Facebook is going public to raise 5 BILLION dollars! This is important. Facebook has 800 million users (who pay nothing). The fact that the company is ready to sell shares to the public and Wall Street is underwriting the initial public offering can only mean one thing: the age of superficial communication devoid of real content and real meaning may be peaking.
The upside of going public for Mark Zuckerberg is that his equity in a private enterprise is now liquid and usually trades at a much higher value. That's the good news. The downside is increased transparency. Shareholders want to know how he makes his money and how he spends it. The public can see where he generates his revenue and how (or if) his business model works.
This is problematic for Facebook. The company probably makes some hefty coin selling space to advertisers. But Facebook's most valuable asset is harder to value. Its most valuable asset is the data it's accumulated on you ... what you look at ... what you buy ... where you live ... who your friends are.
The image above shows this tension between how Facebook is perceived and what is really going on under the hood. Facebook is valuable as long as users pour their time and information into it. The data you generate as a user is what's making Zuckerberg rich (and good on him).
Someone is making a lot of money - someone, but not the people whitewashing the Internet's fences! The world is full of Tom Sawyers!
