I'd put $1 on the following proposition: 30 years from now, the advertising industry (i.e. in which sellers of products pay directly for advertising - advertising which is not content and does not attempt to confuse the receiver about this) will have less than 1/10th the revenue it does today, as a proportion of the total revenue of all industries put together (I'd say "GDP" but I think that may be defined in terms of profit rather than revenue - and I expect margins to shrink everywhere).

(I think we'll see a big rise in viral marketing, shill and semi-shill reviewing (Klout, amazon's programme where they send products to highly rated reviewers), product placement and sponsored content (the my little pony cartoons; mad men with jack daniels; akb0048), which will blur the line between advertising and content creation. But I think outright ads will collapse)

I love the position you're taking on this. It's a specific view of the future that is plausible, and contrary to my position. Nice work.

To restate: I bet $1 that the ratio of total ad revenue (not including product placement revenue) to GDP will be substantially greater than 10% of what it is today.

Hope we're able to track each other down in 30 years, love to see how it turns out!

I'm pretty sure he wasn't predicting a demise, just margins that won't be as sexy.

Well, the first line of the article is

> Facebook not only is on course to go bust but will take the rest of the ad-supported Web with it.

Perhaps that's just a juicy opening line to draw people in to the article - but it sure sounds like predicting a demise to me.

Some of the things the article says are reasonable - but I wouldn't bet a dollar on facebook going bust and taking the entire ad-supported web with it.

> it sure sounds like predicting a demise to me.

He is. Of Facebook.

Facebook is not cheap to run. If revenues fall and costs do not ...