Facebook: Teens Aren't Leaving

Facebook is attempting to downplay its own report that it's losing teens, with chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg calling the reports exaggerated.

"I think the reaction to that comment has been blown out of proportion. As we said on the earnings call, overall U.S. teen usage of Facebook remains stable," Sandberg told AllThingsD. "The vast majority of U.S. teens are on Facebook. And the majority of U.S. teens use Facebook almost every day."
 
Instead, Sandberg said that the first rumors of Facebook losing teens and being uncool started when she joined the social network in 2008 and have been dogged, but not necessarily true. 
 
Facebook chief financial officer David Ebersman said that Facebook was losing teens in the 13 to 19 age range during Facebook's earnings call last month.
 
"We did see a decrease in [teenage] daily users [during the quarter], especially younger teens,"  Ebersman said during the company's third-quarter earnings call, but despite the decrease he said that usage was still stable for most U.S. teens. Facebook also earned $621 million in the third quarter, double the social network's year-over-year profit.
 
Many critics have suggested Facebook is losing teens and young adults to photo-messaging apps such as Snapchat and Whatsapp where they're trying to avoid parents and other relatives. Recent news that Facebook offered $3 billion for Snapchat seems to indicate that this is likely the case. Unfortunately for Facebook, Snapchat rebuffed the offer.
 
 
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