This week the big story was Facebook filing for an IPO.  $10 Billion is the estimate of what they will raise in new cash.  The filing unmasks some of the realities of today’s internet.

Well, this guy summarizes it pretty well:

“Two years from now, Facebook should be competing with Google to see who can best use your own data to help marketers target ads to you, no matter where those ads appear.” (Forrester analyst Nate Elliott)

So this is where the internet is finally headed – everything will be monetized – every page view, every “app”, game, etc. will be geared toward to collecting data and using it to sell to you.  I’m not against capitalism – quite the contrary.  But I wonder if there will be a tipping point – where subscription based services (ad free!) will start to gain traction, as people decide that spending a few $$ is worth it to keep their data private.  Of course, it’s hard to break from the idea that all internet content should be “free”, even when we see it’s not really free at all.