Why Facebook keeps beating every rival?

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The tech world just witnessed a robbery. The heist was so brazen you kind of had to admire it, even if it was pulled off with all the grace of a gas station stickup, according to New York Times.

Facebook barged into Snapchat's happy Venice Beach, Calif, mansion, took a solid inventory of the goods, then lifted the crown jewels. First a version of Stories, the fun slide-show format that Snapchat created, appeared last year on Instagram, owned by Facebook. Then Snapchat's features made their way to WhatsApp and Messenger, Facebook's chat apps. A couple of weeks ago they got to the big leagues — Facebook's main app — and the heist was complete.

On Tuesday, the leader of the Facebook crew, Mark Zuckerberg, put on a conference to show off his loot. But he went further: he unveiled a vision of augmented reality — in which digital objects and effects are overlaid on images of the real world — which could undercut Snapchat’s mission to become the camera company for the next generation.

His speech had a lot of corny jokes, but that was just Zuckerberg's way of hiding the shiv. In reality it was a performance that made plain Zuckerberg's ruthlessness as a businessman. It also shows that he understands Facebook's most important assets. Zuckerberg realized early on that the most important thing in his business was not necessarily creating the best new features. It doesn't matter who invents digital moustaches. What matters is owning the biggest and most engaged network. And because he has the network, he always wins.

For years now, the world has been doubting Zuckerberg. Facebook, they said, would never beat Myspace. Then Facebook was going to get a run for its money from every other social network — Twitter, Pinterest and more. Hey, could it survive Google's onslaught? Could it survive its own initial public offering? How would Facebook adjust to mobile? What about live video? And then there was Snapchat. By turning the smartphone camera into a communications platform, Snapchat created a novel and compelling social experience. Teenagers couldn’t get enough of it. And teenagers are the future. If Facebook lost teenagers, game over.

Hahaha. In the big picture none of these things really made a dent in Zuckerberg's expanding kingdom.
Source: New York Times