These two Internet giants share similar goals and scale, but different approaches that largely reflect the differences between how the Internet functions in the West and in China. Still, both have much to learn from the other.

So Facebook has filed an initial public offering, aiming to raise $10 billion. The $100 billion market flotation value for an Internet company breaks the record set by Google in 2004.

Now, it would seem, is as good a time as any to compare this web giant to a Chinese counterpart whose ambitions – and scale — are no less ambitious. Tencent, an online communications portal, is currently the world’s third-largest Internet company, behind Google and Amazon. Founded in 1998, it went public in 2004. Now it is Facebook’s turn.

Facebook has a total revenue of $3.8 billion and $1.5 billion profit for 2011 whilst Tencent, China’s largest internet service portal, expects to tally total revenue of $4 billion and $1.4 billion profit for the same year. The primary source of Facebook’s revenue comes from advertisements; only 11% comes from the sale of virtual goods. Tencent’ s revenue mainly comes from internet value-added services, and the advertising counts for less than $300 million.

The two companies have certain similarities. Both have a very loyal social network after drawing in a sufficient number of users. But they are also very different in certain key ways: Facebook constructs a community without building up its own industry in this community, though it is considering starting up a bank. Tencent does exactly the opposite: it possesses a huge number of its own businesses and is now providing an open platform.

The price of “pirate culture”

Facebook has attracted 800 million users in a relatively short period without relying on having its own industry. This could not possibly have happened in the China’s Internet market. Facebook depends on an open platform and partnerships to provide user services that require a user-friendly environment and basic rules of competition. Meanwhile, the wild Chinese Internet firmament would have swallowed up a company like Facebook; only a giant like Tencent could emerge. We’ll call this a regional characteristic.

In China’s Internet market, if you consider making your platform open right from the beginning, some may appreciate your efforts, but you risk not getting invited to the ball. Pirate culture is the mainstream on the Chinese web. An enterprise has to identify with this culture to survive. Some firms accumulate their users and brand name in the name of cooperation with others, but will quickly burn the bridge once they have passed over.

Nevertheless, China’s environment and the rules of the game are improving. User consciousness and a sounder legal system will all help to establish a better environment in the Chinese Internet sphere.

Facebook has up to now built up an enormous community with super user stickiness. Its huge traffic is what the advertiser is after. And if it learns from the Tencent model in increasing its value-added services, its profit will soar even further.

Meanwhile, there’s also plenty Tencent can learn from Facebook. Currently Tencent’s community structure includes QQ.com, an open microblog, and a QQ instant message service as a paid service on smartphones. On its community platforms, it offers services like e-commerce, online games and a search engine. But it has not yet achieved substantial growth in its advertising revenue. On this front, it can learn from Facebook.

As different as their approaches may seem, these two Internet giants have very similar objectives: scale, scale, scale.

In early 2006, Israel’s then-prime minister, Ariel Sharon, suffered a devastating stroke that ended his political career but not, as it turns out, his life. All but forgotten, Sharon is nevertheless alive, thanks to a life support system that costs the family and state 300,000 euro per year.

JERUSALEM — Consider the following scene: on Sept. 4, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends the marriage ceremony of the daughter of Eli Yishai, the interior minister and chairman of the ultra-Orthodox Shas party. While giving a short speech, Netanyahu refers to one of his predecessors, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

“May his memory be blessed,” says Netanyahu. The audience is silent, looking both stunned and embarrassed. Netanyahu quickly catches his mistake and corrects himself: “May he live long…”

The gaffe was revealing. Most Israelis have forgotten Ariel Sharon, even though he is still alive. After suffering a stroke on Jan. 4, 2006, Sharon plunged into a deep coma. Since then he has been kept on life support at Sheba Hospital in Tel Aviv. He is 83 years old. He has a single room that is not located in an intensive care unit. In five years and nine-and-a-half months, he has not given a single sign of waking up, but has he had no major complications either.

“He has a sturdy body, but his case is exceptional,” says a doctor. “Many patients would have died of an infection by now. Not him; he’s still holding on. This situation may continue for a long time, but he has absolutely no chance of regaining conscience.”

The fate of Ariel Sharon has been kept silent for years – word does not get past any doctors, politicians or members of his family. In September 2009, the spokesman for Sheba hospital had only this to say to Le Monde: “The only information I can provide you is that his condition is stable and unchanged. For more information, please contact the members of his family.”

“If this were anyone else,” says the discreet but well-placed doctor, “they would already have let him die. Sharon is kept alive because it is the will of his family, but [the situation] is… pathetic.”

What may look like aggressive therapy is actually not dictated by religious reasons: Ariel Sharon, like his parents and his sons, Gilad and Omri, is not at all religious. “His family is very attached to him. One might think that it’s irrational, but there it is,” says the physician.

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• Why is Ariel Sharon still alive? He’s been in a coma since 2006….. with little or no chance of waking back up…?
• Why is he being kept around? What is his significance to Israel?

Haya maswali hapo juu yanaweza yasiwe muhimu wa watanzania sababu ni mambo ya waisrel hayatuhus lakini tuna la kujifunza na kujiuliza. So turudi nyumbani hapa Tanzania .

Je kwa viongozi wetu wanaostahiki kutibiwa wanatibiwa na pesa za walipa kodi mpaka kifo kama Rasi, PM, etc iitokea hali hii ya airel sharon

• Ni nani wa kuamua. Mfano kama familia ya Nyerere ingegoma kuondolewa kwa mashine?
• Na kama serikali ndio Muamuzi ni vigezo gani vinatumika katika hali kama hii…….?

BUSARA ya utu ndio inamuweka hai gwiji huyu wa kihafidhina au ni SIASA