Who Turns Down $4 Billion Dollars?
Evan Spiegel, 23-year-old co-founder of one of the newest forms of social media, SnapChat, that's who.
After being offered $3 billion by Zuckerberg's very own Facebook, the young business man also turned down a $4 billion offer from Google.
Evan Spiegel, 23-year-old co-founder of one of the newest forms of social media, SnapChat, that's who.
After being offered $3 billion by Zuckerberg's very own Facebook, the young business man also turned down a $4 billion offer from Google.
Although the letter below is a satire written by Nina Ippolito, a freelance writer, it raises some good questions regarding the future of social media sites such as Facebook.
“Yo Zuckerbro,
I wanted to hit you up personally to tell you how gutted I am that stuff didn’t work out between Facebook and Snapchat. It’s a bummer, but Facebook just isn’t the smexy young hookup we’re looking for, $3 billion or not. Sorry to be a buzzkill.
I’m sure you get it, brosepher. You can probably still remember being a hot-to-trot brogrammer, back in the day, when you were still 23. Remember how, when you weren’t hella old, shit just kind of came to you, like how you had your hand on the pulse of digital innovation, or how your parents gave you a brand-new Escalade, and then pulled strings so you could park it next to your high school?
We both know what it’s was like to be a little too badass for college — you for Harvard, and me for Stanford. We also both know how to party hard in Palo Alto. I bet your ragers with Sean Parker are pretty similar to the stuff that got my frat, Kappa Sigma, kicked off campus.
And then there’s the fact that we’re both total geniuses. You came up with Facemash to look at pictures of chicks, and I invented Picaboo so hotties would send me nude selfies. You crushed it, and after one thing led to another, your company became the new hotness. But then your classmates got all greedy, and started claiming that maybe you kind of screwed your certified bros out of a lot of money. What even is that? We’ve both been there, brogellan. Good thing we’re too rich to care.
That’s why you’ll totally understand that the reason Snapchat couldn’t take your money is that — no offense, bro — it’s ‘cause even though we don’t have any kind of revenue stream, in a few years, our mascot, Ghostface Chillah, is going to be all kind of dancing on Facebook’s grave. I’m sorry, but kids just don’t do Facebook anymore, Zuck. You’re like Tom from Myspace. Or what was that other thing our parents had? Friendster? Did they have a mascot?
I get it. It’s hard out there for a disruptive technologist pimp. Not everyone can create an app that perfectly captures the ephemeral and fluid nature of human communication. After all, aren’t sexts just back-alley flashing made digital? Doesn’t the transience of Snapchat’s dick pics mirror that of Anthony Weiner’s political career?
But bro. Bro. Don’t sweat it. I am like 100% certain that your next startup will be huge. If you haven’t come up with an idea, you should totally start shopping around for one. I hear Uber drivers have some bitchin’ schemes these days.
Boom.
Warm brogards,
- Evan Spiegel, Snapchat co-founder and CEO
As Facebook continues to change in its nature, from starting out as a college girl finder if you will, to the now ever effective communication tool its provided for businesses all over the world, is it on the outs or will it continue adapting to the rapidly changing society around us and maintain itself?
Has Facebook become more business oriented and with their ever changing policy updates are they soon to lose users?
As the article below states, Spiegel apparently refused to take the offers from Facebook and Google because he feels as though it will be changed into something that it wasn't ever intended for, such as Facebook. The point of SnapChat is to be able to send out pictures without leaving behind any history which is subsequently what allows Facebook and Google to run. Spiegel didn't feel as though Facebook or Google are genuine in their offers, primarily because he knows SnapChat would inevitably be altered.
So, how do see the future of social media? Is everybody going to sell out to top servers?
Could Facebook one day divide into two different entities?
One for business, one for social communication?
http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/breakout/meet-the-23-year-old-kid-who-turned-down--3-billion-for-snapchat-010309114.html
Spigel is obviously very passionate about his creation and what it was created to do. Not many people would pass up an offer like that, so I give him a lot of props. I absolutely believe that Facebook is becoming divided. It doesnt even feel like a cyber meeting space for friends anymore. It has become so commercial. And I think that is the biggest downfall of all social media, once they become to commercialized the users move on to the next. I feel like I am constantly being hit up for something on FB, which is why I now prefer instagram, which was bought by Fb and is now strting to do advertisements. I think social media is a great way to interact with their consumers, and is a must have for most businesses, but I feel like its starting to get taken to far.
ReplyDeleteYou make an excellent point in regards to the commercialization of social media sites. I will be interesting to continue to watch in which ways sites like Facebook adapt to the rapidly changing world around us. I too have recently veered away from Facebook because of the commercial junk that fills up my newsfeed. Instagram has proven to be a favorite between multiple users and the two way communication that Twitter provides can be very useful. Although, twitter is also one of the most widely used sites to bully people, which is a very hot topic in the United States right now. How might you see Twitter changing in the next couple years?
DeleteI loved reading this! That letter was hilarious. My favorite part was, "you're like Tom from MySpace." The idea of it was completely true though. These social media sites become sellouts, but honestly how hard would it be to turn down that kind of money? Pretty damn hard if you ask me. I love that SnapChat is going to stay the same concept as it started; I wish more companies would have that much passion for their original idea. As far as your questions goes, honestly I do think social media sites will continue to sell out. Money wins at the end of the day. I can't believe he turned down $4 billion! With that type of willpower, I doubt he'll budge anytime soon. I don't think Facebook would ever split into two entities just for the sole reason that it already has a huge population base that doesn't seem to mind advertising.
ReplyDeleteI've started veering away from Facebook mostly because of their always changing policies. One that recently made me delete my Facebook (which I later had to get back because it's required for one of my classes...another interesting point) because ANYBODY can now see my Facebook page.
ReplyDeleteI pose the same question to you as I did Margaret. Twitter is a great way to directly communicate with publics and can be very useful to businesses and public relations in general. It is also a huge site for bullying which is a hot topic in the United States right now How might you see twitter changing in the next couple years?
Like every social media platform we've almost forgotten, going allllllllll the way back to dial-up chatrooms, it's going to come to an end eventually. It might be because we find a faster, easier, more fun way to communicate (chatrooms to Myspace), or because it gets old, has too many surveys and personality quizzes when we just want to see our friends, and becomes overrun with preteens (Myspace to Facebook). In the case of Facebook losing out to Instagram and Snapchat, I think the sell-out factor has a lot to do with it. Facebook evolved from a great social idea to a great profitable idea pretty quickly, and like you guys said, it's now become way more commercial than most of would like. Obviously Facebook is a great tool for businesses/organizations, so I don't think it's going anywhere anytime soon, but I do think the users and the audience will shift pretty dramatically.
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