Image via Wikipedia

Any day now Mark Zuckerberg and those who have worked with him the longest, will be partying like never before.  After all, it’s not very often that companies go public for billions and billions of dollars!  Facebook is expected to topple Google’s $27 billion.  There is no question about it, the champagne corks are flying throughout the offices of FB Headquarters.

Why would he consider going public?  The mounds of money are quite obvious. He will also continue holding over 56 %, therefore controls voting power.  This includes the final decision regarding any board elections.  The public will be purchasing Class A shares, each share holds a single vote, while insiders hold Class B shares.  Class B carries 10 votes each.

While in the process of IPO, everyone at Facebook is overflowing tirelessly with ideas and positive frenzy, the question might be what will happen after the process, once there is that big exhale.

Mark Zuckerberg isn’t a very experienced corporate executive.  There will be a learning curve for him to play the Wall Street game.  He will have to adapt to a much shorter term view and quarterly goals for the board members, fluctuating of stock prices, and generating income.

The Wall Street Journal has commented that in order for Facebook to grow into its IPO valuation it needs to exploit the user base aggressively, since Facebook “makes” nothing, the actual user (in this case) is the product.

Sixty percent of the population care to engage in social media, the others perhaps just prefer to keep private.  Perhaps some of those 40 percent would consider to connect with friends and family using Facebook but have their doubts once confronted with ads being pushed in front of photos of brother’s skiing trip, or shy away from the thought of digital sharecroppers harvesting private and even sensitive information.

Regardless of the various points of views on this IPO, one must keep in mind, that Facebook produces nothing of economic value, so some have been asking themselves what are investors actually buying into?   It will be interesting to see what lies ahead.