voyeurism, and meaningless drivel... kind of like Facebook
It's called Shitfacedbook.
I think this thing will have a huge opening day, and be a huge flop five years down the line. They'll try to get involved in cell phones, tv, and whatever is hot at the moment. Advertisers will realize nobody clicks those ads, and in fact most people use adblock. lolol.
I'd like to add one more point: by going public with our private data and acting like this is the new norm, Facebook has invited a better social media site to be created. One that keeps user data private. Do not be surprised to see something like this spring up in the next year and everyone flock to it.
People who can get in on the IPO will do well. Nobody else should touch it.
There is nothing, absolutely nothing, on Facebook which is private. Period.
Yes, I know. I should have put "private" in quotes.
I use all fake data on FB. I recommend everyone do this.
yes, use the pictures of those people from the inserts that come in the frames you buy at kmart
I have ghostery, adblock plus, betterprivacy, https, noscript, etc., and I don't see any ads, anywhere.
I also use an older version of Firefox, because they can suck my ass with their new supercookie.
On ZH you except this type of response of a hyped IPO like FB. Whats interesting is that even if you go to Blogs on Yahoo, you find the same negativity behind it. It's hard to find people excited about FB
lol... when's the next update Tyler? are your strawberries dying in farmville? or you playing Hemp Tycoon now?
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/ZeroHedge
A small head's up on Zynga:
They've been (fairly directly) offering to buy out profitable / zeitgeisty small games / apps (either single product or entire studio) and when refused, have been cloning them [i.e. 100% direct clone of style / mechanics etc].
Whilst this is in no way illegal in the games market, it has pushed a few noses out of joint in the small world of computer geeks, and is known as the China model of company development. This adds to their mission of building skinner boxes merely to keep rats tapping that button1. However, popular places such as Penny Arcade have now jumped on the band wagon, as has Reddit, Gamasutra, even Business Insider.
Note: Last time Penny Arcade jumped on a band-wagon, they ruined the guy's career; this time I can imagine the track-back will be more subtle. However, working for them is rapidly moving down from a decent place to work where there's lots of talent to "sweat-shop with no creativity that forbids design or innovation and forces you to clone other people's games. Oh, and give that fucking stock back now, or else".
I see that 15% hike as a short term gain; medium to long term, I see a lot of the talent leaving ASAP.
In other news ~ FB. Getting people to pay for being the source and product of a company that gets it for free is the ultimate in irony.
Facebook IPO is the Solyent Green of Capitalism.
Solyent Green of Capitalism- liked that!
funny, youth unemployment is skyrocketing...
I honestly warms my heart to know how many here hate facebook. I thought I was the only person left on the planet who avoided it like the plague.
Never been on it. Not once. Never will.
Pets.com
Everyone should bombard Facebook with nonsense and lies. If enough people put false information on it the data would become worthless.
Even if the data is inaccurate, the metadata could be valuable. The only winning move is not to play.
Facebook allows one to hide in plain site. And to keep track of your teenagers. It's not all bad.
Buy.