Today Thefacebook unveiled a new layout and a new domain name (facebook.com). In addition, now it refers to itself as just Facebook, so on some level it also got a new name. The confusion that resulted from having an incredibly awkward name is over. The masses may now rejoice. In honor of this occasion, below is the text of my post from June 17, 2004. This was taken from my previous blog that is no longer active.
As the blanket of snow covering the New England hills was facing its final days, no one could foresee an epidemic that would soon be unleashed upon the world. Spawned in the cellars of Harvard University, Thefacebook has been invading college campuses nationwide since its February launch. Cornell became one of the first petri dishes for this virus, along with other elite schools like Stanford, Columbia, and Yale. Thousands of Cornellians rushed to create Thefacebook accounts when the campus was added to its network in March. The Cornell section of the web site already has over 9,000 members, which is incredible given the fact that there are less than 14,000 undergraduates at the university. Besides AOL Instant Messenger, it is impossible to name any other online service that has penetrated the student body to such an extent.
According to Thefacebook, the service is “an online directory that connects people through social networks at colleges and universities”. It is easy to make comparisons to Friendster and Orkut. When you join, you are asked to create a profile. All fields except for your name and email are optional, but of course the vast majority of students fill out most of them. A key part of Thefacebook experience is adding other members to your list of friends. It is absolutely delightful to browse your network to see who your buddies know and how you are connected to numerous other students. You may then proceed to look up random people to see where they are from, what classes they are taking, their birthday, and so forth. It is no wonder many call it an excellent stalking tool.
The way Thefacebook works is simple. The part that has continued to puzzle me is why people have joined it in droves, especially considering all of the privacy concerns. I decided to run a simple experiment. On April 15, a new account was created by Andy Connors. He became the 4588th person (determined from the profile’s URL) to join Thefacebook. Andy was a just like any other Cornell student, except for the fact that he did not exist prior to that moment. Despite having a simple name, he could not be mistaken for someone else. According to the Cornell directory, there was no one on campus with that name.
Just like many other brand new members, Andy left his profile on Thefacebook unfilled. He then started generating random user IDs and going to the profiles corresponding to those users. The first 20 people that already had friends (indicating they were active users) were sent a friend invitation. Three days later, Andy had nine friends. He was no longer someone existing solely within the digital realm. He had real friends. It was time to add some information to his profile. He then selected three people from each of his friends’ lists of friends (assuming they had at least three of them). These 24 individuals were sent requests to be added to Andy’s network. In the next four days, 15 of them would approve them. During this time, two more of his original invitations were accepted. In his first week of existence, Andy acquired 26 friends. After another week passed, this number grew to 29.
In the first two weeks, nearly two-thirds (29/44) of Andy’s friend requests were confirmed. The sample size in this study is far from sufficient, but it goes a long way in helping to illustrate an important point. When asked why they joined Thefacebook, most people fail to give a coherent response. Andy helped me find the secret that fueled the explosion of this phenomenon. Perhaps people see it as a way determine their self worth with a discrete number. A small network could only mean one that you are an antisocial loser, so it is imperative that you try to expand it. This means if there are people you know who still have not signed up, you must pressure them to do so. Your honor rests on it.
It is absurd to think Thefacebook is not about counting friends. It is about counting every person you ever met. It does not matter if you only saw them once in one of your classes. It does not matter if you have not talked to them in two years. It does not even matter if they are not a real person.