Facebook
is a popular social networking website, whose name originated as the nickname
of directories handed out to university students that aided in their getting to
know their fellow students.
Facebook was invented by Harvard
computer science student Mark Zuckerberg, along with classmates
Eduardo Saverin, Dustin Moskovitz, and Chris Hughes. The origins to the name
hints as to the history of Facebook, however, the website was originally and
briefly called Facemash. Mark Zuckerberg was a second year student, when he
wrote the software for the Facemash website. Perhaps, it was Zuckerberg's
sophomoric sense of humor that led him to create the site as a type of
"hot or not" game for Harvard students, where website visitors could
compare two student photos side-by-side and let viewers decide who was
"hot" and who was "not". Mark Zuckerberg put his computer
science skills to good use by hacking into Harvard's security network and where
he copied the student ID images used by the dormitories and used them to
populate his Facemash website.
Fashmash opened on October 28, 2003, and
closed a few days later, shut down by Harvard execs. Mark Zuckerberg faced charges
of breach of security, violating copyrights, and violating individual privacy
for stealing the student photos he used to populate the site. He also faced
expulsion from Harvard University for his actions. However, all charges were
eventually dropped.
On February 4, 2004, Mark Zuckerberg
relaunched with a new website "The facebook". Six days later, Mark
Zuckerberg again faced trouble when three Harvard seniors, Cameron Winklevoss,
Tyler Winklevoss, and Divya Narendra, accused Zuckerberg of stealing their
ideas for an intended social network website called Harvard Connection, and of
using their ideas for The Facebook. Winklevoss, Winklevoss, and Narendra later
filed a lawsuit against Zuckerberg, however, the matter was settled out of
court.
Membership to the website was at first
restricted to Harvard College students. Zuckerberg enlisted a few of his fellow
students to help grow the website: Eduardo Saverin worked on business, Dustin
Moskovitz as a programmer, Andrew McCollum as a graphic artist, and Chris Hughes.
Together the team expanded the site to additional universities and
colleges.
Mark Zuckerberg, Founder of face book
Facebook
Mark Zuckerberg's antics finally
did pay off when profits from Facebook made him the world's youngest
multi-billionaire. Kudos goes to Zuckerberg for spreading the wealth around,
according to the NYTimes, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg donated $100 million
dollars to the Newark, New Jersey public school system, which has long been
underfunded.
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