Facebook Doesn’t Look at Profits the Way other Companies Do

Image from: WSJ

A good example of a “mission driven organization” is Facebook. Even though Facebook is growing big (52% in 2015) and earning a lot of money (44% operating margins), money is not the sole motivating factor for Facebook, but its mission to make the world more open and connected. Hang around Facebook executives enough, and you’ll learn that cynical business questions about money are best phrased in terms of “user experience” and the mission.

Below is Fortune’s Coverage on Facebook’s year-end earnings call and how Mark Zuckerberg responded on his “Mission trumps money” stand at Facebook.

In Facebook’s year-end earnings call, held Wednesday night, Zuckerberg closed his prepared remarks with some high-minded mission talk about how his newborn daughter has made him think about the legacy his company will leave to the next generation. “If we continue to focus on solving the fundamental challenges facing the world, and bringing the world closer together, we can leave a better world for the next generation,” he proclaimed.

I’m guessing the analysts heard that and thought: “Sure, whatever you want. Just keep growing revenue by 52% with 44% margins and we’ll keep trading your stock up.”

But toward the end of the call, an analyst made the business question mistake. He referred to a “billion-dollar conversation” that Zuckerberg had had years ago with Facebook’s engineers about the company’s slow shift to mobile. With that in mind, the analyst asked, has Zuckerberg had that conversation about Facebook’s messaging platforms, WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger?

The question set Zuckerberg off on a long, corrective explanation that can double as a helpful look into how Facebook thinks about making money from its popular Internet services. It also shows how Facebook went from falling behind in mobile to making 80% of its revenue there and coming to dominate the category.

The short version is “Mission trumps money” at Facebook. (Lucky for the company so far, the money has been pretty good.) Here’s Zuckerberg’s answer:

I think you have it wrong. I don’t know where you got that story from. I never had a conversation with the engineering team, where we were behind on mobile and I said, “We need to do this to make money.” That’s not really how we operate.

What happened was we realized mobile was growing faster than desktop and people were shifting their usage. It was the more important thing for people’s consumer experience. That’s when we made the shift. Not in our business first, but in how we developed the products.

I told all of our product teams, when they come in for reviews: “Come in with mobile. If you come in and try to show me a desktop product, I’m going to kick you out. You have to come in and show me a mobile product.” That was a crude leadership tactic—somewhat effective—in helping to motivate the organization to shift its energy toward focusing on mobile.

But if you remember, we actually went through a tough period where our mobile experience was not as good as we wanted it to be and we had no ads on mobile. We prioritized making the experience good before putting ads in.

That’s how we think about messaging. We know messaging is going to be increasingly important. That’s why we hired David Marcus [Facebook’s vice president of messaging products]… and why we bought WhatsApp.

We have a formula for how we build these businesses: First you build a great consumer experience that helps people share in a new way. That’s really important. Then, after that, you can start to introduce organic ways that people can interact with businesses.

So far, this strategy has worked well for ads on Facebook. It has also worked well for video, which is beginning to make money from ads, and for Instagram, which analysts predict will bring in over $3 billion in revenue this year. Soon Facebook will begin to make money from Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp, which have a respective 800 million and 1 billion monthly active users. As roundabout as it may seem, Facebook’s mission-driven approach works—the proof is in the profits.

Aisha Mustafa Invents New Space Propulsion System that could Propel Space Probes Without Using Fuel

According to digitaljournal.com

A physics student from Egypt’s Sohag University, Aisha Mustafa, 19, has patented a new type of propulsion system based on quantum theory that she says could propel space probes and artificial satellites without using any fuel.

According Gizmodo, Aisha’s new system exploits the quirky laws of quantum physics which state that in spite of appearances, space really is not vacuum but that it is a seething cauldron of fundamental particle interactions involving creation and destruction of “virtual particles.”

Mustafa believes it is possible to use vacuum energy fields to create propulsion and build spacecraft propulsion systems that need little or no fuel to travel in space. According to Fast Company, Mustafa is betting on exploiting quantum effects involved in dynamic Casimir effect and the Casimiri-Polder force. She uses two silicon metallic plates in a vacuum, “like capacitors placed a few micrometers apart.” The plates interact with the virtual photons in the quantum field and generate a net force that is either an attraction or a repulsion depending on their arrangement.

According to OnIslam.net, the invention is similar to a hypothetical concept of jet propulsion termed “Differential Sail,” proposed by NASA’s Marc G. Millis.

Fast Company reports that Aisha’s university was so impressed with her new invention that it assisted her with a patent application. OnIslam.net reports that Mustafa’s supervisor, Dr. Ahmed Fikry, who heads the physics department in Sohag University, said “I expect this invention to be highly beneficial in several fields and areas of industries.”

The President of Sohag University, Dr. Nabil Nour Eldin Abdellah, said the university facilitates “science clubs” for creative students. He said: “Once we knew about her (Mustafa’s) invention, we encouraged her and provided her with the budget needed through the Science Club for innovative students in the university. This is the case with any other creative student.”

According to OnIslam.net, with the retirement of NASA’s space shuttle program, the field of space vehicles propulsion is expanding and and growing in importance with ongoing search for new methods of space travel that are faster, safer, cheaper and easier. A rich variety of new ideas in propulsive systems are being proposed some of which are beyond current technological capabilities to implement.

Gizmodo reports that Mustafa intends to further study and develop the design so that it may be tested out.

In a popular Egyptian morning program “Sabah El kheir Ya Masr”(Good Morning Egypt), Mustafa expressed her appreciation to her faculty and university staff for providing materials, resources and support. She, however, lamented that there is no funding for a department of space science in her university and in Egyptian universities in general. She said this prevents development and research in the field of space technology. She said: “Departments of astronomy and physics are only available. Although they are related to space sciences but unfortunately they aren’t into the specific field of my invention and they can’t practically test or implement it.”

Read more: http://digitaljournal.com/article/325785#ixzz2bhvi8jjH

3-D Printer Brings Dexterity To Children With No Fingers

Richard Van As is a carpenter in South Africa. One day he lost control of his table saw and he lost his two fingers and mangled two more on his right hand. While still in the hospital Richard was determined to work again and made his own solution, making a mechanical hand using a 3D Printer.

In time, Van As came across a YouTube video from Ivan Owen. In the video, Owen, a special effects artist and puppeteer in Bellingham, Wash., was demonstrating one of his creations, a big puppet hand that relies on thin steel cables to act like tendons, allowing the metal digits to bend.

The two began working together long distance — Skyping, sharing ideas, even sending parts back and forth. Finally, Owen flew to South Africa to finish the work in person with Van As. And today, Van As has a working mechanical finger to assist him with his work.

But something else happened on Owen’s visit to South Africa: While he was there, Van As received a call from a woman seeking help for her 5-year-old son, Liam Dippenaar, who was born without fingers on his right hand. The cause was a rare congenital condition called amniotic band syndrome. In ABS, fibrous bands can wrap around a hand or a foot in utero and cut off circulation.

Within days, they developed a crude, mechanical hand for Liam, with five aluminum fingers that opened and closed with the up and down movement of Liam’s wrist. Owen still remembers the 5-year-old’s reaction when they rigged up the device for the first time.

They made improvements in this hand and partnered with Makerbot, They now call this the Robohand and is available for anyone to download for free complete with instructions. This can be found in Thingyverse.

To read more about this story please visit: http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2013/06/18/191279201/3-d-printer-brings-dexterity-to-children-with-no-fingers

The Orion Project: Sustainable Non-Polluting Free Energy

© Guerito 2005 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I was listening to the Joe Rogan Experience podcast and the guest was Dr. Steven Greer. It was an amazing podcast and what amazed me is that Dr. Greer has a lot of great insights about this free energy solution. It was very intriguing because if this energy solution is developed and if the research is backed up could we be seeing the end of fossil fuels or the use of these other non-renewable energy resources?

This is called, The Orion Project and the objective according to their website is to produce an Energy Generating System (a free energy generator) for the home or business, which will be available to the general global public. Ultimately this will free us from dependence on costly, limited, and polluting fossil fuels and forever transform the current non-sustainable energy paradigm.

See more at: http://www.siriusdisclosure.com/orion-project/energy-solutions/#sthash.CwVs5mM7.dpuf

Have you ever seen frozen smoke?

Aerogel or also known as frozen smoke is the world’s lowest density solid, clocking in at 96% air. If you hold a small piece in your hand, it’s practically impossible to see or feel, but if you poke it, it’s like styrofoam. It supports to up to 4,000 times its own weight and can withstand a direct blast from 2 pounds of dynamite. It is also the best insulator in existence

One rat brain ‘talks’ to another using electronic link

Got this news from BBC Radio Science Unit by Jen Whyntie

They found a way to how to make rats directly communicate to one another via cables. What these scientists did is that they placed implants on the rats’ brains and they tested whether the rats could interpret the signals that they are making to one another.

Professor Miguel Nicolelis and his team at Duke University Medical Center in North Carolina further developed their study and wanted to test whether they could finally establish a new medium where animals could communicate miles apart.

“Until recently we used to record this brain activity and send it to a computer… and the [computer] tells us what the animal is going to do,” Prof Nicolelis told the BBC’s Science in Action programme.

“So we reasoned, if we can do that with a computer, could another brain do that?”

This is why they did a water reward test. They have 2 rats that they trained for problem solving. These rats were placed in separate chambers and microelectrodes are the only thing connecting their brains (cortex which processes motor information).

One rat is designated the “encoder”, who will receive a visual clue, the other is the “decoder”, who will not. Image from: http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/66109000/gif/_66109740_01_rat_brain_expt_464.gif

These rats need to press the correct lever to get the water reward. What happened is that one rat acts as the encoder and the other one acts as a decoder. the decoder rat will have to rely on the que transmitted by the encoder rat to unlock the water. These rats were successful for about 70% of the time.

This could lead to possibly humans transmitting information to one another thousand of miles apart without the need of a keyboard only by using their brain.

“We will have a way to exchange information across millions of people without using keyboards or voice recognition devices or the type of interfaces that we normally use today,” he said.

“I truly believe that in a few decades… we will know what it is to communicate in that way.”

They just need to find a non invasive way to apply this if they ever plan to share between human brains.

Read More: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21604005

Cities in Metro Manila should use Reusable Eco Bags Instead of Plastic Bags or Styrofoam

Many cities in Metro Manila are starting to cut down their use or completely ban the use of plastic bags and styrofoam. This is because to help strengthen the climate resiliency of Metro Manila from our sporadic weather patterns. This would also help lessen the effects of water pollution to our rivers here in Metro Manila. This move also helps reduce the cost of waste disposal, water ways clean up activities, and other water related retrieval operations. There are a lot of benefits when we ban the use of plastic bags and styrofoam.

Polluted Pasig River picture from: http://typicallifeofapoorman.blogspot.com/

We should make the move from using DISPOSABLE plastic bags to REUSABLE eco bags today.

There are suppliers of eco bags in Metro Manila and they also do printing. One of them is our company Eco Bags BGC. Eco Bags BGC is a supplier of eco bags in Metro Manila. Eco Bags BGC supplies ready made and customized eco bags. You can choose from a variety of sizes for ready made eco bags. If you cannot find the exact specifications of your bags we can customize it for you for a minimum order.

Eco bags not only contribute to the benefit of the environment, but they also are  great for corporate giveaways, weddings, birthdays, parties, seminars, lectures, summits, baptismal and many more.

There are different types of Reusable Eco Bags:

Non-Woven Eco Bags

Katcha Bags

Tafetta Bags

Sack Bags and many more.

We can also silk screen your design or company logo on your eco bag orders.

The green movement is here and let us help our environment by using eco bags.

Eco Bags BGC is located in Taguig City, Philippines. We cater to clients around Metro Manila (Makati CIty, Taguig CIty, Fort Bonifacio Global CIty, Ortigas Center, Quezon City, Pasay City and many more.) They could also ship the eco bags all over the Philippines and internationally.

Order your eco bags now!

We are under:

 

Samsung Unveils Its New Ipad Mini Competitor, The Galaxy Note 8.0

Apple Ipad Mini (Left) vs Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0 (Right)

Samsung Unveils Its New Ipad Mini Competitor, The Galaxy Note 8.0

Got this news from Business Insider. Samsung recently introduced a smaller tablet, the Galaxy Note 8.0. The Galaxy Note 8.0 has an 8 inch screen which is similar to Apple’s iPad Mini. It has the ability to run two apps at the same time in a split screen and it also comes with Samsung’s S Pen. It also features a version of the Flipboard news reader app that makes use of the Note 8.0’s stylus! Imagine doodling while reading your favorite news and articles.

Here is a breakdown of the Galaxy Note 8.0 features:

• 8-inch display
• Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean
• A version of the Flipboard news reader app that makes use of the Note 8.0’s stylus
• Some versions of the tablet will be able to make phone calls, but that depends on country and carrier.
• Reading mode that adjusts the screen settings to be easier on your eyes
• A new universal remote control app that works with most TV sets and lets you search for content by sucking in data from your cable or satellite provider

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/samsung-announces-galaxy-note-8-0-2013-2#ixzz2LmNuqzns

This Micro-Algae Lamp Absorbs 150-200 Times More CO2 than a Tree!

This Micro-Algae Lamp Absorbs 150-200 Times More CO2 than a Tree! This was invented by French Biochemist and Shamengo pioneer, Pierre Calleja. This is a genius invention because it absorbs a lot of CO2 in a year thus helpin reduce the greenhouse gases in our atmosphere.

They should place these lamps in streets where there is a high volume of cars and traffic. They could also place these algae lamps in places with high air pollution concentration like in cities and factories. I salute mr. Pierre Calleja for this wonderful invention. Hope someone funds this idea because this may be the solution that mankind is looking for to combat greenhouse gases.

http://www.treehugger.com/urban-design/microalgae-lamp-absorbs-150-200-times-more-co2-tree-video.html