This was a rather pointless article. Yes, every company will reach a point where growth slows. Yes, every company will have users who quit. Yes, valuations are high right now. Yes, many companies will get replaced by better ones that come along. And yes, it is implied that Facebook is a company.
How does any of this lead to "the end of facebook"?? The author even states "Facebook is still growing very fast in terms of page views and number of users."
I completely agree, but one point that he briefly mentions that I think is even more interesting is the idea of a Facebook IPO.
Consider that Facebook isn't going anywhere (most likely) and will be a major company for a long time. That still doesn't change the fact that if they've already done all of the their major growing (user-wise, I'm assuming that they will continue to look for new revenue sources), their IPO could be a significant letdown for investors if there is simply no where to go but flat.
That said, I don't know any more (or less) that this guy..
Yeah, at this point why would they IPO (except to get rich[er], of course)? Obviously they could grow in some unforeseen way, but if they don't have an ace up their sleeve, what business reason would they have for needing additional capital?
Well, there may or may not be a pressing business need for capital, but I'm sure a lot of the current shareholders would see an IPO as a good exit.
I suppose it's possible that facebook could still be acquired, but given how large they are, and the huge amount of cash/stock it would require to buy them, that seems unlikely to me.
Because when other social networks have stopped growing, they have massively shrunk as the next big thing has come along.
Of course, it's very possible that that argument is mixing up cause and effect, and this is still a relatively young field. But the implication is that, if facebook isn't relevant to pretty much everyone, then it will eventually be eaten up by something that is.
Agreed. FaceBook is still growing and will have to continue to change things up and grow in other areas such as deals, etc. The only reason this article is ranked so high on HN is how sensational titles can game the upvote without opening system.
no, this is major fail from all the financial people involved. you want your company going public when there are expectations of substantial growth. instead facebook is flattening...just what i'm looking for in an IPO, low growth
facebook should have been trading for a year already. and now the market is entering what could be a protracted decline. this reminds me of companies that went public in february of 2000. so obvious the train had already left the station...
In this case, I wouldn't care much about the growth of the user base, which is pretty ubiquitous regardless of some dropoff or slow growth. Rather, the only number I'd care about is the growth of profits and advertising, which is relatively unknown at the moment.
How does any of this lead to "the end of facebook"?? The author even states "Facebook is still growing very fast in terms of page views and number of users."
Major linkbait.