The over-reaction to the sell out of Oculus: Slides in Facebook Shares

[Facebook's Stock]  Seems like what Facebook did was none too popular, and it's harming others. It's nice that they're gambling on the fact that virtual reality become a big thing in the future, and I hope it does (in a Google Glass type of way) - the problem being that they're playing the fat, lazy, rich man, who instead of researching and developing a new market on their own, decided to purchase what looked like the best (and most acquirable) option.
 
The silver lining lies in that OculusVR will remain mostly independent to develop their own system; the big (and ugly) downside is that they will be controlled by Facebook, who could do anything with it.

What I don't get is why Facebook is "acquiring" all these companies/apps/things instead of developing their own. Wouldn't it be cheaper to create a WhatsApp and force it out of popularity than to purchase one for almost $20 Billion? It would certainly help them form an identity for themselves.

I guess the only thing we can do is wait and see where they go after this.

(An article about Facebook's acquisition bringing the stock market's closing numbers down)