The cost of developing the site wasn't the key to it's success. There's hundreds of already developed socnet sites and templates out there waiting to go. The reason it succeeded was it did what myspace was doing in a slightly less trashy/more exclusive way. It "got" that in order for socnets to succeed they had to be the mcdonalds of the internet with a single standard experience rather than trying to be a highly customisable homepage with autoplaying music and ghetto glitter effects. Bebo went halfway towards that (and was rapidly grabbing marketshare) but it was still too niggerifiable for grandmas and professionals to want to use. Facebook went the whole way and grabbed both of their userbases, along with their potential users. Eventually facebook will drive it's users away too and something else will become the "unbeatable monopoly". Right now it's looking like political censorship is likely to be that wedge issue, but even if it's not, something else will happen. This is not an issue about what companies are allowed to do by the politicians they own.