A radical business plan for Facebook: Charge people. Slate Magazine

News Type: Event — Seeded on Mon Nov 3, 2008 9:39 PM EST

Article Source: Slate

technology, facebook, small-business, social-network, silicon-valley, slate, zuckerberg, tech-company

A couple of weeks ago, TechCrunch, a blog that hit it big by chronicling the rising fortunes of Web startups, launched a decidedly downbeat new feature: a layoff tracker. Silicon Valley insiders have long wondered how deeply an economic downturn might hurt tech firms; after all, companies here in the Bay Area weathered the worst of the last recession, and since then, they've all adopted leaner, less profligate business practices. (E.g., there are no more Super Bowl ads featuring sock puppets.) But hard times are here again. Venture capital firms are telling their clients to batten down the hatches because free money is gone. Share prices for the biggest tech companies have plummeted over the past year. Per TechCrunch, dozens of companies have announced plans to let go of more than 24,000 workers, and no one doubts more cuts are coming soon. Even Google's fabled free-food privileges are being cut back.

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1.5

{"commentId":3865587,"authorDomain":"dungbeetlemania"}

dungbeetlemania

Interesting. I hope the advertising model survives to some extent though, because I can't afford to pay for all the online apps I use!

{"commentId":3865587,"threadId":"408860","contentId":"2069512","authorDomain":"dungbeetlemania"}

1 vote

#1 - Tue Nov 4, 2008 7:28 AM EST

{"commentId":3874767,"authorDomain":"lzimmer"}

lzimmer

I think charging might significantly hurt Facebook. The article suggests that the money from 5% of the users would increase profits, but what about the loss in advertising profits from all the people who cut back on their use?

{"commentId":3874767,"threadId":"408860","contentId":"2069512","authorDomain":"lzimmer"}

1 vote

#2 - Tue Nov 4, 2008 1:37 PM EST

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LZIMMER

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A radical business plan for Facebook: Charge people. Slate Magazine

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