Facebook is really two companies for the price of one: Areally nifty, visionary, we’re-going-to-change-the-worldinnovator and a mind-numbingly technocratic/grind-it-out money-making machine.

　　Let’s take the second first. The company reported full-year earnings Wednesday, and by any measure Facebookis an impressive business. Largely by selling ads that runon cell phones, Facebook’s 2014 revenue increased 58%to $12.5 billion. The company earned almost $3 billion.Nearly 900 million people used Facebook daily duringDecember.

　　Unless your exceedingly interested in the intricacies ofadvertising technology, there’s almost nothing interestingabout how Facebook makes money. Listening to adiscussion of its financial results is a forced marchthrough the muddy fields of organic impressions,increasing velocity of advertising efficiency, right-handrails, and the like. In discussing Facebook’s desire to be agood partner to software developers, Founder and CEOMark Zuckerberg referred to the company’s efforts atbuilding a “cross-platform platform.” Sheryl Sandberg,Facebook’s chief operating officer, piped in that “ourultimate goal is to be the critical business partner to ourclients.”

　　Yawn-inducing, perhaps, but powerful too. Facebook nowgets nearly 70% of its revenue from mobile devices, upfrom nothing a few short years ago. Considering its rapidgrowth, it is astounding that revenue from ads that runon desktop computers only growing at a 1% clip forFacebook. It’s worth repeating: Not very long ago desktopads were all that Facebook had. Facebook also has abalance sheet nearly as big as its 2014 revenues: Itended the year with $11.2 billion in cash.

　　But wait, wasn’t there something about a vision andmaking the world safe for something other than efficientmobile ad units?

　　Indeed. Zuckerberg did something unique for an investorearnings call: He shared a three-, five-, and 10-yearvision for his company. The three-year vision includescreating better services for people and, critically,businesses while growing Facebook’s “community.” Thefive-year plan envisions making businesses of WhatsAppand Messenger, an acquisition and a separate messagingapp, respectively. The 10-year plan involves Zuckerberg’sgoal of helping every person in the world obtain anInternet connection (through his Internet.org project) andthen plopping them down into a virtual-reality worldstemming from Facebook’s Oculus VR purchase.

　　It’s the kind of stuff that only a company that’s printingmoney from its gigantic audience can afford to thinkabout.

　　Toward the end of the earnings call an investor askedZuckerberg if it made sense to spending so much moneyto provide Internet connections to customers whowouldn’t generate sufficient revenue for Facebook torecoup the investment. Why, the analyst asked, does thismatter to investors? Zuckerberg’s response neatlysummed up his thinking about Facebook. “It matters tothe kind of investors that we want to have because we’rea mission-focused company,” Zuckerberg said. “Part ofthe sub-text of your question is that if we were onlyfocused on making money we’d simply focus on sellingmore ads in the U.S. But that’s not the only thing we thinkabout here.”

　　At Facebook FB 0.61% , they certainly think about makingmoney. Indeed, when you make so much of it you alsocan think about creative ways to make even more, even ifthe payout is way off into the future.

　　nifty: adj.俏皮的，极好的

　　visionary: adj.空想的，幻想的; 预言性的; 有远见的;

　　technocratic: adj.由技术专家官员组成的;受技术官僚影响的

　　intricacy: n.错综复杂; (因复杂而产生的)难以理解

　　muddy: adj.泥泞的; 暗的; 模糊的; 糊涂的

　　velocity: n.速率，速度; 周转率; 高速

　　astounding: adj.使人震惊的

　　balance sheet: n.资产负债表; 财务状况表

　　gigantic: adj.巨大的，庞大的; 巨人似的

　　社交网站Facebook有两张面孔：一张是时髦且富有远见、志在改变世界的创新者;另一张则是单调乏味技术专家式加埋头苦干的赚钱机器。

　　我们先来看看Facebook的后一张面孔。上周三，该公司公布了全年营收，不论以何种标准来衡量，其业绩都相当不错。2014年，Facebook的营收增长58%，达到125亿美元，主要来自移动端广告销售。Facebook2014年净利润将近30亿美元。截至去年12月，每天有近9亿人使用Facebook。

　　除非你对复杂难懂的广告技术非常感兴趣，否则，Facebook的盈利模式听起来相当无趣。听人讨论其财务业绩，简直好比在泥地里强行推进，令人痛苦不堪，耳边充斥着各种术语：有机曝光次数、广告投放率递增速度、右侧栏，凡此种种，不一而足。谈到Facebook希望成为软件开发者很好的合作伙伴，公司创始人兼首席执行官马克•扎克伯格称，Facebook正努力建设“跨平台平台”。Facebook首席运营官谢丽尔•桑德伯格插话道：“我们的最终目标，是成为客户的关键商业伙伴。”

　　这种话或许令人大打哈欠，但却富有感染力。Facebook目前近70%的收入来自移动设备端，而就在短短几年前，移动端收入几乎为零。相较于其高速增长，Facebook台式电脑端广告营收的增速仅1%，不由得令人震惊。值得一提的是，就在不久前，Facebook几乎全部收入都来自电脑端广告。Facebook当前资产负债表上的现金规模几乎可媲美其2014全年营收：截至2014年底，该公司坐拥112亿美元现金。

　　等等，除了高效的移动广告单元外，Facebook不是还有个要使世界变得更安全的愿景吗?

　　没错，扎克伯格做了件在投资者收益电话会议上极为罕见的事：他分享了Facebook的三年、五年以及十年愿景。其三年愿景包括，为人们以及(最重要的是)企业提供更好的服务，同时使Facebook的“社区”不断发展。五年计划是使WhatsApp和Messenger两款应用分别实现商业化。十年计划则包括：使全球所有人都能连上互联网(通过扎克伯格的Internet.org项目)，并使他们进入Facebook收购的Oculus VR创造的虚拟现实世界。

　　这样的愿景，只有拥有海量用户、日进斗金的公司才敢有。

　　收益电话会议接近尾声时，有一位投资者问扎克伯格，斥巨资帮助那些不能给Facebook带来足够收入的客户接入互联网，以至于收不回本，这样做是否合理?该分析师问道，这同投资者有什么关系?扎克伯格的回答，很好地概括了他对Facebook的想法。他说道：“对于我们想要吸引的投资者来说，这一点很重要，因为我们是一家专注于使命的企业。你提的问题的潜台词是，如果我们只关心赚钱，我们会专注于在美国卖出更多广告。但我们并不仅关心赚钱。”

　　不过，Facebook肯定有琢磨赚钱的事。确实，当你大赚特赚时，你可以想些有创意的方式来赚更多的钱，哪怕回报要很久以后才能看到。

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（责任编辑：何莹莹）