I just listened to an interview between Accel VC Jim Breyer and Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook's Founder. Here's some interesting points about this phenomenon of good judgement, timing and site design… Mark Brooks
LOOMIA — Oct 26 — 450 servers and 25,000 signups a day. 230 million page views a day! Mark considers Facebook, not as a social network but as an online directory. Some have called it a 'walled friendster' but Mark says it's a utility, a directory. They made a decision to keep individual schools walled to keep maximum focus. Users can see fellow alumni only…so they feel more comfortable listing private information such as their cell phone number. "Friendster, myspace and facebook are all very different things. We have this directory, Friendster is a dating site and…who knows what Myspace is." (laughter). Mark is very humble and reveals, (32:08) "I've no idea what I'm doing." Jim adds, "I'll add a couple of comments. (laughter). Mark has a number of skills that one rarely sees…he's a great listener and you learn from listening…I'm still stunned how many entrepreneurs come to our offices and it's all output and there's no thoughtfulness. It's amazing that the very best entrepreneurs are…great listeners and…their organisations tend to be great listening organisations.
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Mark Brooks: This is what Friendster got fabulously right. Jonathan (Friendster's founder) listened and observed the real world for 6 months after splitting up with his girlfriend. He bottled what he saw in how his friends networked and met new people in the real world. On another note, I'm very pleased to announce that Sierra Ventures ($1.1 Billion managed) confirmed today that they will be speaking at the next Internet Dating Convention on raising venture capital and working effectively with VC's.
A little more from Mark Z. from the interview…(42:53) "One of the things one of my friends and I were messing around with the other night was seeing if we could comput who we thought would be in a relationship…and we realised we had over a third chance of predicting which two people would be in a relationship in a weeks time." (laughter).
Mark Brooks: Hmm, so dating is intriguing to Mark. I believe Facebook will eclipse the other 'social networks' simply because it offers the highest utility (focus+integrity) at the biggest point of pain and value. Pain being, the pain of losing connections with alumni. Value being, in maintaining contacts and reaping the long term emotional and financial benefits. A central directory was needed, Universities knew this…but they never quite got around to it. I visited and pitched UC Irvine and UC Berkeley on a plaxo-esque directory in 1999. Alas, a little early, wrong company.