In two days’ time, social media platform known as Facebook will quit teen years and clock 20.
From a fledgling single entity that has changed names and endured uncommon controversies, litigations and huge payouts in damages and fines, Facebook has grown into a global conglomerate called Meta Platforms, Inc.
According to Meta’s latest earnings release, the world’s largest social network ended 2023 with 3.07 billion monthly active users, up 3 percent — or more than a hundred million users — from a year ago.
“Amazingly, to this day, Facebook has never seen a year-over-year drop in active users and once it happens, we won’t know, because the company announced that it won’t be reporting Facebook user numbers going forward.
“Instead, the company will focus on metrics that are more relevant to its advertising business, such as changes in ad impressions and the average price per ad at the regional level,” Statista, a German online platform that specializes in data gathering and visualization, reports.
Speaking of Meta’s advertising business, the company blew past analyst expectations in the fourth quarter, reporting a new revenue record of $40.1 billion, 96 percent of which came from advertising.
That’s up 25 percent from last year’s December quarter, while the company’s profit more than tripled year-over-year to $14 billion.
“2023 was our ‘year of efficiency’,” Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a call with investors.
“I think that being a leaner company is helping us execute better and faster,” he said, referring to the aggressive cost-cutting measures implemented in 2023, which included laying off thousand of employees.
