Facebook is an app right?
I have heard stats like 80-90% of Facebook activity is through their mobile app, something like that, maybe more.
If that's the case then who owns the house that they play in? Google and Apple.
That's a huge threat to Facebook.
Imagine a company that has 1.84 billion daily active users and an annual revenue of $86 billion getting banned for a violation from either app store? Especially with the progress Apple seem to be making towards privacy. Unlikely, but possible.
Remember when Facebook attempted to build their own mobile and mobile OS?
The HTC First is an Android smartphone released by HTC on April 12, 2013. It was unveiled on April 4, 2013, as part of a press event held by Facebook. Serving as a successor to a pair of Facebook-oriented devices HTC released in 2011, it was the first and only Android device to be pre-loaded with Facebook's own user interface layer, Facebook Home, in lieu of HTC's own Sense.
If that had taken off then a large portion of their revenue and active daily users would be 100% protected, reducing that risk significantly.
That never happened though. So what was next?
Facebook went for offering free Internet (as long you used Facebook)
Internet.org is a partnership between social networking services company Meta Platforms and six companies that plans to bring affordable access to selected Internet services to less developed countries by increasing efficiency, and facilitating the development of new business models around the provision of Internet access. The app delivering these services was renamed Free Basics in September 2015. As of April 2018, 100 million people were using internet.org.
This was renamed to Facebook Free basics. Which, from the look of things, didn't turn out so well
So that's a fail on device ownership, OS ownership and access to the Internet. All areas that allow Google and Apple to have dominance, control and power over Facebook.
So what's the next mainstream entry point that Facebook could own at scale..?
AR and VR. The Metaverse finally becoming a mainstream reality and Oculus is the main character in that story.
Here is an extract from Barron's Facebook’s VR Business Is Bigger Than You Think. And It Is Masking the Company’s True Profitability
The analyst points out that The Information recently reported that Facebook has close to 10,000 people working on virtual reality devices. Mahaney estimates that the company will generate between $5.4 billion and $6.4 billion in operating losses this year on its virtual reality business. He estimates that a loss of that magnitude translates to a reduction in the company’s operating margin of about five or six percentage points—he thinks the total could be in the range of 43%-44% range rather than the 37.8% he has been modeling for the year. The implication is that Facebook’s earnings are being muffled by about $2 a share because of the investment in Oculus.
10,000 people working on virtual reality devices.
People are always asking what the next major iPhone like disruptor will be. Apple are reportedly working hard on AR/VR headset, glasses etc
Industrial looking VR headsets won't be round for long, it's only a matter of time before the full Metaverse is realised through something light, fashionable and comfortable that you wear around your eyes.
Once that happens, you'll be either enhanced with all the Metaverse abilities and content, or you won't. I can't imagine a bigger digital divide than that.
Will Apple get there first? Or will Facebook (through the Oculus) be finally free from the house that Google and Apple allow them to play in?
Top comments (2)
I'm very interested to see where they go with it, its a huge step in adoption for the crypto space!
I think all this treading on toes essentially holds back innovation, the whole idea of Web-3 is you're not held back and there is no 'boss'
Really hope its the start of something special!
Definitely and so easy to forget… that’s also how the web started