Google’s YouTube, launched in 2005, has hit 72 hours of video content uploaded per minute, in a steady ascent. By 2007, users were adding six hours of video per minute – by January of 2009, that number hit 15 hours, by March 2010, 24 hours, by November of that year, 35 hours, and so forth. YouTube has been having some copyright infringement problems since its inception, with record labels and movie studios suing over the platform’s lack of better control over what its users upload. YouTube recently lost a court case in Germany over 12 unlicensed songs a user uploaded to its server. The plaintiff had urged YouTube to install better upload filters in an attempt to stop illegal content streaming. Though, now with the 72 hour per minute ratio, the logistics of this of thing just become more complicated. Also, if new filters are enforced, this could delay upload times for YouTube. This would definitely be a hit to the service – a main reason why some users steer clear of other video hosting sites, like Vimeo, is because of the long processing times. And Facebook’s filters flag anything found to be copyrighted, and promptly deletes it. A YouTube clip is processed very quickly, and an anti-infringement endorsed filter would likely hinder this to an unknown extent, with copyrights having to be cleared. On the other hand, if a random user is monetizing an unsigned artist’s content on YouTube, which happens all the time, this is also a bad thing, which would warrant longer wait times. As of now, video content can be posted faster than real time – meaning, an hour long clip can be put online in ten minutes, so there’s no way some oDesk employee in Tangier might have pre-screened it. It is evident that it will likely be a while for YouTube and Google to sort out the most efficient balance regarding how its content is legally uploaded.

It’s pretty obvious by now that I look forward to E3 like a kid looks forward to Christmas morning. It’s the most exciting time of the year and you’re probably just as hyped as I am. One of the more interesting shows this year will be coming from Nintendo as they have to prove to the world that the Wii U is something worth getting excited over. Nintendo is in a good position to make that possible as they are brining back their All-Access Programming from last year, but in some new ways. The most important element is the press conference that will be taking place on June 5 at 9 a.m. PST. The press conference will be live-streamed via Facebook, and for the first time ever, Nintendo will be partnering with Viacom to broadcast the press conference commercial free on MTV2 and Spike TV. “We don’t want anyone to miss the energy and excitement of this year’s E3 Expo,” said Cindy Gordon, Nintendo of America’s vice president of Corporate Affairs. “By offering different ways to tune in and follow all the Nintendo news, we aim to make fans all over the world feel like they’re right there with us at the show.” It doesn’t just stop at Facebook and television as Nintendo is taking advantage of every social network available to them. They will be using YouTube to post updates from the show floor during the entire convention. It will include looks at upcoming software and hardware as well as interviews with developers. Twitter will also play a big role with Nintendo of America’s Twitter account tweeting details all throughout the show. It will also be live tweeting announcements during the press conference for those who can’t watch it on Facebook or television. Lastly, Nintendo has opened its E3 Web site for all the world to see. It wil feature all the latest updates from the show floor. I assume it will also feature the same kind of videos from last year with Satoru Iwata interviewing developers working on 3DS/Wii U software. If anything, Nintendo is shaping up for this year to be something big. We’ll hopefully get all the major details on the Wii U this time around and be able to see some truly mind-blowing things. I’m already excited just by thinking about it.

The kicks just keep coming when it comes to Facebook’s advertising value. Today’s entrant: the company’s international ad revenue is the pits. Business Insider took a look at how Facebook’s advertising model is working beyond the borders of the United States and found some rather pathetic results. Facebook users produced nearly $10 per person in ad revenue last year in the U.S., but those numbers clip off precipitously when you start to look at different regions. In Europe, the revenue is just under $5 while Asia is a meager $1.79 and in the rest of the world users are churning up a lowly $1.42 per person. The way each of those different regions trend, it’s a good thing there’s not more parts of the world or else those bar graphs would be inverted and Facebook would end up actually paying users to look at ads. Actually, I wouldn’t mind that at all, but I’m sure all those investors would mind considerably. So what’s a Zuckerberg to do? Really get to work on a strategy that actually makes some money off of Facebook’s mobile platform? Focus more on making advertising tools more effective? They should probably start at something soon, as today’s activity on the stock market doesn’t really inspire much excitement from Facebook.

If you’re fortunate enough to have already gotten your awkward and formative teenage years out of the way, count your lucky stars because teenagers are all but being sucked down into the third level of internet hell these days. A new survey by McAfee involving more than 1,000 teenagers aged 13 to 17 in the United States revealed that teens’ social interactions and personal relationships are being heavily influenced by social networks and the internet, and not exactly in a good way. For one, you can hardly be a teenager these days without being online as 95% are reportedly plugged in and 80% use social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and, well, pretty much any site that includes some sort of socializing, which is basically everything on the internet these days. What’s more, and in what can only be described as a mistake of youth, one-third of teens say they use Facebook as a place to find love. That’s more than the 20% of teens who are still hoping to find that special someone within church communities. While there isn’t anything inherently wrong with using sites like Facebook to go looking for love, this doe-eyed quest for some tender loving care on Facebook unfortunately leaves kids vulnerable to some creepy doings. 34% of teen girls and 16% of boys say they have received unwanted attention from the opposite sex. What’s worse, 75% of teens – 68% of girls and 19% of boys – don’t tell their parents whenever online communication reaches that creeepy, icky, uncomfortable feeling. “Teens today increasingly face pressure to live up to peer expectations and are basically growing up faster than the normal standards,” said Stanley Holditch, online family safety advocate with McAfee. Holditch’s assessment is reflected in some of the teens’ responses, as study participants laments that “everyone (on Facebook) is putting out there what they do with their boyfriends and there is some pressure to do the same.” As if being a teenager didn’t have enough natural difficulty, the fact that people are only ever posting things on Facebook of happy events and happy photos is giving teenagers an inferiority complex because they feel pressured to keep up with the endless newsfeed of warm, fuzzy updates. Some more information to make you uncomfortably readjust in your chair: 46% of teens feel the Internet influences what their boyfriend or girlfriend expects from them in terms of relationship behavior. 29% of girls say that they have experienced interactions on the Internet with members of the opposite sex that made them feel pressured, uncomfortable or threatened, compared to 18% of boys and 20% overall. 23% of all teens say that they’ve received unwanted attention from the opposite sex online. And here we thought that cyber-bullying was the big problem to be concerned about on Facebook in regard to teens, which is a somewhat more recent phenomenon. However, creepy people have been lurking in the dark alleys of the internet since the whole thing started, so it shouldn’t be much of surprise that these trolls have crawled out from the slimy bridges they live under and found their way onto social media sites like Twitter and Facebook. As much as Facebook tries to emphasize positive interactions and reinforce happy meal behaviors on the site, it’s trying to break humans from not defaulting into their most basic, reptilian tendencies and being uncouth weirdos.

Not much is known about the billionaire bride of Mark Zuckerberg. But there is one place you can always find information on the people you are stalking *cough*, interested in – Facebook. Here are the pertinent facts of the recent bride. Lives in Palo Alto. Married to Mark Zuckerberg. Duh. Priscilla graduated from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) with a degree in medicine. She was in a relationship with Mark Zuckerberg on March 20, 2011. She worked at The Harker School teaching 4th and 5th grade science. Started grad school in 2008 at UCSF. Graduated from Harvard in 2007 with a major in Biology Worked at Fase as a Director/Mentor. A non-profit for “Women and the Environment” in Port-au-Prince, Haiti Went to Quincy High school in Massachusetts. Born in Braintree, Massachusetts. She seems like a stand up gal, graduated from Harvard and UCSF, taught science, and even volunteered in Haiti for a time. She has the credentials, and seems very trustworthy. Maybe Zuckerberg didn’t need to listen to Donald Trump when he told him to get a pre-nup. Since not much is really known about the woman, people are making their own assumptions. They really seem to think she is a gold digger, even though they met in Harvard, long before Zuckerberg had his billions. .ditto204573414197952512 {background: #C0DEED url(http://a0.twimg.com/images/themes/theme1/bg.png) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204573414197952512 a {color: #0084B4;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @TheStalwart Joseph Weisenthal @TheStalwart Facebook down 13%. Priscilla Chan having regrets. 30 minutes ago via TweetDeck · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite .ditto204126924925181953 {background: #59403E url(http://a0.twimg.com/profile_background_images/147060672/Aplhabet-249x300.jpg) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204126924925181953 a {color: #D02B55;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @14_yr_old_Etard E-tard @14_yr_old_Etard Mark Zuckerberg marries his girlfriend Priscilla Chan. Last night Priscilla’s relationship status changed from “it’s complicated” to “$$$$$” 1 day ago via web · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite Far right. Far left. Almost duck-face. .ditto204022316546531329 {background: #9AE4E8 url(http://a0.twimg.com/profile_background_images/187098295/Buck_5meg.jpg) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204022316546531329 a {color: #0084B4;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @buckhollywood Michael Buckley @buckhollywood And how lovely that Mark Zuckerberg has been dating Priscilla Chan since 2003! That is nice!!!!! Congrats to the happy/rich couple! 1 day ago via web · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite .ditto204582462729355265 {background: #1A1B1F url(http://a0.twimg.com/images/themes/theme9/bg.gif) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204582462729355265 a {color: #9946C9;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @JulieStagis Julie Stagis @JulieStagis “Mark Zuckerberg has changed his status to ‘Married’…. Priscilla Chan has changed hers to ‘Jackpot’.” http://t.co/GWjdCYbk 2 minutes ago via web · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite [via: Mashable]

Friday started out pretty exciting as Facebook shares started trading. The feelings of joy soon turned to disappointment, however, as Facebook’s share price never really went anywhere. The question then turned to what caused the poor performance. To help answer that question, Nasdaq CEO Robert Greifield took to a conference call yesterday to clarify what exactly went wrong on Friday. Bloomberg reports that Greifield blamed the poor performance on the software used to power the computers that were doing the trading. The main problem seems to have started occurring after Morgan Stanley sold 421 million shares of Facebook Thursday night. The trade request apparently disturbed the auction process and threw everything into a loop. Nasdaq had to intervene to get the auction rolling at 11:30 a.m. The mix up had Nasdaq ending up with 5,000 shares of Facebook. They sold those shares for $10 million but are asking for permission to use the money to repay investors that never received their shares on Friday. It would appear that underwriters kept the share price from falling below $38 on opening day. If it had dropped below $38, it would have been disastrous for first day trades. The less than stellar first day already knocked Zynga’s share price down to little below $8, so it’s painful to imagine what a worse day for Facebook would cause. Regardless of Facebook’s poor performance on Friday, Nasdaq still saw a lot of action thanks to the company. Bloomberg calculated the numbers and found that Facebook shares traded 582.5 million times on Friday. That number accounted for 6.6 percent of total U.S. exchanges. It’s pretty obvious that Facebook is going to remain a hotly traded company for the months, and hopefully years to come. It has already attracted the largest number of individual investors ever and it’s going to be really popular with a lot of people. I think that Facebook is one of those companies that people have a lot of faith in. If the problems didn’t plague its opening day on the markets, I’m sure Facebook would have closed much higher than it actually did. I would say that it’s not yet fair to count Facebook out. We should give it the rest of this week to see how well it does. Facebook is currently trading for $34 per share. It’s been slowly climbing since I began writing this, so we’ll keep watching for any major changes. We’ll let you know if Facebook rises to the top of the mountain or sinks beneath the sea. Either way, things are just starting to get interesting.

Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan married this weekend. It was a lovely wedding and we all wish him the best. There are some people, however, who think that Zuckerberg should start planning ahead for a potential divorce. Donald Trump, speaking to CNBC last Tuesday, questioned whether or not the Facebook founder had set up a prenuptial agreement yet. This was before the marriage was even announced because the whole thing was still up in the air until Saturday. Trump said that the IPO was going to make Zuckerberg worth $19 billion and that Chan could sue him for half of that in any potential divorce proceedings. Here’s his take on the matter: “So he’s gonna be worth like $18, $19 billion, you’re telling me he’s got a girlfriend … does he get a prenuptial agreement? They get married, and then for some reason over the next couple of years they get divorced and then she sues him for $10 billion and she hits the jackpot … In New York, she would get a big chunk of what he has.” Going even further, Trump offered his own assistance in the writing of any prenuptial agreement. He called himself an expert on the subject. He should be after being married three times with two divorces that were handled by prenuptial agreements. He even makes reference to a friend who gives $80 million to every divorced wife. Here’s the interview where Trump offers his advice to the young billionaire. Do you think it’s too early to begin talking about prenuptial agreements? I certainly think so, but a man like Trump has a right to be concerned over ex-wives trying to take their husband’s fortune. The question now is whether or not Zuckerberg has the same feelings towards his wife. As always, the users of Twitter have their own feelings on the matter: .ditto204020293398835201 {background: #EDECE9 url(http://a0.twimg.com/images/themes/theme3/bg.gif) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204020293398835201 a {color: #088253;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @EricStangel Eric Stangel @EricStangel Mark Zuckerberg just changed his Facebook status to “Married With A Ginormous Prenup” 13 hours ago via web · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite .ditto204195498704384000 {background: #9AE4E8 url(http://a0.twimg.com/profile_background_images/378335908/IAmGWoods-logo.png) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204195498704384000 a {color: #FF8040;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @iamgwoods GWoods @iamgwoods Mark Zuckerberg got married after becoming a billionaire. Wonder what that prenup looks like? 1 hour ago via Echofon · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite .ditto204065866340503552 {background: #050505 url(http://a0.twimg.com/profile_background_images/429603515/twitcon_edit_1.jpg) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204065866340503552 a {color: #44C3C7;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @CEOcypha CEO Cypha @CEOcypha Mark Zuckerberg better make his new wife sign a prenup 10 hours ago via UberSocial for BlackBerry · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite .ditto204023308432314368 {background: #9AE4E8 url(http://a0.twimg.com/profile_background_images/551505097/KingsOfTheMixBottles.jpg) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204023308432314368 a {color: #0084B4;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @DJMoonDawg DJ MoonDawg @DJMoonDawg mark zuckerberg just got married today….I’d say congrats to his new wife for the come up but I’m sure he made her sign a prenup. 13 hours ago via Tweetbot for iOS · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite .ditto204044013131677698 {background: #C0DEED url(http://a0.twimg.com/images/themes/theme1/bg.png) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204044013131677698 a {color: #0084B4;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @jkarpati Joshua Karpati @jkarpati I can only assume that Mark Zuckerberg’s prenup is more ironclad than Robert Downey Jr. 11 hours ago via web · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite .ditto204214161109032961 {background: #C3EBC6 url(http://a0.twimg.com/profile_background_images/425974447/YMCMB.jpg) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204214161109032961 a {color: #B30000;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @JoshNahim Josh Nahim™ @JoshNahim Aww, as if mark Zuckerberg got married. Hope he made her sign a prenup, it’s not worth the risk #golddigger 28 minutes ago via Twitter for iPhone · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite .ditto204219586776797184 {background: #131516 url(http://a0.twimg.com/images/themes/theme14/bg.gif) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204219586776797184 a {color: #009999;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @dougdarrigo doug darrigo @dougdarrigo Depending on the prenup, if Mark Zuckerberg gets divorced, his marriage could turn into the world’s most expensive Asian fetish 6 minutes ago via Twitter for iPhone · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite .ditto204205549141753856 {background: #C0DEED url(http://a0.twimg.com/images/themes/theme1/bg.png) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204205549141753856 a {color: #0084B4;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @fiveplustools Dave Perkin @fiveplustools Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook got married. I would love to look at that prenup..it’s probably thicker than the Beijing phonebook. 1 hour ago via web · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite .ditto204203476782284800 {background: #352726 url(http://a0.twimg.com/images/themes/theme5/bg.gif) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto204203476782284800 a {color: #D02B55;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding: 12px 0px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.twitreply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.twitreply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @deannazabel Deanna Zabel @deannazabel Another example of the #manvswoman difference: Me: Mark Zuckerberg got married, it’s about freakin’ time! Husband: I hope he had a prenup. 1 hour ago via web · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite [h/t: Huffinton Post]

The much-anticipated initial public offering of Facebook, as you surely know by now, has finally taken place. Although the news has garnered a lot of excitement, it has also brought up some questions. Numerous analysts have raised concerns over the future of the company, citing uncertainties about Facebook’s revenue model, mobile strategy, advertising, Mark Zuckerberg’s leadership, and more. Christian Taylor, CEO of leading Facebook ecommerce platform, Payvment, tells WebProNews he’s not worried about the company’s future. Francis Gaskins, the President of IPODesktop, spoke with WebProNews earlier this year, and told us he was skeptical of the future growth of Facebook given its past quarter earnings. “[If] you look at what happened for December 2010, March, June, and September of 2011, oddly enough, what you will find is the operating earnings were flat,” said Gaskins. “The net after tax earnings were flat, and the margins – the profit margins – went down.” “The credibility of management’s forecast is very, very important,” he added. More recently, we talked with Vitaliy Katsenelson, the Chief Investment Officer at Investment Management Associates and author of The Little Book of Sideways Markets. He too voiced doubt about investing in Facebook and indicated that Wall Street would quickly demand higher revenues and a CEO that is more committed to profitability. “After a while, investors are going to start looking at it… not as this kind of prized asset, but as a business where genuine cash flow is essential,” he said. “I want him [Zuckerberg] to think about long term stability,” he continued, “and if he doesn’t, I would just run. I would not touch the stock.” What’s more, a new poll from Whisper Number does not deliver results in Facebook’s favor either. The financial research firm surveyed 1,100 investors and traders and found that 68 percent of them would not consider Facebook a “buy” after its IPO. When asked if Facebook was a long term investment, 65 percent of those surveyed also answered with “No.” Contrary to these viewpoints, there are those who value Facebook very highly. Payvment’s Taylor told WebProNews that he was not at all worried about the company going public or its future, and that the wildly popular social network is much more than Facebook.com. Unlike other destination sites, he told us that Facebook creates a means to connect the entire Internet and world. Specifically, it brings people together while also allowing them to discover news, movies, games, and much more. “[It’s] something that’s so engrained into the fabric of the entire Internet,” he said. “If you look at Facebook as just a .com entity like you would any other .com place, it’s very narrow-sighted.” Taylor is also very confident in Facebook’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg. As a fellow CEO/engineer, he told us that he watches Zuckerberg’s leadership “in awe.” “The reason why Facebook can still innovate to this day, and the reason why whenever I talk to an employee of Facebook, they’re excited to be working there – they truly do feel like they’re changing the world… that is Mark Zuckerberg’s doing,” pointed out Taylor. “He’s really the guy that rallies that company and will going forward,” he added. Taylor believes so strongly in Facebook and its CEO that he built his own company on top of the social network. Payvment, as he explained, allows businesses to add ecommerce to Facebook in order to create a new social shopping experience. At this point, it has more than 160,000 businesses using its apps to promote their products and services on Facebook and is adding hundreds more daily. “We’re really truly inventing a completely different kind of shopping when it comes to shopping on a social network such as Facebook,” he said. It is this new shopping experience and the “huge possibilities” that it brings that makes Facebook a good investment to Taylor. He’s not concerned about competition from Amazon or eBay since Facebook enables serendipitous shopping. In other words, users shop based on what is happening in the Facebook environment. For instance, around the season premiere of the hit show the “Walking Dead,” Payvment noticed that zombie related items were their top sellers. Taylor believes that Facebook will build upon its ecommerce platform and utilize it for further monetization. He envisions the current gaming “credits” being integrated into ecommerce in a way that makes shopping universal and seamless through the Facebook platform. With Facebook’s IPO, Taylor told us that he could see this potential concept and other innovations happening very quickly. “A lot of times… when companies go IPO and they get big,” he said, “they have a tendency to slow down. But, I have a feeling that… we’re gonna see the complete opposite.” Facebook better not slow down, because it has a lot more competitors than those mentioned. The giant elephant in the competition room, of course, is Google, who also happens to have a pretty wide presence throughout the web (beyond Google.com). It’s not just a matter of Google+ vs. Facebook. Facebook is clearly lightyears ahead on that front. Advertising is another matter, however. Take a look at this infographic comparing Google and Facebook in terms of advertising and revenue: There has been a fair amount of controversy this week around Facebook ads, with GM deciding to pull the $10 million it spends on them, in favor of trying the free content-centric Facebook Page/Timeline approach. As unfortunate as it is for the social network, the fact is that this approach is certainly going to continue to be an attractive strategy for many businesses. Of course, it’s always a matter of News Feed visibility, which is controlled by Facebook and its algorithm. Some, as Taylor suggested, think Facebook Credits might become a bigger source of revenue for the company. In Facebook’s defense though, there aren’t many companies that can claim to have a significant user base of addicts. A recent study found that Facebook is slowly becoming the reason to pay the Internet bill, at least in the U.S. You don’t hear about “Google addicts” so much, although Google’s YouTube is certainly an Internet hotspot. The search giant is also trying to ramp up interaction on Google+ in hopes of turning it into the next big social hub. On the other hand, a recent poll found that half the U.S. thinks Facebook is a passing trend. And why not? We’ve all seen other hugely popular social sites emerge and fizzle out. But again, Facebook is much more integrated with the web at large than any of those ever were. And, of course, Facebook is huge around the entire world. Chris Crum contributed to this report.

Mark Zuckerberg must be on top of the world right now. Facebook went public on Friday to the tune of $42 a share, even though it settled to $38 after a not so hot day.Regardless, it’s still a reason to celebrate. Zuckerberg wasn’t going to let the good times stop at the IPO though as the founder of Facebook also got married this weekend. Zuckerberg updated his Facebook Timeline to show a picture of himself with long-time girlfriend, and now bride, Priscilla Chan. The picture of the newly wed couple has already attracted over 700,00 likes and over 600 comments. While it doesn’t break any records, it shows that the Facebook community is super excited for Zuckerberg. All the comments are full of good will and congratulations instead of the jokes that I was kind of expecting. According to Daily Finance, the wedding ceremony was set to friends only. It took place at Zuckerberg’s home in Palo Alto surrounded by only 100 friends and family. The ring given to Chan was adorned with a “very simple ruby.” Here I was hoping that he was going to give her a ring with a sapphire shaped in the Facebook logo. The funny thing is that most who attended the wedding were completely caught off guard. It would appear that the couple was waiting for Chan to graduate medical school so the date of the marriage was always in flux. It appears that the guests were invited under the pretense of a party, but found out it was a wedding after they arrived. Like any good relationship, the marriage has become Facebook official. Both Zuckerberg and Chan have updated their profiles to show that they tied the knot. We here at WebProNews wish the newlywed couple the best of luck in the coming years. Here’s hoping we will soon be able to report on some little Zuckerbergs running around the Facebook HQ causing all kinds of chaos.

This week could have been a better one for Facebook. An ominous constellation of events aligned that conjured up a palpable cloud of doubt over Facebook’s ability to lure and sustain advertisers. First, WordStream released the results of a study that shows Google leads Facebook in a number of advertising-related areas like ad targeting options and ad formats. Then, the week was capped off with an announcement from General Motors that it would be pulling all $10 million from its paid advertising campaign on Facebook because, in short, GM says they don’t work. Do you ever click on Facebook ads or do you pretty much ignore them as clutter? If you’ve purchased any Facebook ads, do you think they’re fairly useless or have you enjoyed some success with them? Share your experiences below. Not the best sentiments to have attached to your company if you’re Facebook considering the company is likely to make its initial public offering this coming Friday. Facebook wants people to spend and invest money with the site, not withdraw it. So were the last few days a dreary period of runic divination for Facebook or just unfortunate happenstance? The short-term ramifications will largely be nonexistent but such developments do cast a thin pall on what should be Facebook’s most glorious achievement yet: having the most lucrative IPO in the history of tech businesses. Going Places GM’s announcement to stop paying for ads is likely a lot of sound and fury signifying very little. What’s of greater import is which party, GM or Facebook, let the other down. As far as GM goes, there’s been some talk that it was handling its social media campaign poorly or simply had misguided expectations from advertising on Facebook. One of GM’s chief competitors didn’t shy away from highlighting this possibility. .ditto202523756571279360 {background: #052857 url(http://a0.twimg.com/profile_background_images/398413405/Ford_Twitter_Background.png) no-repeat;padding: 20px;}.ditto202523756571279360 a {color: #325685;}p.dittoTweet {background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 22px !important;font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;line-height: 30px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;}span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding-top: 12px;height: 65px;}span.metadata span.author {line-height: 20px;color: #333;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;}.tweet {font-size: 24px;}span.metadata span.author img {float: left;margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;}a:hover {text-decoration: underline;}span.timestamp {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;margin: 10px 0 0 0;line-height: 25px;}span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;}span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image: url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;}span.timestamp a.reply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;}span.timestamp a.reply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;}span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;}span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;}span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;}span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;}p.indent {margin-left: 20px;}.at-name a, .at-name a:visited, .at-name a:hover {color: #999;text-decoration: none;font-size: 14px;font-weight: normal;}.dittodownarrow {width: 0;height: 0;border-left: 20px solid transparent;border-right: 20px solid transparent;border-top: 20px solid #EEE;margin: 0 0 0 73px;} !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id))}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); Follow @Ford Ford Motor Company @Ford It’s all about the execution. Our Facebook ads are effective when strategically combined with engaging content & innovation. 21 hours ago via SocialEngage · powered by @socialditto  Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite Zuh-zing. GM insists that its decision to stop with the paid Facebook ads was purely coincidental that it happened so soon before Facebook’s IPO and the Wall Street Journal, who broke the story yesterday, reports that GM had always intended to reassess how it’s spending money on the site. Regardless, whether you call it fate or call it intentional, it’s hard to dismiss this peculiar sequence of events. “A lot of people are probably suspicious of the timing of that announcement,” said Andrew Frank, a marketing analyst with Gartner, who spoke to WebProNews about GM’s decision. Although the timing may be curious, Frank doesn’t think GM’s withdrawal of advertising funds is a hostile decision nor should it be seen as a total freeze on Facebook’s potential to appeal to large companies. “Facebook very frequently updates its formats and releases new products, so it will have another chance to pitch to GM,” he said. GM’s cessation of paid ads on the site isn’t such a dark omen for Facebook’s future relationship with other high-profile advertisers, either, he adds. “It won’t have too much of an effect. $10 million is pretty small to the overall scheme of Facebook revenue.” He added, “It’s clearly a negative, but I think that advertisers will probably look beyond that one data point.” Still, others think there might be cause for some apprehension on the advertisers’ side of the street. Larry Kim, the CTO of WordStream, the company that produced the report yesterday that showed Facebook lagging behind Google, told WebProNews that he isn’t surprised GM dropped its paid ads on Facebook. “It’s not a great way of selling cars,” Kim said, “but if it truly isn’t a great way to sell cars, is there a risk that other brands need to figure out as well? Absolutely.” The potential certainly exists for Facebook to become a great place to sell cars, however, that would take a lot of big directional changes on the company’s part. Just don’t hold your breath on that happening anytime soon. Backseat Drivers Mark Zuckerberg (now) famously wrote to shareholders in Facebook’s official S-1 filing, “We don’t build services to make money; we make money to build better services.” A recent profile in New York portrays a Zuckerberg who was disdainful of advertising on Facebook in the early days, not wanting it to become the “ad-choked cesspool” that MySpace eventually melted into. It would appear that Zuckerberg’s disposition toward advertising has survived to this day and, riding into the company’s IPO lucre, he is content to relegate advertisers to the backseat. He claims that he’s sticking to the mission to make the internet more social, not more fertile for advertisers. Whether you’re a frustrated advertiser or just a studied speculator on the side, that may not exactly come as news to you. “Based on the very slow pace of ad innovation in the last six years, it’s clearly not Facebook’s top priority,” Kim said. “They’ve made significant advances with social networks, such as with Timeline, but not nearly anything of that scale on the advertising side. It’s ten year’s behind.” Facebook’s lack of prioritizing is what informs Kim’s lack of surprise that GM won’t pay for more ads on Facebook. “There’s no shortage of places that companies like GM can spend on advertising,” he said. “Why spend money on a website that’s not even doing their best to make the most out of advertising?” Aye, but if you’re looking to advertise, there’s the rub. Facebook has an unprecedented reach of users with so much information collected on each and every one of them. The built-in reach of ads on the site is one of the most alluring reasons companies choose to advertising on Facebook in the first place, even in spite of a glaring paucity of research that shows whether advertising on Facebook even works. With Facebook on track to register its 1 billionth user as soon as later this year, advertisers can’t ignore Facebook anymore than iron shavings can resist a magnet. The problem isn’t whether to advertise or not on Facebook – it’s a foregone conclusion at this point – but what to expect to get out of advertising on Facebook. One of the big problems that companies are having with Facebook advertising is measuring the efficacy of the ads, which may have been GM’s problem. “People are still trying to figure out the return on investment on Facebook,” Kim said. “The most effective thing you can do is drive fanpage “likes,” but the economics of a fanpage “likes” are really unknown. It isn’t clear if those are even worth anything.” Until such values get established, for now companies are banking on the extraordinary access that Facebook has to people as the best return on its ads. “A lot of advertising decisions are based on reach and frequencies and Facebook has pretty good metrics,” Frank said, “especially with engagement metrics, which are just off the chart.” He expects that the optimization and effectiveness of the ads will come in due time. Asleep at the Wheel? Facebook’s revenue ballooned on the strength of advertising sales to $3.7 billion in 2011, which makes the absence of GM’s $10 million a proverbial drop in the bucket for Facebook. Nevertheless, some spectators began prognosticating Facebook’s demise following GM’s announcement. And while it’s true that GM’s reduction of how much it spends on ads – it still plans to spend $30 million on maintaining a presence on the site – does mean that two of the top three advertisers in the United States have decided to spend less on Facebook this year, it’s hardly any indication that we should expect Facebook to start wheezing along after its IPO. After all, it’s got nearly a billion users’ worth of data it’s largely not using. “Facebook has yet to really tap into the value of the data they have for advertising,” Frank said. “From a targeting standpoint, most of the ads that Facebook sells are probably not really optimized for the platform.” While Facebook might monetize their audience at a lower rate than, say, Google, he doesn’t necessarily see that as a bad thing. “It’s just a question of whether they prioritize that side of the business.” Realistically, Facebook probably doesn’t need to take advertising too seriously for now because it would require a grand overhaul of the site’s advertising platform. The company seems to have a developed a ridiculously successful formula, so why mess with it? In the end, Facebook obviously doesn’t need to cater to advertisers in order to succeed – just watch the company’s stock blow up on Friday (or whenever the IPO happens). It probably wouldn’t even need to change up much, really, to enhance the way it makes money off of advertising. “Facebook has all these fan Pages for people that they’re just giving away for free,” Kim said. “Instead of charging for ads that are boring and nobody clicks on, start charging for Facebook Pages.” By making the brand Page as engaging as possible with pulls and such to engage an audience, Kim thinks that method of generating revenue through ads would be much more lucrative. And that’s the easy route of changing things, according to Kim. If Facebook really wanted to go for Vegas-level winnings with ads, it could easily retool its targeting options. “I don’t think Facebook is doing a great job in terms of ad targeting options,” he said. “It knows what demographic you belong to but it doesn’t know anything more specific, like if you’re looking to buy a flight to San Francisco.” By tapping into more specific data of its users, Facebook could easily maximize the value of its ads. “There’s no technical reason why Facebook can’t optimize its targeting options,” Kim added. Whether it’s stuffing a cookie in your browser that retargets ads on Facebook based on what you’ve been looking at elsewhere on the internet or making it easier for Facebookers to connect directly to a business via mobile ads, Facebook has an inventory of options when it comes to really maximizing the site’s advertising potential. The means exist. It’s just a matter of whether Facebook wants to go that route. Or, more dreadfully, if it ever needs to take that route. Regardless of where Facebook goes after this GM blemish, one thing’s for certain: nobody thinks that Facebook’s star isn’t done rising just yet. Frank doesn’t see the GM announcement really slowing Facebook’s ascent, either. “The Facebook story is so full of promise and impact and hype that it’s hard to see GM’s decision having that much of an impact.” Likewise, Kim is curious to see where that Facebook story continues to. “I have a tremendous amount of respect for what Facebook’s built and I’m optimistic about what they’re going to be doing in the future,” he said. Facebook didn’t get to where it is by following the rules and just because a company like General Motors withdrew a fractional amount of money from its advertising campaign is hardly enough to slow down Facebook’s momentum or people’s confidence in the site. More, it may signify that Facebook shares the driver’s seat with no one. What would you like to see Facebook do to improve the ads? Should the company make them more relevant and personal or will you continue to just ignore them either way? Does the GM withdrawal affect how you think Facebook’s upcoming IPO will be perceived by investors? Join the debate below.