Slashdot Mirror
Facebook Adds 96 Million Shares, Will Privacy Get Worse After IPO?
AlistairCharlton writes "Facebook has made yet another amendment to its S-1 filing, adding a further 96 million shares, pushing its initial public offering up to a potential maximum of $18.4bn (£11.5bn). In what is the eighth amendment to its S-1 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Facebook has also increased the number of shares allowed for over allotment, up from 50.6 million to 63.2 million." Facebook will have a lot of pressure to increase revenue after it goes public. jfruh writes in with a story about how that will impact their privacy policies. "There's been a steady drumbeat of panics over the past few years involving how Facebook uses the personal information you give it; nevertheless, someday you'll look back at 2012 as the golden age of Facebook privacy. That's because, once Facebook has its IPO, it'll come under huge pressure from the markets to extract more revenue from its business. And with display advertising not generating game-changing amounts of money, Facebook has only one valuable resource: your data, which is going to be monetized as hard as possible."
Will it make privacy worse?
Yes.
And here's why:
Read the fine print of the IPO - it says FB "will do evil whenever it can".
Now if that is not a slap in the face of Google, I don't know what is.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Google, unlike Facebook, actually makes money.
Or else he did a search for Acura to find the dealerships. The simplest explanation is usually the correct one.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
What the HELL is it with this trend of new people having multi-paragraph posts up at the exact same time the article hits. Check the timestamps -- there's less than a minute between this post and the article going up. It's this account's first post, it's paragraphs long, it's up at the same time as the article, and it's telling you to buy Facebook stock. Draw your own conclusions.
I can picture your ads now: "Do you have compulsive lying disorder? Get relief now, ask your doctor about VeriPilium."
Working in investment industry, I would seriously suggest buying Facebook shares
When people in the "investment industry" start talking about buying shares in anything publicly, that's usually about the time the general public should run, screaming, in the opposite direction.
You go ahead and buy yourself a few thousand shares, 'Mr. Investment Industry.' Good luck with your pumping and dumping.
Both Facebook and Google share many business practices and monetizing practices. While Google had the unfortunate timing for their IPO (2004) after dot com bubble burst, the exact same thing could had been said about them. Many slashdotters, however, still believe that Google does the right thing.
I'm not sure who these "Many Slashdotters" are that you refer to -- some sort of expert panel on the morality of corporations I guess -- but they certainly are ignorant, and haven't been reading the website for which they are named. Google has become quite bent, particularly relative to their starting point, and that subject is discussed regularly and extensively on these forums (typically with a few ignorant twits starting the discussion by saying, "But you all love Google!" followed by a chorus of, "Are you daft? No we don't."). From cozying up to the U.S. surveillance state to embracing censorship in China, Google has become far more morally flexible since their IPO.
And bear in mind, Google started off as a hard-core moralist corporation. They were the poster-boys for "what a scientist/moralist company should be" until Eric Schmidt and the public shareholders came along. Facebook is starting with no discernible principles to act as a rudder.
Of course, I agree with your assessment of the investment potential. But that says a great deal more about the flaws in our economic policies than it does about whether Facebook is good for long-term United States growth.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
Don't know about selling data, but their astroturfing unit seems to be running at full steam.
Take a look at the original post. I SAID LOOK AT IT! Holy shit! IT'S FUCKING BEAUTIFUL. The grammar and punctuation is impeccable. It's the longest, most intensive, best edited FIRST POST! I've ever seen. Complete with embedded links! Almost as if he had it typed and ready to paste in advance of this story. Oh, and it's the only story ever commented on by a brand new ID. Get bent, astroturfer. We like Google better than you. Suck on it.
Indeed, because the only other accusation is that Google is reading the old man's mind.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Ya, only if you know HISTORY. But this about the future, man. Progress. You have to look forward. Seize the day. BUY BUY BUY!
Don't know about selling data, but their astroturfing unit seems to be running at full steam.
Take a look at the original post. I SAID LOOK AT IT! Holy shit! IT'S FUCKING BEAUTIFUL. The grammar and punctuation is impeccable. It's the longest, most intensive, best edited FIRST POST! I've ever seen. Complete with embedded links! Almost as if he had it typed and ready to paste in advance of this story. Oh, and it's the only story ever commented on by a brand new ID. Get bent, astroturfer. We like Google better than you. Suck on it.
I can top that... google his name, it shows up nowhere on the entire internet except this /. story. If you're gonna astroturf, at least have the brains to use a name like "john doe" or "a5tr0turf3r".
Can someone with a FB account search for him on FB? I deleted my account well over a year ago so I can't search FB.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Okay so I know you're just another of those high UID, never posted before anti-Google troll-shills but I can answer this question:
"What I cannot understand is why Google gets a free pass on this while slashdotters absolutely hate Facebook."
There are a number of reasons, but for me they are:
Despite all the FUD your PR company likes to spread, for all the theoretical things Google has done wrong over the years I've never actually suffered anything detrimental as a result of Google's theoretically evil actions. I've never suffered spam, I've never had any problems. Contrast this to Facebook and the theoretical problems turn into actual problems - I have had Facebook illegaly sell my data in breach of the UK's data protection act, I have had it recommend people who it could only have associated with me by illegaly gathering data from elsewhere. I know these things for a fact because we're talking about data which I have not stored on Facebooks systems, e-mail addresses that I have only used in certain places and so forth.
Further, whilst Google certainly does do wrong, it also often tries hard to do right, in contrast I can't think of anything positive that's over and above it's business interests that Facebook has done. I've also yet to see anyone quite as obnoxious and who quite so desperately believes his own bullshit as the guy following the discussion at about 49minutes into this documentary:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zeOlO_2nddY
Still, it's fun watching him squirm.
Oh, it probably doesn't help that Google came from a couple of guys doing some university research, whilst Facebook came from a guy who stole and cheated left right and centre either. That's not really the greatest starting point for a company who wants to get all our data, whether given it honestly, or whether it's obtained it illegaly. On the illegality thing, here's a hint as to what I'm referring to: under the data protection acts of many countries, including (all?) those in Europe, a third party cannot give a company permission to hold your data, yet Facebook uses EXACTLY this method to gather data on people. The previous automatic opt in on allowing apps to gather friends data even if those friends haven't used that app and hence have no relationship with the 3rd party company in question is an example of this.
Oh, and I forgot to add, perhaps it's also because Google doesn't need to hire shills to troll Slashdot?
It's ironic, your very employment answers your own question - the reason people hate Facebook more than Google is precisely because Facebook hires too many people like you.
I thought exactly the same thing when Google went IPO and the Investment Industry was pushing a stock price of $75. I convinced our investment club (remember those?) that they didn't have a business plan, had no obvious source of sufficient revenue to sustain the share valuation that was being discussed, and that we shouldn't buy in.
8 years later, it's above $600.
And the worms ate into his brain.
Actually, this time, he actually did just that. "John Wiggenerstrom" == "Waggener Edstrom".
Trolling is an art. I miss the Chiropractor Troll, he was funnier.
And dozens of other companies that fit the same description are gone. Don't doubt yourself. Don't invest in a company if you don't understand how they're going to make money.
In the year before its IPO (2003), google profited $106M.
In the year before its IPO (2011), facebook profited $1,000M.
Currently there are amount 800 million people (a very impressive number!), but there is room for over 6 billion more. And those won't be joining MySpace, Google+ or Diaspora, they will join Facebook because that's where everyone is.
Last time I checked 800 million is way less than 6 billion (about 13% of 6 billion), which kind of contradicts the statement that 'that's where everyone is'
Working in investment industry, I ...
Oh is that where the fuzzy math comes from?
Before I reach for my wallet, could mister financial industry explain how facebook's revenue (around 1bilion) justifies the current valuation of 100 billion? Short of making every single living person on the planet a facebook member and then quadrupling their net income per user (currently at about $1) I don't see how any investment made now will break even in the next 5 years.
Myspace launched in 2003, was bought by News Corporation in 2005 for $580 million, was totally irrelevant by 2008, and was sold again in 2011 to Justin Timberlake for only $35 million.
It seems to me that Google is a huge exception to an otherwise pretty bankable rule.
Actually, Facebook's profit margin and debt-equity ratio are about the same as Google's. However, their revenue and profit are around 1/10 of Google (IIRC) while their estimated valuation is about 1/5 (?), so they are likely overvalued.
Ceci n'est pas un sig.
Facebook is caught between a rock and a hard place with regard to user privacy. They already take a lot of flack from users who don't like what they perceive as Facebook's lax privacy protection. Facebook can't simply dilute it further without risking a flood of protest from its users. It can't afford that. That's not to mention the various state and federal privacy regulations already in place that will also constrain them.
Oh, and don't count out Google+ as competition just yet. Google isn't going to declare defeat in the social media space any time soon. They recently completely revamped the Google+ interface and have shown that they're in it for the long haul. They will be waiting for Zuckerberg & Co. to stumble and give users an excuse to jump ship. I suspect they won't have to wait long.
Of course, the investors will be howling for Facebook to bring in the numbers, especially now that GM has announced yesterday that they are cancelling all of their advertising on FB due to its lack of effectiveness. You can bet that move has caught the attention of every other large advertiser. Facebook is in trouble. They have very little maneuverability to enhance their revenue stream and a lot of pressure to do so. Something's got to give and I predict it will not be pretty for either FB's bottom line or their stock price.
If the OP typed up eight paragraphs in response to a Firehose submission just in case it got posted and then sat there ready to claim first post when it did, and he's not getting paid, he's just trolling, I think that's a good deal more self-humiliating than the people "falling for it".