For my third prediction of the year, I’m going with one just a tad bit less obvious than “Facebook will go public.” There seems to be no doubt about that event occurring this year, though I’ve certainly heard intelligent folks argue that Facebook can and should figure out how to stay private. I’ve argued that Facebook ought to be a public company, if only to be held (somewhat) accountable given all the data it has on our lives.
But this prediction has to do with Facebook announcing and then launching a web-wide advertising network along the lines of Google’s AdSense. I’ve talked about this for years (short handing it as “FaceSense,”) and I’ve asked Mark Zuckerberg, Carolyn Everson, Bret Taylor, and Sheryl Sandberg about it on stage and off. The answer is always the same: We’re not interested in launching a web ad network at this time.
I predict that line will change in 2012. Here’s why:
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