Goldman Sach’s investment in Facebook has received an amazing amount of press coverage. Extrapolating that investment gives a $50bn valuation, something that has got the media worked up into quite a frenzy. It’s a big number, but lots of internet companies have pretty amazing valuations.
And when it comes to big numbers, 50,000,000,000 isn’t Facebook’s most impressive. Today information is power, and Facebook’s ‘social graph’ is truly staggering.
| Statistic | /second | /minute | /hour | /day |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New websites integrated | 0 | 7 | 417 | 10,000 |
| New users added | 8 | 486 | 29,167 | 700,000 |
| Applications installed | 231 | 13,889 | 833,333 | 20,000,000 |
| Links shared | 833 | 50,000 | 3,000,000 | 72,000,000 |
| Minutes spent (mobile) | 837 | 50,228 | 3,013,698 | 72,328,767 |
| Photos tagged | 1,103 | 66,150 | 3,969,000 | 95,256,000 |
| Event invites sent | 1,237 | 74,200 | 4,452,000 | 106,848,000 |
| Wall posts made | 1,323 | 79,350 | 4,761,000 | 114,264,000 |
| Status updates added | 1,543 | 92,550 | 5,553,000 | 133,272,000 |
| Friend requests accepted | 1,643 | 98,600 | 5,916,000 | 141,984,000 |
| Users log in | 2,025 | 121,528 | 7291667 | 175,000,000 |
| Photos uploaded | 2,263 | 135,800 | 8,148,000 | 195,552,000 |
| Messages sent | 3,860 | 231,600 | 13,896,000 | 333,504,000 |
| Likes received | 6,381 | 382,850 | 22,971,000 | 551,304,000 |
| Comments left | 8,507 | 510,400 | 30,624,000 | 734,976,000 |
| Minutes spent (total) | 266,362 | 15,981,735 | 958,904,125 | 23,013,699,000 |
So is Facebook worth $50bn? That you’ll have to decide for yourself or wait and see, but I’m sure that you won’t need reminding that back in 2005 the usually savvy (and always well-informed) media tycoon Rupert Murdoch spent $580m on myspace which at the time was the market leader in the nascent field of social networking.
Sources include Facebook and the BBC.
Posted by John on 4 January 2011