[fufulabs]

Google, Facebook, iPhone, Android, Tumblr, etc. had markets that seemed all stitched up (i.e. search, social network, smartphones, iOS dominated smartphone market, blogging).

I would hazard a guess that in 2012-2014. Facebook would have taught the mass market of the concept of social network and grease up adoption of more specialized ones thereby widening the addressable userbase for players that have a great product.

We can see this happening with Instagram, Pinterest, Etsy, Reddit which are all social networks with 1 or few social objects at the center.

For example, Facebook has 800M and Instagram has 15M. thats 1.8%. I would guess that as Facebook gets more and more bloated - that ratio (1.8%) will get bigger as more & more users will need a more insular group and specialized features. In turn, niche social networks will have a higher ceiling of XX% of 800M/1B total social-network-exposed people (courtesy of Facebook - the social network gateway drug so to speak)