Facebook ‘Could Disappear In Five Years' Unless It Conquers Mobile Market

Could Facebook 'Disappear' By 2017?

Mark Zuckerberg’s world-dominating web company Facebook could disappear within five years according to an industry expert.

Ironfire Capital founder Eric Jackson told CNBC's Squawk on the Street: "In five to eight years they are going to disappear in the way that Yahoo has disappeared.

"Yahoo is still making money, but it's 10 per cent of the value that it was at the height of 2000. For all intents and purposes, it's disappeared."

Jackson’s reasoning is that for Facebook to continue to flourish, it must dominate the fast-growing mobile market and learn how to make money from it – something he believes it will struggle to do.

However, Olly Mann, BBC 5 Live’s internet expert thinks that Jackson is being far too pessimistic.

He told The Huffington Post UK: “Facebook's future is dependent on conquering mobile - a platform they have yet to monetise effectively. But as yet there are no competitors who come close to offering a more popular social experience on mobile, so it's pessimistic to imagine this is a hurdle they can't jump.

“Facebook will manage to retain an older demographic of users who simply can't be bothered to migrate to new platforms, even if a pretender to the throne creams off a few of their younger users in the years to come."