Facebook Graph Search Receives Big Shrug from Wall Street

Well it seems that Facebook's big announcement was just a damp squib to investors.

The new feature, dubbed "Graph Search," allows Facebook users to search their own network of connections for people, places, photos and interests that have been shared on Facebook. For example, users will be able to search for "friends who live in my city," "photos of the Eiffel Tower," or "music my friends like."

Facebook first announced the event last week, but was vague in its media invitations, calling for reporters to "Come and see what we're building." But investors appeared to be unimpressed with the announcement. Shares of Facebook (FB) fell 2% Tuesday afternoon.

I would be unimpressed as well because this is pretty much a search engine of your friends stuff. If your friends don't have a lot of stuff shared then it would be nearly worthless to anyone else. I'm not sure how useful a photo of the Eiffel Tower taken by your friend will be or why I would need to search for it.

Also it would be impossible to monetize this thing in any meaningful way. If you search for "music my friends like" will a Pandora or an Amazon link pop up where you can listen to or buy that music? It probably will just say your brother-in-law likes Coldplay as if you didn't know that already. I guess it will be useful if you have 1000s of friends that you don't know really well.