I just found out that Facebook's IPO disappointed millions of investors who were eager to share Mark Zuckerberg's success story. How is that I didn't pay attention to this IPO dead line? I knew, but didn't care. I live in Manhattan, and many of my friends work in Finance. Is there something really wrong with me? Shall I see a psychiatrist? Even in the last 24 hours, I was given several opportunities.

Last night, on my way to the opening of Wakhan, an Other Afghanistan, where Fabrice Nadjiari and his partner Varial presented a different and beautiful point of view on Afghanistan, I realized that my friend Tommy was checking stock prices. I looked at him puzzled and asked: "What are you doing? Back in the trading fever?" He replied: "I am checking the Facebook stock." I smiled and left, busy thinking I was late for the opening.

This morning my wife was reading the NY Post headline "ZUCKERS!" She also mentioned that last night she asked our friend Nicolas if he had purchased the Facebook stock. I kept driving and didn't really care.

Just now I opened the NY Post and read some scary lines on page 4: "Hordes of everyday New Yorkers played the fool yesterday to Wall Street fat cats and Facebook insiders, who used a bloated stock price to milk them of billions of dollars during an overhyped IPO." Funny coincidence is the ad next to the article:

Now I finally realize why I didn't pay attention to the Facebook IPO, why I didn't care about the results, and why it simply wasn't worth my time. I know this sounds arrogant, but let me give you some back story on this. This week, Mike Sweeney, Tommaso Rulli, and I started our first operations by Film Annex Capital focused on our collaboration in Afghanistan with Roya Mahboob.

• We established the parameters of the Film Annex Afghan Digital Business Incubator.
• We refined the JV agreement with Roya Mahboob's Citadel Software Company in Kabul.
• We moved forward on the constructions of 40 Internet Classrooms, and by Wednesday, classroom number 2 is opening. 
• We are connecting 160,000 Afghan Children to the World Wide Web.
• We are supplying Afghan students the online Software in Dari and English called Examer with a focus on Digital and Social Media.

Wait a moment! Are we building the future programmers who might tumble companies like Facebook and Twitter? Can you just imagine if we actually wire the 40 schools, educate the 160,000 children and open Afghanistan's education system to Social Media and educational software companies, create R&D digital centers shoulder to shoulder with the most motivated youth of the world? An on top of it, we pay everybody with Mobile Money as suggested by our friends at USAid?

Lets talk about R.O.I. (Return on the investment): We invest $20,000 to build an INTERNET classroom and connect 4000 children to the world wide web and websites like the Khan Academy, learn foreign languages, social media and SEO curriculum, and consequently increase per capita Afghanistan GDP from $900 to $8000/yr. This is not in theory; those are today's numbers. This is not an IPO on paper but a reality in people's lives.

Just like Varial and Nadjiari traveled to a remote and fascinating part of Afghanistan, we are now exploring the unexpected potential of Afghanistan's Social Media and Technology. This is so fascinating that I can't focus on the Facebook IPO.

One question to the disappointed Facebook investors: What motivates you to invest in Facebook? Is it money? Is it the short cut to success and fame? Or your love for Mark Zuckerberg? Save your breath. Roya Mahboob is a better point of reference; she is a couple of years younger than Zuckerberg, she is the CEO of the most successful Digital company in Afghanistan with clients like NATO and the University of Kabul. She is elegant and charming, and she always over delivers what we agreed.

One more note: Zuckerberg translated from German means "Mountain of Sugar", while Roya Mahboob translated from Persian means "Beloved Dream."

 

Francesco Rulli

follow @rullifrancesco