Topics: Facebook | Technology | The Guardian
Facebook is an American for-profit corporation and an online social media and social networking service based in Menlo Park, California. The Facebook website was launched on February 4, 2004, by Mark Zuckerberg , along with fellow Harvard College students and roommates, Eduardo Saverin , Andrew McCollum , Dustin Moskovitz , and Chris Hughes.
Facebook has more than 2 billion monthly active users as of June 2017. Its popularity has led to prominent media coverage for the company, including significant scrutiny over privacy and the psychological effects it has on users. In recent years, the company has faced intense pressure over the amount of fake news , hate speech and violence prevalent on its services, all of which it is attempting to counteract.
Membership was initially restricted to students of Harvard College ; within the first month, more than half the undergraduates at Harvard were registered on the service. [15] Eduardo Saverin , Dustin Moskovitz, Andrew McCollum , and Chris Hughes joined Zuckerberg to help manage the growth of the website. [16] In March 2004, Facebook expanded to the universities of Columbia , Stanford , and Yale. [17] It later opened to all Ivy League colleges, Boston University , New York University , MIT , and gradually most universities in the United States and Canada. [18] [19]
