Social Commerce Panel 2011 Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Commerce. Social Gaming Panel at Goldman Sachs 2011 Technology and Internet Conference. Online Local Panel at Goldman Sachs 2011 Technology and Internet Conference. Max Levchin and Bill Gurley at Goldman Sachs 2011 Technology and Internet Conference. Levchin and Gurley Say That Next Big Company Will Capture The Interest Graph. Yesterday, at the Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference in San Francisco, Googler and PayPal founder Max Levchin and Benchmark GP Bill Gurley discussed “game-changing technology” and the future of the Web.
Emblematic of today’s mindset, they attacked this rather large topic by comparing the strengths and objectives of Google and Facebook, using the latter’s jaw-dropping stats (500+ million users, 1 in every 13 people on Earth logs into Facebook each day) and its promotion of the social graph as a measure of what’s to come. Levchin said that Facebook is fast becoming the new social white pages, i.e. when you don’t know where someone is on the Web, you go to Facebook to find and connect with them. But, in addition to that, he says, the social networking giant is really “the rich white pages,” where you not only locate someone but have the added benefit of finding out what they like, what they read, what their favorite movies are, and so on.