FB - Facebook

[Liberty]

The fact that a phone's contacts are accessible to other apps is the way that most of these bootstrap.

The social graph is ok for some types of networks (messaging), and was ok back in the early days of social networking, when most people were starting from almost zero, but at this point, if you just ported the social graph but didn't bring over all the content (personal photos, videos, posts, etc) I think a lot of people wouldn't find that enough. Even if you decide to make a move, it's hard to break the habits of everyone else in your graph and have them post their stuff and message you somewhere else too. The land grab part of this might be over.

[Jurgis]

If you want to pwn Facebook, heavy regulation would work much more than theoretical data portability. China did it. Europe might do - a lesser version of - it.

I don't care about it much either way. I now have some money invested in FB, so I'm immediately biased, but overall I don't care much. I think the whole data ownership and portability is not very workable, not very useful and not gonna improve anything (much), but if people want to work on it, power to them. Maybe they'll do something useful, who knows. 

[vinod1]

I am pretty much in agreement with both of you guys.

Given the scale FB has reached - along with all the content it has, ensures that no other social network is likely to displace it anytime soon. What data portability offers along with closing of acquisitions for FB, is to allow other social networks to grow/survive in future. Think what it would have been like if Instagram and WhatsApp are still independent. Not that it is a magic bullet. The fact that Google itself has thrown the towel, is all the proof we need.
 
At the end of the day, it is only regulation along many dimensions - data portability, privacy rules, limitations on acquisitions, etc have a chance of working. I do not think Chinese style regulation would be accepted in US. So it has to be little more subtle.

Vinod

[Liberty]

Not only that, but the mass of existing content is useful for the user experience (which we tend to forget in these days of data scandal).

So in theory, a new social network will little content but lots of people would probably be a worse experience than one where your newsfeed is optimized for you based on lots and lots of past shown preferences (ie. they can show you updates from friend X straight to the top because they know every time you've seen one in the past you left a comment, and show you articles about electric cars because you always click through to read those, but not to show you anything from that stupid uncle because even though he's in your graph, you've muted him, etc). A newer social network would kind of have to throw things at you more randomly and the average experience wouldn't be as good/personalized.

[SlowAppreciation]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-18/facebook-is-forming-a-team-to-design-its-own-chips

[Liberty]

https://stratechery.com/2018/open-closed-and-privacy/

[Liberty]

Q1:

First Quarter 2018 Operational and Other Financial Highlights
Daily active users (DAUs) – DAUs were 1.45 billion on average for March 2018, an increase of 13% year-over-year.
Monthly active users (MAUs) – MAUs were 2.20 billion as of March 31, 2018, an increase of 13% year-over-year.
Mobile advertising revenue – Mobile advertising revenue represented approximately 91% of advertising revenue for the first quarter of 2018, up from approximately 85% of advertising revenue in the first quarter of 2017.
Capital expenditures – Capital expenditures for the first quarter of 2018 were $2.81 billion.
Cash and cash equivalents and marketable securities – Cash and cash equivalents and marketable securities were $43.96 billion at the end of the first quarter of 2018.
Headcount – Headcount was 27,742 as of March 31, 2018, an increase of 48% year-over-year.
In April 2018, we increased the amount authorized under our share repurchase program by an additional $9.0 billion. Our board of directors originally authorized repurchases of up to $6.0 billion of our Class A common stock under the repurchase program, and this increase is incremental to the original authorization.

[Spekulatius]

FB numbers are stellar, IMO.

As I mentioned in another thread, I started investing in 1982.If someone had told me that there would be a company in 2018 that would grow their revenue from $8B to $12B or 50% YOY, while making $5.6B in operating profit and having FCF left to buy back stock at the same time, I would have thought he would be nuts.

Even more so, if he had told me that I can buy this for roughly 20x earnings.

[LongTermView]

If someone had told me that there would be a company in 2018 that would grow their revenue from $8B to $12B or 50% YOY, while making $5.6B in operating profit and having FCF left to buy back stock at the same time, I would have thought he would be nuts.

Even more so, if he had told me that I can buy this for roughly 20x earnings.

I agree.

[Jerry Capital]

Julian Robertson agrees (fifth largest position from what I can see Q4 2017)

This is from September 2017:

KELLY EVANS: All right. Let me ask you about a couple of particular companies, just thinking about Apple, for example, which has a lot of cash overseas.

You were a holder of that going back a couple of years, and they have a big event today and are launching a bunch of new products. But has it just become too expensive for you guys, is it not -- or would you look at investing in Apple again?

JULIAN ROBERTSON: No, I think we should definitely look at Apple. Apple is not that expensive of a stock. There are a lot of disadvantages of being an old goat. One of the few advantages is the fact that we've seen all this a little bit before. And right now the Apples, the Facebooks, the Googles, those great growth companies are priced cheaper than they would have ever been in the '60 s , '70 s , and '80 s .

KELLY EVANS: Hmm.

JULIAN ROBERTSON: And I don't think a lot of people realize that.

KELLY EVANS: Well, you're trimming your positions in Facebook, and Google, and you're not in Apple right now.

JULIAN ROBERTSON: Well, I don't think I've . . . I kind of trade Facebook and those things a little bit. And I consider myself kind of a long-term player of Facebook.

KELLY EVANS: Even though you think the markets overall are expensive, these emblematic tech same names you actually don't think are that expensive?

JULIAN ROBERTSON: Correct.

KELLY EVANS: And we've spoken about Netflix before, too, which then you said that one might maybe got a little out of reach.

JULIAN ROBERTSON: That might be a little out of reach, but that one is awfully tempting to me because it's run by really good people and -- and I love it, too.

[LAUGHTER]

JULIAN ROBERTSON: Anybody that doesn't like Netflix, that's like saying you hate Santa Claus.

KELLY EVANS: Do you have a favorite show right now?

JULIAN ROBERTSON: No, but I just . . . I like all of them.