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Facebook's (NASDAQ:FB) core business is thriving, with strong engagement for the company's namesake social network and its Instagram subsidiary driving impressive top- and bottom-line growth. Here's a look at how the momentum from the company's social networks translated to earnings performance last quarter:

Data source: Facebook.

With Facebook having since passed 2 billion monthly active users and management indicating that ad placement on the social network is near a saturation point, growth could be more difficult to deliver going forward, but the company is hardly resting on its laurels. The leader in social networking is working on initiatives that have the potential to create huge benefits for its core products and open up new business avenues down the line.

Image source: Facebook.

From the invention of the television through the rise of the mobile phone, the screen has been at the center of the information age, but dramatic changes for display technology could be on the horizon. Virtual reality (VR) got its first big commercial push in 2016 and currently has niche appeal, but Facebook is betting on the technology's potential and angling to play a leading role in bringing it to the mainstream. The social media giant's virtual reality push is probably the company's most well-known innovation investment, with its $3 billion acquisition of VR company Oculus generating lots of press and evidencing a clear enthusiasm for display innovation.

Facebook's Oculus Rift headset has gotten off to a somewhat disappointing start, with the device receiving a number of price cuts following weaker-than-expected sales and trailing HTC's competing Vive hardware, but CEO Mark Zuckerberg has reiterated a belief in VR as the next big computing platform and has his company working on a range of hardware and content initiatives that could lay foundations for the future of the tech.

Facebook Spaces; Image source: Facebook.

The company recently launched Facebook Spaces, a platform that allows users to create an avatar to hangout and share pictures and video in virtual chat rooms. It also recently partnered with Samsung for the release of the Facebook 360 app, bringing the social network's panoramic photo and video content to the Gear VR platform.

In 2016, Facebook committed a $250 million investment in VR content, and Zuckerberg has indicated that his company plans to invest an additional $3 billion over the next decade to improve VR and drive adoption. The company also has plans to develop augmented reality (AR) offerings far beyond the filters currently available on Instagram, stating in its most recent earnings call that it plans to invest aggressively in content and infrastructure to build its position in AR. These technologies have the potential to change the way the world sees and interacts with information, and, if they take off, they'll open up innovations opportunities in industries ranging from retail to healthcare.

Image source: Internet.org.

Facebook is working to bring free (or at least low-cost) internet to the world, a move that will dramatically expand its addressable market -- and one that could threaten internet service providers (ISPs) and wireless carriers. The company recently launched Express Wi-Fi, a partnership project with a group of ISPs in Africa and Asia to expand the reach of connectivity, and it's got even more ambitious plans in the works. Here's a Zuckerberg quote from Facebook's most recent earnings call about the progress the company is making with its internet-beaming airplane project:

On the connectivity side, in April we successfully simultaneously beamed 16 gigabits of data in each direction between a location on the ground and a Cessna aircraft circling more than 7 km away. Eventually, we're going to use this technology along with Aquila, our solar-powered plane we're building, to beam internet to parts of the world that currently don't have access.

The company is also working on delivering internet by satellite. Of the roughly 7.5 billion people on Earth, roughly 3.7 billion are currently connected to the internet, so expanding the reach of network connectivity presents Facebook with huge growth opportunities.

Building its position in the telecommunications field gives Facebook ways to sidestep data cap and throttling issues the company faces from international ISPs as well as domestic providers including Verizon, AT&T, and Comcast -- issues that could become more pronounced as the social network makes streaming video content a bigger part of its platform. For now, Facebook's efforts are concentrated on making the internet more globally accessible, but, in the long term, growing its provider capabilities could make it significantly less dependent on today's telecom leaders.

Image source: Facebook.

Facebook is also aiming to shakeup the network hardware space, and has been distributing designs for "white box" alternatives and partnering with manufactures to make them available for enterprise. These are made with non-proprietary parts and run on open-source software, and pose a significant threat to networking companies including Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) and Juniper Networksbecause they offer levels of flexibility and customization beyond products from the current industry leaders. They also have the potential to dramatically reduce pricing power for routing, switching, and data center.

Increases in video streaming and the use of VR and AR technologies will put added pressure on data centers and increase costs for businesses. Facebook has an interest in facilitating these technologies, and reducing the expenses associated with networking hardware has the potential to remove a central roadblock to their progression. Lowering the costs of network infrastructure is also likely to play a big role in bringing internet connectivity to areas that are currently without it, so it's a disruptive initiative that could have huge payoff and pave the way for the evolution of the social network.

Keith Noonan has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Facebook and Verizon Communications. The Motley Fool recommends Cisco Systems. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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Beyond the Social Network: Facebook Wants to Disrupt These 3 Industries - Motley Fool

The Union Government is contemplating to regulate the functioning of social networking sites to ensure safety of the users' data.

The Central Government on Friday told the Supreme Court that it is contemplating to enact regulatory regime for social networking sites or services like Whatsapp, Facebook, Skype and others.

The Centre made these submissions before the five-judge Constitution Bench that is hearing WhatsApp privacy policy case.

The Centre told that personal data of users is a part of their right to life and it can't be shared freely by telecom providers or any social network sites.

Any attack on data is an attack on 'Right to Life', the Centre told the apex court.

During the hearing before a five-judge Constitution Bench, the bench asked the government whether it would regulate data.

Counsel for WhatsApp and Facebook, senior lawyers Kapil Sibal, Sidharth Luthra and Arvind Datar, said that they were willing to give an undertaking before the bench that WhatsApp has not and will not share data with anyone.

A nine-judge Supreme Court Constitution bench is also hearing various issues relating to right to privacy and data protection arising out of question whether whether Aadhaar violates right to privacy or not.

This bench is to rule whether right to privacy is a fundamental right or not, and other contours relating to data protection.

A nine-judge constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar is examining the nature of privacy as a right in context of two judgments -the first in 1954, the other in 1962 - which held that privacy was not a fundamental right. (ANI)

Link:
Govt Planning to Regulate Social Networking Sites to Ensure Safety of Users' Data - Outlook India

Its now possible to tour Beijings Forbidden City, without actually setting foot there.A social networking app allows would-be visitors to take virtual tours of parts of the city.

More than 400,000 Imperial artifacts have been digitized.

But as CGTNs Roee Ruttenberg reports, the job is far from complete.

For some 500 years, the corridors of Chinas Imperial Palace were off-limits to non-royals. The Forbidden City, as it became known, opened-up just in the last century. Now, a museum it attracts more visitors each year than any other in the world.

A new social networking app now allows those visitors to share their stories online. And museum administrators are working in other ways to deepen the experience.

Su Yi oversees an ambitious effort to digitize nearly two million artifacts. Her teams just a quarter of the way there.

The technology is changing every day. It can help us become more efficient, said Su, who is the director of the Palace Museum Institute for Digitization. But it also poses a challenge. New equipment makes our older methods outdated.

In April, the museum announced it had found another 55,000 artifacts.One by one, thousands of items are being photographed by highly-skilled professionals. A smaller number are being captured using 3D technology, and then placed inside virtual replicas of Palace rooms.

Everything has to be very precise, to reflect the true nature of the building, Senior Digitization Engineer Ouyang Hong said. And it can be very challenging to convert the large scale numbers into an accurate 3D representation.

Now, patrons of the Forbidden City, or Palace Museum as its also known, can virtually visit areas still closed-off to the public. Curators hope the digital data will also help researchers get a fuller picture of what life was like during Imperial times.Theres nothing quite like being here in person to experience the majesty, the history, and the culture. The digitalization process isnt meant to replace that, but rather supplement the old with something very new.

China has a long history, Su said. But the world doesnt fully understand Chinese culture or the Chinese people very deeply. We want to use the internet to help change that.

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Social network app provides digital tours of Beijing's Imperial Palace - CGTN America (blog)

NEW DELHI -- The Union Government is contemplating to regulate the functioning of social networking sites to ensure safety of the users' data.

The Central Government on Friday told the Supreme Court that it is contemplating to enact regulatory regime for social networking sites or services like WhatsApp, Facebook, Skype and others.

The Centre made these submissions before the five-judge Constitution Bench that is hearing WhatsApp privacy policy case.

The Centre told that personal data of users is a part of their right to life and it can't be shared freely by telecom providers or any social network sites.

Any attack on data is an attack on 'Right to Life', the Centre told the apex court.

During the hearing before a five-judge Constitution Bench, the bench asked the government whether it would regulate data.

Counsel for WhatsApp and Facebook, senior lawyers Kapil Sibal, Sidharth Luthra and Arvind Datar, said that they were willing to give an undertaking before the bench that WhatsApp has not and will not share data with anyone.

A nine-judge Supreme Court Constitution bench is also hearing various issues relating to right to privacy and data protection arising out of question whether whether Aadhaar violates right to privacy or not.

This bench is to rule whether right to privacy is a fundamental right or not, and other contours relating to data protection.

A nine-judge constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar is examining the nature of privacy as a right in context of two judgments -the first in 1954, the other in 1962 - which held that privacy was not a fundamental right.

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Centre Plans To Regulate Functioning Of Social Networking Sites To Ensure Safety - Huffington Post India

PricewaterhouseCoopers estimates that the global sharing economy, worth $15 billion today, will hit $335 billion by 2025. IMeYou, which makes local information collaborative, is hoping to grab a piece of that pie.

New to Bengaluru, Anuj Singh wants to buy some Hindi fiction books. But he doesnt know where to go and wishes he knew someone who shared his interest. Its tougher because Anuj lives in a locality of Kannada speakers. A friend suggests IMeYou, an app that will connect him to people who have the books hes looking for.

I borrowed the books, made friends and returned the books after a month, says Anuj Singh, who works as a restaurant manager in Bengaluru.

Such are the wonders of the sharing economy.

Every year, it is expected that more than six million students head to 56 cities in search of jobs. At their new destination, they must depend on local agents for information on rentals, food and local government rules. What if this was sorted for you on an app where a digital friend can answer queries dynamically? This is exactly what 30-year-old Vartika Manasvi has been trying to do for a couple of years.

Vartika, who completed her MBA course from JIIT, Noida, in 2010, built communities during her initial days at work, but chose to give up her corporate job when she realised that there was a business opportunity staring her in the face.

Most people would call their friends to know about a place or to know how to get something done, says Vartika, who quit her job in December 2015 and started IMeYou as a side project.

This was a project on Slack initially and I joined an Asian blog as a community manager to make some money to survive, she says.

Vartika went about her idea with clinical precision. She on-boarded 300-plus people on the Slack group by doing Skype calls and telling them about her vision for IMeYou, where people share knowledge with each other and collaborate.

She envisaged IMeYou as a geo-social platform to context connect people at places that matter), as a social networking platform for the sharing economy.

The objective of this experiment was to make one friend in every city who can help with local information and test digital trust among strangers, she says.

Vartika was joined by two young engineers, Celento C George, 19, and Arshpreet Wadehra, 21, who came forward to help build this platform because they believed in the vision and the power of the community she was building.

The three of them formed a strong team and the Slack group supported them with UI suggestions.

By August 2016, less than a year after she had started work on IMeYou, the platform was built.

From that Slack group we graduated to the web application and recently launched our mobile app for IOS, she says.

IMeYou, which currently has 2,000 consistent customers, wants to democratise access to goods and services.

Its our vision to unlock the world of collaborative consumption where trust is the new currency, Vartika says.

The companys business model is to take on traditional market behaviour pertaining torenting, lending, sharing, bartering and gifting.

On this platform, users will be able to generate the most efficient use of resources by extracting maximum value from products and materials while in use, and extending longevity through reuse at the end of a life cycle. So if you and your classmate want to read the same book why not invest in buying the book equally, share the cost and then redistribute it to someone who would want it?

Currently we are not charging our users to engage with each other. It will evolve as we gather data on engagement levels, Vartika says.

IMeYou is focusing on a micro-universe of college hubs where students can connect with each other to collaborate on needs like sharing hostel rooms, exchanging books and notes, planning project groups, finding accommodations, and inter-college connectivity.

The company has an investment of less than Rs 10 lakh and is yet to generate any revenues.

PricewaterhouseCoopers estimates the global sharing economy to be worth $15 billion today, a figure that is projected to hit $335 billion by 2025.

There are plenty of social sharing and discovery apps, including GoYaNo, Fashin and Loqation, on the market, but majority are yet to make money while some are struggling to stay afloat.

IMeYou is yet to deliver value and being a consumer business must spend for consumers to discover their app on a national scale.

But Vartika believes that the sharing economy drives huge benefits not only from the economic point of view, but also from environmental and social points of view.

Naganand Doraswamy, founder of IdeaSpring Capital, says: All consumer businesses need to build on strong technology and must figure out a business model quickly otherwise history shows how money is lost to marketing instead of building a strong product.

Vartika is hopeful that connecting people will help take her product forward. For now, we suggest you check out IMeYou if you want to share guitar/lessons, meet someone for coffee or exchange notes on rental apartments.

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Read Also: Why Startups need to work with Corporate?

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With IMeYou, Vartika Manasvi aims to build top social networking platform for the sharing economy - YourStory.com