J.R.McHale

The consensus early reaction, the day after the Facebook Home announcement, appears to be:

• Facebook Home is well-designed, with some clever elements such as the messaging bubbles;
• Google and Android app developers will dislike Facebook’s lock/home-screen and launcher approach which makes Google services and 3rd party apps less visible;
• Facebook home might appeal to certain Android users in the United States (i.e., Facebook power users and mobile phone newbies), but Facebook Home might be more of a play for new users internationally, particularly in emerging markets;
• So what’s new: Facebook Home poses additional privacy concerns through enhanced data collection.

Facebook Home Link Round-up:

• What the Analysts are Saying: A dozen analyst reactions at CNN.Money.
• How Facebook Home Is (and Isn’t) an OS: Fast Company.
• App Developers Are Scared Facebook Home Will Bury Their Stuff: Business Insider.
• Facebook Home’s uneasy relationship with Google: Tim Carmody at The Verge.
• I Like It, but I Don’t Like It Like It: Farhad Manjoo at Slate.com.
• Facebook Home at First Glance: Web/App designer, Khoi Vinh.
• The Soul of a New (Facebook) Machine: The Atlantic.
• Mark Zuckerberg on Facebook Home, Money, and the Future of Communication: Steven Levy.

Aftermath of the Facebook IPO: Now that a bit of time has passed since the IPO and passions regarding the offering have cooled somewhat, interesting post-mortems on the offering are beginning to appear:

Felix Salmon: Facebook’s SecondMarket Muppets

Aswath Damodaran, Professor of Finance at the Stern School of Business, New York University: Facebook: Sowing the Wind, Reaping the Whirlwind In Professor Damodaran’s view, “[m]uch of the chatter about whether Facebook was a good buy or not was framed in terms of pricing, with the optimists arguing that it was a bargain because you were paying less per user than you were at other social media companies and the pessimists arguing that it was expensive because it was trading at a much higher multiple of earnings or revenues than Google or Apple. Any attempt at full-fledged valuation, where you confronted the uncertainty and attempted to make estimates, was viewed as an exercise in speculation and guesswork. I also think that this is why the conspiracy theories, where Morgan Stanley fed inside information about future growth to institutional investors prior to the IPO and where the poor retail investors were the last ones to know, are misplaced. I am convinced that the growth rate and the prospects of the company were never key drivers in how this stock was priced and that if there is a story here, it is one of ineptitude and arrogance, rather than malice.”

Also by Professor Damodaran, his pre-IPO thoughts on the valuation of Facebook:

Facebook and ‘Field of Dreams’: Hoodies, Hubris and Hoopla

The IPO of the decade? My valuation of Facebook

Facebook: Playing the “IPO pop” game?

I think Facebook is colossally dull. I think it’s like everyone coming to live in a huge Soviet apartment block, [in] which everyone’s cell looks exactly the same.

The Facebook Form S-1 Registration Statement (initial filing)

Facebook Settles FTC Charges

David Fincher’s upcoming film (October 2010): The Social Network, about the founding and founders of Facebook.

Facebook, arguably the largest and most important website in the world has most of its content walled off from Google. In fact, the biggest loser in the Facebook privacy debate is not Facebook, it’s Google. Why? Because the more people that put all their status updates, information and pictures behind a wall of privacy, the fewer status updates available to Google (and other search engines as well). The net result is that Google’s mission to index all the world’s information has been irreparably damaged. 500mm Facebook users and most of what they all publish to their networks is unavailable.

Facebook Users’ Bill of Rights

Two interesting posts by Thomas Baekdal: (1) The first rule of privacy, and (2) Facebook is dying; social is not.

More on Facebook’s recent privacy changes:
Wired: Facebook’s Gone Rogue; It’s Time for an Open Alternative.

So now we know what Zuckerberg’s megalomania is, and he’s brilliant, and hired the right guys … to make it happen. But think about the role he’s cast himself in for a minute. Facebook is to be the identity system for the web. A company? That just can’t work.

Speculation on the Value of a Facebook IPO