[frankbreetz]

I think if Facebook leaves Europe someone who plays by the rules will quickly take their space. It's not like creating a photo-sharing site or social network is hard to do. Facebook is only still around because of the network effect someone else would be happy to move in.

[dwaite]

Exactly - they won't just lose their user base in Europe - a lot of their consumer base outside Europe will then be motivated to start using these competitors to keep up with their friends and family (plus influencers) in Europe.

They've bought companies to keep from having to face competition in their network effect. I doubt they'll let segmentation of surveillance data push them out of that large of a market.