Facebook revenue beats estimates; discloses antitrust probe | Hacker News Reader

Facebook revenue beats estimates; discloses antitrust probe

reuters.com

121 pointstareqak100 comments

I came to the conclusion that there is definitely an ad network listening in to private conversations on users' phones and that network probably belongs to Facebook.

Recently, I was cleaning my apartment and I moved a heavy piece of furniture to vacuum the dust underneath it and I found a set of clear plastic retainers for teeth. They must have belonged to the previous tenant who had moved out about 6 months earlier. The retainers looked like they were 3D printed (lots of small ridges on them) and I told my wife that when I had mine (a decade earlier), they were kind of expensive but these ones were 3D printed so they must be a lot cheaper and we can probably just throw them away. The conversation lasted no more than a minute.

Next day, I was browsing yahoo.com and the ad banner had a picture of a clear plastic retainer and was advertising 3D printed retainers. Neither me not my wife had posted anything about the retainers anywhere or discussed it with anyone else or even looked it up on any website (neither of us cares about the subject at all; neither dentistry nor 3D printing). This is the first time I ever saw advertising related to dentistry or 3D printing.

This is not the first time that I've experienced a creepy ad but it was definitely the most disturbing because:

1. It was an extremely specific and niche subject matter which does not relate to me in any way; it was based on an extremely unlikely freak occurrence.

2. I only spoke about it with my wife in an extremely casual way. Neither of us looked it up online on any website afterwards (we verified). The subject matter only occupied our thoughts for an extremely small amount of time.

3. The ad came up the next day after having the conversation.

I have had similar stuff come up, the most cut and dried example I could pinpoint was when on a Sunday morning, Meet the Press, which after the 2016 election I had started watching each week, was pushed off in place of a golf tournament that week. I got distracted, and started just doing some stuff around the house while it was on in the background.

I have no interest in golf, I have never searched or cared about golf in any way whatsoever. Yet, the next few weeks I started getting ads about golf stuff in FB. The only other real explanation would be that Verizon is selling my viewing information and this is somehow being linked back to my FB account.

Other's are definitely experiencing this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0SOxb_Lfps

There's this famous picture of Zuckerberg with tape over parts of a MacBook Pro next to him implying that whoever that computer belonged to didn't feel that even Apple's security was enough to protect their privacy. (I can't remember if that's suppose to be his laptop or just one he's coincidentally next to)

Here it is: http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/5769a61e91058425008...

It's totally anecdotal, but most people I know have either stopped using Facebook or are much less active than previously. The few teenagers I know don't even use it at all.

I guess all that growth must come from countries that recently got into Facebook.

Or from fraudulent accounts, or both!

Instagram

I'm not sure if the report includes Whatsapp, but that should be a huge portion of active users.

Their MAUs and DAUs exclude insta and whatsapp. Bottom of page 4 of their 10Q.

I wonder if there is sort of the uncool factor going on. People might "use" FB but it's not cool to post very often or admit to it. 1.56B DAUs, that's 20% of the planet, if you include whatsapp, I think it's staggeringly more. Either they are somehow lying about their numbers and risking potential shareholder lawsuits or it is like shopping at Walmart or eating at McDonald's where the "cool kids" never admit to it but very clearly a good sized chunk of them still do. Lying about the numbers just seems sort of silly to me.

It's odd, none of my same age friends post much on FB; it's vacation brag pictures, various life events or children's milestones sort of stuff. At the same time, messenger might be the best way to contact many of them, better than SMS.

I can also anecdotally confirm that I myself and most of my friends very rarely use Facebook anymore. I imagine that my browser or devices are still pinging FB on my behalf and counting me as an "active user" even though I haven't browsed the app or site in more than a year.

If you look at how they determine an active user (in their quarterly filings), you'll discover that that is not particularly true.

Anecdotally, I know a lot of people who stopped using facebook, but continued using messenger. They’d all still count as MAU.

The people you know may not be representative. I agree that it seems that less people use FB to share stuff about their life or follow friends and family. But many people also shifted their main usage of FB, so it's not that they are not using it all, just use it differently. That's at least my impression based on the little data I have. I'm talking about things like FB groups, market place and others that are pretty popular.

Agreed, groups are a huge deal. Once I figured out groups my FB use changed dramatically. Now I'm on there all the time, my family and friends don't see what I'm doing unless I for some reason joined a public group, and miracle of miracles, you can even find file downloads in these groups and the search functionality works pretty well.

Facebook was in my no-thanks bucket for a long time, but that has really changed and it didn't involve any significant privacy compromises beyond the usual ad-sales stuff.

By the way, there are a LOT of people using assumed names in these groups. Some of them get reported and return to unleash their annoyance on the rest of the group for "whoever did that". It's a really awkward aspect of the experience IMO.

> By the way, there are a LOT of people using assumed names in these groups. Some of them get reported and return to unleash their

and then they resolve to stolen identities which makes this whole fb thing awfully fraudulent

Oddly enough my experience is that use has only increased in my parents generation (the 75+ crowd). From my admittedly small glimpse into their circle of "friends" it seems that much of their use is a non-stop rage fest around politics.

Politics, and grandchildren. It seems to be a specific set of topics shared amongst close knit groups in the older demographic.

Daily Users have grown only 5m in 2 years, in the US/Canada.

About 51% of US/C check facebook or messenger every day, and 67% every month. So 16% of people check it but less than daily.

usage has shifted less from "posting baby pictures omg omg omg" to more facebook groups and business pages and stuff. Which is likely better for Facebook and exactly what they want (well, they'd probably rather have both, but if they can only have one..)

I see people glued to the Facebook app every day.

Same here. My group of friends we all have an account but we very rarely post anything. I only connect maybe once a week max to see if I have some notifications.

Every once in a while I think about deleting my account but then I remember I have all those people I know only through Facebook.

I use it more than ever! It's where everyone organizes events, says they're interested in festivals so they know which friends are going, forms groups around.

I have yet to sign up.

I have missed meetups, other social engagements, family photo shares, news and such that were on FB only. Get routinely made fun of by family and friends since I am the "techy" who is "afraid" of technology as they say.

But people I care about I contact via email, chat, talk in person or phone. Maybe I am strange and I just never felt the need to either broadcast to everyone what I am doing or keep an eye on what everyone else is doing unless I am talking to them one one one.

You don't have to broadcast. You can just make an account and let them invite you. It's not as hard as HN makes it out to be.

This. I have had a Facebook account since the days of needing to be invited and yet I have posted a status update on the site less than 10 times. I barely even check on my newsfeed.

But there is hardly a messaging platform as ubiquitous as Facebook messenger. Not everyone uses it as their main messaging client but almost everyone has one. Having an active Facebook page and group has also done more for my online business than any ad marketing. And Facebook marketplace is like Craigslist but better in almost every way.

I don't care if people make a Facebook account or not but there is certainly value in one, even if you don't care about the "News Feed".

No, it’s that anecdotal experience doesn’t really say much about a global platform.

Teenagers usually don’t use FB. They have other means to keep in touch with their peer group and they don’t want to be on the same platform as adults are on. But you see once they move away and want to keep in touch with family, they are more likely to be on it.

> I guess all that growth must come from countries that recently got into Facebook.

I have worked for companies with big, really big, user bases. As time passes companies get way better at getting more value from each user. They have more data. They have better software to offer promotions, advertisements, etc. You may be better off with half the users but getting more money from each one of them than with more users but giving low value. Depending on where the lines in the graph cross less users and more money is possible.

They are reporting their users now across Whatsapp, instagram, and FB. While almost everyone I know hardly logs into the FB property, we're still really active on WhatsApp.....and that counts towards their 2.5b monthly user metric.

Thanks, I didn't know that. I thought it was purely Facebook users.

Yeah unfortunately I contribute two users - WhatsApp and Instagram to that count. I am sure plenty of people count multiple times because the services may not be linked together. IG, WhatsApp, FB and even FB Business accounts would all count as separate users when really they are the same human behind the account

Yes - pretty much impossible to NOT use some kind of FB service these days. Hence all the anti-trust hoopla.

I agree, teens dont use facebook. But in College, everything changes. Its the easiest platform to coordinate events across hundreds of people you might not even know. Theres just a bunch of cases that no other platform covers, like finding clubs and events, promoting your party, or even selling donuts to fundraise. It does everything on one platform that everyone has. We don't like facebook, but there is simply no alternative.

My impression (also anecdotal) is that while there are people who have given up Facebook, or are using it less, they're a small percentage.

Most of what I've noticed is people no longer posting something on Facebook, then Instygram, then Twitter, then Tumblr, then whatever else is out there. They seem to be coalescing into one or two favored platforms.

I have a bunch of friends who barely used it to begin with. More recently, most of the people I'm closest to who did have stopped using it. I think my aunts and uncles use it more these days though?

I remember reading a while back (It may have been on here but I can't find it!) that the growth wasn't the big ticket issue facing them it was the lack of sharing!

People were sharing less and that seemed to be a major issue for them.

I'm betting that an FTC antitrust probe will have no effect on other nations using FB. I lived in Brazil, and it was typically a year or two behind the trending here in the US. While US use of FB is down in their previous major demographics, it is spiking internationally.

The title mentions an antitrust probe but the article says nothing about it. What is that about?

The last part of the opening sentence has it (emphasis mine):

Facebook Inc (FB.O) beat analysts’ estimates for revenue on Wednesday, even as the world’s largest social network agreed to pay a $5 billion fine over data privacy and announced a U.S. antitrust investigation.

Oddly, I see less issues with Facebook than with Google. Facebook has a tight grip on social media, but then there's also Twitter. facebook.com is dying long-term (though Instagram is picking some of that up) and they're not nearly as vertically integrated as Google is, for example (browser, operating system, email, video streaming, maps,...).

In the current political climate, I don't see an antitrust investigation ever leading to any major impact but it's almost inevitable, over the coming decade or so, to see a ton of regulation and forced splits for tech giants. The current system simply can't be healthy.

Oddly, I see less issues with Facebook than with Google.

Patience. Everyone will get their turn.

The last paragraph in https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-24/facebook-... says that the FTC will be dealing with Facebook and Amazon while the Justice department will deal with Apple and Alphabet.

More specific news about the antitrust probe: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-24/facebook-... .

Facebook has the same problem the Republican party has. Their users/supporters are all dying and less and less people are signing up. However they are still a force to reckon with and generate a lot of cash.

How’s life in your Bay Area bubble?

It's not hard to look at the age breakdown for each of the political parties and see this checks out.

https://www.people-press.org/2018/03/20/1-trends-in-party-af...

Haven't Republicans traditionally trended older? If there are enough voters who change parties as they age, does it matter that one party tends older while the other trends younger?

I hear that claim a lot but if you look at the link I posted under the "A wide – and growing – generational divide in partisanship" heading, it doesn't appear to actually be the case. If that were true you'd likely see a much bigger pull to republicans as Gen X aged during the studied period (94-17). Also doesn't explain the sharp millennial pull to democrats at all.

This assumes that people's political affiliations don't change as they age.

Given by the amount of youth that support communism I sincerely hope you're wrong.

As I said in other comments, you can look at those graphs and see they are relatively static across all generations. That said, what isn't pictured is the shift of the ideologies of the parties themselves, which both have gotten more progressive long term, though not really in the years studied in this case.

> Given by the amount of youth that support communism I sincerely hope you're wrong.

As someone in that demographic it sounds like you're listening to way too many conservative sources trying to scare you. I'm very heavily liberal and even I know maybe 1 in 1000 that actually want any form of communism. Most people my age in the US (Millenial / Gen Z border) on the left are very much for the hybrid socialism / capitalism of Bernie and much of Europe.

Why from a throwaway?

Is it a problem? Older people are more likely to vote and spend more time on Facebook. Older people have more money to donate to parties and spend on products they are advertised.

If it is a problem, it sounds like a great one to have. What's best: new old people are being made every day and they are a huge cohort right now.

This will also surprise the youth-o-philes in SV, but young people eventually grow up to be old people and they almost always change drastically in political views, media consumption, and purchase decisions. Sure, they probably won't be on Facebook and the current Republican party will change, but that just means Instagram will be the new old people place and the future Republicans will have made their mark.

young people eventually grow up to be old people and they almost always change drastically in political views, media consumption, and purchase decisions.

This is true. I knew a bunch of really lefty people in the colleges I went to. Now that they're full adults, only one still adheres to that mantra.

My guess about it all is that it's easy to be conservative when you have something to conserve. It's easy to be liberal when you're not invested in a house, neighborhood, career, children, etc... because most of your life is ephemeral.

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