Who know, maybe its true. Though all I can see is: 'buying out promising products before they are going to become your rivals' mentality.

It might be a successful strategy to run a business when you are big enough to do it (as long as your buyouts are correct).

I heard about facebook from a friend when it was still exclusive and I joined when it was opened up. Now I open it up at what seems exponential intervals, and each time it seems my disappointment with the platform is also exponential.

Its a mess filled with garbage mixed with adds that pretend to be content.

Back when it was still exclusive to people with university '.edu' email addresses Facebook was the best thing to ever happen to college. Instantly knowing who's in your classes or potential courses was a game changer.

Facebook is establishing itself as the social network you go to when you are tired of chasing new social networks. If you wait long enough features off that new network will come to you. This is a much bigger market than dominating a five year cohort.

Facebook has been declared dead without actually dying for so long now that it might still be alive when the retro mechanisms start kicking in.

It's not clear Facebook have the formula for a successful new network - Instagram and WhatsApp were both acquired. When Facebook have tried to create their own new networks, like their original Snapchat clone, it didn't work. That's not really a knock on them though, I don't think anybody else could claim to be able to spin up a successful new social network either.