Facebook’s IPO is coming soon. And many of the people who will pay for the initial stock offering of around $45 are betting the price will shoot up. And for a while, it will. But I think many will soon find that the high price is unrealistic and unsustainable. Why? Those who invest are thinking about Facebook as a technology company. Yes I know that for Facebook executives it’s a big data marketing company. In reality, for it’s users, it is really a social venue. The social venue is what makes the big data side possible.  And social venues and their popularity follow social rules. Facebook’s growth is now to the point of social maturity. And for social venues, that’s not always a good thing.

If you are familiar with social venues like a hip restaurant or club, you know that, in real life, social venues have their 15-minutes-of fame cycle.

First phase: the new club opens up. For a while, just the cool people and hipsters use it.

Second phase: Then when people hear it’s the cool place to be, the place has long lines as everyone tries to get in.

For a social club, or even fashion, it’s the popularity and the any-one-can-get-in feeling, is what ironically becomes the venue’s downfall. Cool people aren’t ordinary. And they don’t do mass, public forums. Unless you pay them. They do cool, exclusive forums that prove their social clout. And that kicks off phase three…

So when a social venue becomes so popular, the hipsters and cool people migrate, like bees leaving the colony, to another place to breed a new cool hive at another social venue. And the process repeats itself.

I am willing to bet this is the future of Facebook. And that Facebook is currently at that point of migration. People are now used to the idea of a social forum, so Facebook’s novelty is wearing off.  No, it won’t die. It will become the Wal-Mart of social media. Large but not the place for certain demographics want to be seen hanging out.  And those “non Wal-Mart” users will migrate to other cooler, more exclusive forums.

I think Facebook already knows this. One reason you see the recent buying spree of Instagram, Glancee, Tagtile in the last month. “Sticky” added value goodies given in the same way cable companies are offering goodies to keep your from canceling your cable subscription; they are trying to give users reasons to stay and stem the eventual migration of users. Even in their revised IPO report a few days ago, they said that the see the migration to mobile devices dangerous for their revenue. Likely because mobile not only kills ad opportunities but gives users easy access to other mobile social forums to use.

Will it work? Let’s keep an eye on the stock price and see. (But I don’t think so).

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