The highly anticipated mega IPO launch of social network leader Facebook was a disappointment as it rose just 23 cents, a gain of 0.6% over its IPO price of $38, amid record volumes.

Still, the $104 billion IPO – second-biggest in history behind Visa and General Motors, made instant billionaires out of CEO Mark Zuckerberg and other Facebook employees have became millionaires.

Well, we can only reminisce those days of dot com mania when valuations can double on opening days regardless of the business. If the price falls below $38 soon, it could put a real dampener on other tech stocks.

Facebook’s profit of $668 million last year from revenue of $1.06 billion makes the current valuation steep. But I won’t underestimate the influence of Facebook which has brought people closer, speed up sharing of information and helped shaped opinions. If Facebook continues to grow, monetize its large user base and make shrewd acquisitions on new technology, it could be a valuable stock to own.

Founder and majority owner, Mark Zuckerberg intends to stay for the long term, with much of his paper wealth tied to the fortune of his company. Will you be throwing your lot in with Facebook too?

Mark Zuckerberg has given Facebook a makeover with Timeline. This new feature makes it easier to see events, pics and posts from your past by year and month by placing a timeline on the right of your profile.

Timeline Views allow you to filter the content by photos, locations (courtesy of Bing maps integration), add apps, “likes” and much more.

I like the addition of Timeline as it makes Facebook a more interesting social network by letting the world know about your life story. But remember that stalkers, girlfriends, bosses, will have an easier time finding out about you too… so keep the embarrassing pics away!

On the football pitch, Leo Messi, the FC Barcelona striker and world’s best football player, mesmerizes with his silky movements and deadly strikes. In the social media, he wins hands down too.

Seven hours after Leo Messi started a Facebook Page, he has almost 7 million Likes.

To put this amazing number in perspective, it’s about 40% more Likes than U.S. President Barack Obama Facebook Page and 30% more Justin Bieber fans. In addition, Messi’s Likes were gathered in hours, not years.

Messi, wrote in a translated welcome message on the page, “Hola! Welcome to everyone. Thank you very much for the great number of messages that I have received. I am so excited! From now on we will be more closely connected … through Facebook.”

Well, hola Messi, glad to have you on Facebook. I wonder how many fans he will have by end of the season.

All along, you have been happily adding friends on Twitter and Facebook… but have it struck you that some friends are not real, or more specifically social bots?

According to a new report by research firm Gartner, one in every ten of your online friends will be nonhuman by 2015. Don’t worry, it is not an aliens or zombies invasion.

Gartner predicts the coming of “social bots”—automated tools used by brands and organizations to engage consumers. These automated software agents can handle interaction with communities of customized users.

I know you guys won’t be pleased to be flirting with a bot instead of a sexy babe. Well, just get used to hits and misses.. and try harder, you will score with a real lady for sure.

[Gartner]

Facebook is a great place to network, update status, play games and getting into intimate relationships with strangers friends.

But there are also lots of breakups going on too, just that you didn’t notice it. Now we finally have some “official” data to tell us when are the popular times for breakups in Facebook…

David Mccandless, an award-winning writer, designer and author based in London, gathered information on “when you’re most likely to get dumped,” based on about 10,000 Facebook status updates and analyzed breakups patterns.

The result… a spike in people moving on during spring breaks and summer holidays. Even romantic days such as Christmas and Valentine’s Day are also popular breakup periods.

Now couples have to keep their fingers crossed during these periods. By the way, I am surprised they counted April Fool’s Day as one of the popular times to end relationships. There could be some serious denials…

[Gizmodo]

Facebook recently invested $10 million to acquire Chai Labs, a startup which help companies develop niche websites that are search engine friendly. 

Chai Labs was started by Gokul Rajaram, a former Google Adsense executive and it’s advisory board and investor list reads like a who’s who, consisting of the likes of Marc Andreessen, one of the cofounders of Netscape Communications, Joe Kraus of Google Ventures’ and Reid Hoffman, the LinkedIn chairman.

Even its client list appears strong with Associated Content, NBC Local and the Travel Ad Network listed as some of their clients.

This is the latest in what’s expected to be a string of acquisitions from Facebook and comes a month after the social net bought travel review site NextStop.

Just over a year ago, Facebook acquired FriendFeed but no ambitious plan were implemented subsequently.

It’s not really clear how Facebook plans to benefit from the acquistion of Chai Labs. Maybe Facebook desire the talents at Chai Labs, as in the Friendfeed deal when Bret Taylor, who launched Google Maps, crossed over and is now Facebook’s chief technology officer.

[Mashable]

Speculation is rife that Google intends to dethrone Facebook with its new social network, tentatively called Google Me.

The rumor gained credibility when Digg founder Kevin Rose reportedly tweeted, “Ok, umm, huge rumor: Google to launch facebook competitor very soon “Google Me,” very credible source” on June 28.

InsideFacebook also quoted former Facebook executive Adam D’Angelo, who says Google’s project is “not a rumor” and that there is “a large number of people working on it.” It seems that Google is modeling the project off of Facebook.

Though Google has not confirmed its new high-priority project, but to take on Facebook is ambitious. Failing in this endeavor with all the resources pumped in will be a huge embarrassment to Google.

Google already has many social services like Buzz, Friend Connect, Orkut, Gmail, GTalk, Wave, Reader, Docs, YouTube, SideWiki, etc. In that sense, Google is already a huge social network.

Setting up another social network modelled on Facebook may render its earlier products useless and there is no guarantee of success (why should people switch over if it is exactly the same as Facebook).

I think Google should just leverage on its existing services by improving on its profiles and connectivity of its products. Given that each Google account has a profile which is central to all Google activities, making them available for sharing will make it similar to Facebook Wall.

Can Google overtake Facebook as the king of social network? Probably not. I am sure Google will definitely announce a much better product than Buzz or Wave but I can’t imagine people leaving Facebook, after seeing how privacy issues fail to dent its popularity.

By the way, Facebook is also trying to move onto Google’s turf by using “likes” as relevance indicators in it’s search results. In addition, Matthew Papakipos, an engineer who “started and managed the Chrome OS project” is now with Facebook.

Improvement is always a good thing but Facebook has a long way to go before grabbing Google’s search market share.

With both giants moving aggressively into each other’s territory, it will be interesting to watch who ends up as the victor. The result will have significant impact on the businesses’ competitive moats. Stay tuned..

[Independent]

Farmville addicts have good reason to cheer. Very soon, their their beloved agricultural simulator game on Facebook will appear on mobile platforms like the iPhone, iPad and Android OS.

The rumors began circulating when domain names (farmvilleandroid.com, farmvilleipad.com, farmvilleiphone.com and farmvillesms.com) were discovered to be registered to DNStination Inc. who also holds the official website domain (farmville.com) for the Zynga game.

In addition, a statement from a Zynga Spokesperson confirmed that they have plans to expand to various mobile platforms.

Fertilizing crops on the go can definitely kill boredom and we can make ourselves more popular on Facebook by helping out on our neighbors’ farms. I expect workplace productivity to drop while we go into crop tending and harvesting frenzy.

Bosses will be crying foul as their employees bury themselves in their iPhones under the pretext of working. But there is little they can do as Farmville is so popular, with more than 80 million users, it will be hard-pressed to find an employee who is not a virtual farmer.

[Mashable]

Insurance companies are getting desperate. They will do what they can to squeeze more moolah out of its customers.

Home insurance premiums could rise as much as 10% for the most trivial of reason… if you are using social media websites such as Twitter and Facebook because it can compromise your home security.

Darren Black, the head of home insurance at Confused.com, said: “I wouldn’t be surprised if, as social media grow in popularity and more location-based applications come to fore, insurance providers consider these in their pricing of an individual’s risk. We could see rises of up to 10pc for people who use these sites.

Source: Telegraph

WTF, that basically includes everyone, except for your 90 year old grandma.