“San Francisco based social network Bebo, which recently raised $15 millionfrom Benchmark Capital, rejected a £300 million ($552 million) acquisition offer from British Telecom Group “a few weeks ago”, according to an insider on the transaction. Bebo’s asking price? North of $1 billion” Says techcrunch.com
Predictably all the arm chair generals responded by saying its a ton of money take it you now while you still can. Yet others screamed that this is yet another sign of the bubble.
Just like I would be stupid to sell right now, so would Bebo. Unlike facebook they are no where near the max market penetration and there biggest costs are hardware. In the next 18 months processing power will double and with it millions will vanish from Bebo’s operating budget. The other major trend is that advertising is coming online in a big way, and once demographic targeting is introduced into adsense and YPN the value of these sites will triple over night. The web in 2 years from now is going to be completely different then it is today. I really think that the people who sell sites with massive pageviews now will be considered idiots in a few years:)
July 12, 2006 at 5:26 am |
Assuming that the whole social networking thing isn’t just a fad of course
July 12, 2006 at 6:17 am |
No, BT would be stupid to offer them that sum.
And they never did.
You’re kidding yourself, it has bubble written all over it. It’s even spurred on by unsustainably high ad rates, just like bubble 1.0.
July 12, 2006 at 8:19 am |
Maybe this BT acquisition was just a roumor to promote Bebo.
At least I learned that this site exists from this blog post….
Anyway I agree that the web is going to change a lot, but this will propably make the big players bigger (as the web2 thing is easier for them) and the small players even smaller.
July 12, 2006 at 3:58 pm |
You could consider me an idiot all you like for $550 mil. Hell you could write it on my forehead in a big fat black magic marker.
July 12, 2006 at 6:56 pm |
In terms of how the web will change.
I imagine more:
Video
Vertical Search Engines
Localized Search
Its almost like the big bang theory that says that the universe expands and then will contract back to a singularity . It will not by the way.
I mean the web brought people together to interact from all over the world.
At least in the same language. But people want local communities.
Local communities mean that large community sites just won’t do.
Look at Craig’s list. Hasn’t he re-factored by city recently?
Won’t the large community sites have to do the same?
Also don’t each of those sub domains for a each locale present and opportunity for someone in that region to compete and beat them?
A global entity can’t know a local environment better than the natives.
I say the future of the web is more decentralized that centralized. More local than global.
July 12, 2006 at 10:30 pm |
The Web will not change.
We will change the Web.
Meaning, I believe firmly that it’s within our means to innovate deeply and thereby help avert another bubble
And it’s going to rock! forget that Web 2.0 crap … I’m talking P2P AI and no more Google … that’s one bubble I’d really like to burst.
Marc
July 13, 2006 at 12:38 am |
If I were them I would take it, then do what google does… churn out a ton of new web sites, some may hit, some may miss, but then innovation continues. If your starting from scratch it is much easier to innovate.
July 13, 2006 at 12:56 am |
Evolvingtrends, why in the world do you want Google’s bubble to burst? Google is pretty much single handedly holding the net together. If it wasn’t for Google, there would be a lot more broke folks around the web. This blog wouldn’t be here, that’s for sure.
July 13, 2006 at 8:09 am |
James
Its’ easier to lead than follow.
Marc