the Facebook public launch

It does make money, the money spent on developing the system and providing the infrastructure. That investment produced the advertising revenues.

Considering fractional reserve banking and all that, the only place that "makes" money is a central bank.

You were the one complaining that you didnt consider the technologies used "new".

The combustion engine made the automobile possible

It doesn't make a damn thing - it takes money from those that do produce 'money' (and thereby brings down the average rate of profit on capital). Stop looking at how much one company makes and look at total capital. Stop using 100 year old economics.

What business doesn't do that?

As I said in my edit the only thing that "makes"/creates money is a central bank, as in the fractional reserve system?

Ones that produces value/money by producing commodities that embody a greater value than the labour that went into them had in return.

LOl. Last line.

Which is exactly what they do, the value of the product facebook produces is worth more than the labour required. Hence the profit.

Anyway a company that produces a commodity as you describe is just transferring the money from someone else to themselves when they sell it.

No, they place themselves better to take the profit from other companies that put into the pot. They are a distribution sideshow. Show me how they produce value/money. N/b - this doesn't mean make a profit. Distribution side of things also historically tries to pay less the it makes - this doesn't mean that it produces value. It doesn't.

Can you provide an example of a business that satisfies your criteria?

What criteria? You mean producing surplus value? Sure? Apple.

Do you consider the iTunes store to produce surplus value?

The itunes store is a way to help the production of surplus value. It doesn't produce it in itself.

Can we have this 100 year old stuff btw been waiting a while.

So which ones of Apple's products do produce surplus value.

All them ipods, ipads, iphones, the accessories - the ones that foxconn workers (mass threatened rooftop suicide last week) put their labour power into producing. Remember them? The ones you think have it great?

You just always seem to come back to that it has to be a physical good, even though you don't explicitly say it. Thats the thing I was referring to as 100 year old economic theory may not be applicable to, or at least need to be updated.

As in the labor of the software engineers in facebook, that their work is not as valuable as a foxconn worker. Thats the difficulty I'm having

what i couldn't understand is why it was such big news and why the had to cover it on live tv. Companies float shares etc on the stock market all the time surely?

The size of this one is particularly spectacular. Plus its tech, so its fashionable to investors.

maybe so,but it just pissed me off today for some reason. Besides I'm sure much larger companies don't get their launches covered live

Well I think thats the point, when was the last IPO of this size?

I keep coming back the the real economy. The one not based on fictitious capital yes. That's why the 100 year old theories that you think are now outdated (won't say why despite repeated requests). And no, the 100 year old theory nowhere says that something has to be a physcial good to be a commodity - it explicitly says the opposite.

As well as the size, we can probably throw in the fact that so many people are familiar with the company, along with the tantalising prospects of it all going horribly wrong (because there is plenty of cynicism about Facebooks true value).

What is the difficulty that you're having?

Yeah I cant help thinking this will all end in tears. People i was with today were saying it probably isn't worth the paper it's written on

A fair list of things that are a commodity, and a list of some that are not, might help. It would certainly help me because I get a bit confused about where the line is sometimes.

That from what you are saying, it least appears anyway, that you consider the product produced by the foxconn employee more valuable than the one by the facebook programmer.

In terms of producing surplus value, of course it is.

Its worth something just nothing like the value that is being placed on it.

Monetization really starts here. You thought pre-IPO Facebook had privacy problems? Just wait and see what happens now.

How can i do this? The commodification of life marches on. More and more things can only be accessed though their role as commodities. This doesn't change that the financial section of capital is running on fictioous capital that the real economy - the surplus value producing section - has to and cannot produce. How can i give you a list?

But that doesn't appear to make sense, whats the distinction? Both workers uses their tools and skills to produce a product which their employer sells.

Apart from one example of course.