• Reuters, Tuesday, July 10, 2007 11 AM

Facebook CEO Michael Zuckerberg's decision to open up the social network to any consumers and outside developers willing to participate has drawn almost unanimous praise, not to mention unprecedented growth. With 29 million users, up 5 million from just three weeks ago, Facebook is growing at an average 150,000 users per day. Venture capitalists across Silicon Valley are even quizzing their potential investments on their "Facebook strategy."

"Call it escape velocity or whatever you want, but social networking now has it. Facebook now has it," writes Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen, whose latest company, Ning, helps users build simple software programs they can easily run within Facebook.

Om Malik of GigaOm isn't as convinced as others about a Facebook revolution. Rather, he's worried about more irrational exuberance from Silicon Valley. Malik says there's a "fog of confusion" surrounding social networks; few earn much from the ads they sell. Widgets and other marketing innovations show promise, but the majority of cash coming out of Facebook still belongs to banner ads.

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