Facebook

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This article is about the social networking service. For the type of directory, see face book.
Facebook, Inc.


Facebook's login/signup screen
Type Public
Traded as NASDAQ: FB
Founded February 4, 2004
(10 years ago)
Headquarters Menlo Park, California, US
Area served United States (200405)
Worldwide (2005present)
Founder(s)
Mark Zuckerberg
Eduardo Saverin
Andrew McCollum
Dustin Moskovitz
Chris Hughes
Key people Mark Zuckerberg
(Chairman and CEO)
Sheryl Sandberg
(COO)
Industry Internet
Revenue US$7.87 billion (2013)
[1]

Operating income US$2.80 billion (2013)
[1]

Net income US$1.50 billion (2013)
[1]

Total assets US$17.89 billion (2013)
[1]

Total equity US$15.47 billion (2013)
[1]

Employees 7,185 (June 2014)
[2]

Subsidiaries Instagram
WhatsApp
Oculus VR
PrivateCore
Website www.facebook.com
Written in C++, PHP
[3]
and D language
[4]

Alexa rank 2 (September 2014)
[5]

Type of site Social networking service
Registration Required
Users 1.32 billion (monthly active, June 2014)
[6]

Available in Multilingual (70)
Current status Active
Facebook
History
Timeline
Acquisitions
Criticism
Features
Facebook (formerly [thefacebook]) is an online social networking service headquartered
in Menlo Park, California. Its name comes from a colloquialism for the directory given to
students at some American universities.
[7]
Facebook was founded on February 4, 2004,
by Mark Zuckerberg with his college roommates and fellow Harvard
University students Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Moskovitz and Chris
Hughes.
[8]
The founders had initially limited the website's membership to Harvard students, but
later expanded it to colleges in the Boston area, the Ivy League, and Stanford University. It
gradually added support for students at various other universities and later to their high-school
students. Facebook now allows anyone who claims to be at least 13 years old worldwide to
become a registered user of the website, although proof is not required.
[9]

After registering to use the site, users may create a personal profile, add other users
as friends, exchange messages, post status updates and photos, and receive notifications
when others update their profiles. Additionally, users may join common-interest user groups,
organized by workplace, school or college, or other characteristics, and categorize their friends
into lists such as "People From Work" or "Close Friends". Facebook had over one billion
active users as of September 2012,
[10]
of which approximately 9% were fake.
[11]
By that point,
Facebook was adding about half a petabyte of data every 24 hours, amounting to about 180
petabytes per year.
[12]
Due to the large volume of data collected about users, the service's
privacy policies have faced scrutiny, among othercriticisms. Facebook, Inc. held its initial public
offering in February 2012 and began selling stock to the public three months later, reaching a
peak market capitalization of $104 billion.