Facebook is arguably one of the most important websites to the average high school/college student (even middle school and elementary school kids these days!) Case in point: I just checked my facebook (unintentionally) in the middle of writing my first sentence. Honestly, I wasn't too thrilled about READING how facebook evolved from its limited Harvard community to the global enterprise it is currently. But, the first part was an easy read, with an easy transition from one point to the next; I barely realized how far I have gotten in the reading.
With the superficial relationships and usage of facebook these days, I was a bit shocked to read the prologue with the story of Oscar Morales and Mark Zuckerberg's description of his goals of facebook in the beginning.
Oscar Morales was an ordinary citizen in Colombia, where the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) instilled fear and anger in the average Colombian. His story was inspiring, and set an almost unrealistic view of facebook, as if anything was possible with facebook! With a simple creation of a group, Morales was able to organize a world wide march again the FARC (p. 4). He became a celebrity and a hero; thanks to facebook, he was able to pioneer an influential group who stood up for the Colombian people.
Mark Zuckerberg had an interesting way of describing facebook: a platform for people to improve already existing relationships. It's ironic how people nowadays argue how social networks such as facebook negatively affect personal relationships, as if the internet-based relationships are replacing face-to-face connections.
I especially loved all the little bits of Mark Zuckerberg the readers can put together throughout the reading. He is one interesting character. Undoubtedly, he is a smart guy with a slight tendency to get in trouble in one way or another. He dabbled in various programs during his first year at Harvard, some of which led to massive usage as well as conflicts. The descriptions of Course Match (p. 20), Facemash (p. 23), and Synapse (p. 25), which is eerily similar to Pandora, make me wish someone like Zuckerberg existed here at Rutgers. Yet, he had his batch of problems. He sounds like a creeper, first of all, staring at people and keeping quiet, seemed to have an elitist mentality, and obviously had trouble keeping good interpersonal relationships with people, judging from all the various problems he had over the course of the years. Of course, to give him the benefit of the doubt, it had to have something to do with how "...whenever [Zuckerberg] did something successful, every capitalist out there wants a piece of the action" (p.83).
Despite everything, facebook is what it is today. Through the progression and transition of one social network to another, facebook seems to be the clear winner right now. From the development of "the wall" (p. 93) to the establishment of new branches, facebook has encountered countless transformations. We got through the very beginning of the site in the first part. It should be very interesting to see how it opened up to the general public instead of just to college students and how the business aspects influenced much of the decisions.
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