As Facebook readies for the biggest IPO in the history of the technology industry, the company has been hosting an all-night hackathon with its staff.
Hundreds of hoodie-wearing Facebook employees have gathered at the company's new Menlo Park headquarters and satellite offices to celebrate the upcoming IPO by celebrating the spirit in which Facebook was created.
The event has been said to reinforce the notion that the company's focus will remain on innovation and new products. Commemorative T-shirts for the event bear the statement: “Stay Focused and Keep Hacking.”
According to reports, the hackathon, Facebook's 31st such event, was kicked off with a standing ovation for Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, before he addressed his employees.
A number of Facebook innovations that have actually been implemented on the site were initially developed during Facebook hackathons. Such innovations include the early version of Timeline and Facebook chat.
The company will make its public debut on Nasdaq later today, as Zuckerberg is expected to symbolically “ring the bell” at the start of trade. Facebook shares have been given a final starting price of $38 - giving the company a $104 billion valuation.
Social hype
The IPO is not only one of the largest in US history (after General Motors and Visa), but also arguably the most hyped. Social media is abuzz with comments regarding the landmark event. While some believe the bubble will soon burst, others just can't wait for people to stop talking about it. Some tweets doing the rounds include the following:
“I think the Facebook IPO will be looked back on a bit like 31.12.99. A high water-mark for investor foolishness. $104bn lolz”. (sic)
“So now Facebook is selling its shares at $38 per share, dethroning Google as king of the Internet.”
“I'm going hard on Facebook tonight (since after midnight) in honour of the IPO. Ugly inspirational quotes for everyone!”
“Would it be ironic to complain about the disproportionate amount of media coverage for the Facebook IPO via a tweet? I'm still going to.”
“Why is Facebook going public? They couldn't figure out the privacy settings either.”
For those users feeling like their digital lives are about to go on sale today, they can calculate the estimated value of their data within Facebook via a service set up by Disconnect Me. The service accesses individual profiles to determine exactly how much value each profile contributes to Facebook as a whole.
Ordinary people wanting to try their hand at being an investment analyst can also do so via a site set up to let people guess what Facebook's share price will be at the close of the first day of trade.
Facebookclosingprice.com uses a fantasy football model to let people get involved in the conversation. At the time of writing, the average predicted closing share price was $54 (based on 1 734 predictions).
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