It’s official: Facebook has crossed the 200 million user mark, founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced in a blog post on Wednesday.
“Growing rapidly to 200 million users is really a good start,” Zuckerberg said.
Along with congratulations in various languages — 70 percent of Facebook users are outside the United States — the news was met with some critical comments on Zuckerberg’s own page. “Please bring back the old new FB,” one user said, noting Facebook’s penchant for changing its look.
Facebook’s dramatic growth since its launch in 2004 has fueled hopes that it may open itself to investors with a Wall Street stock offering amid questions about whether its revenue can keep up with higher computing costs. But the company says its balance sheet is healthy. In a recently leaked internal memo, Zuckerberg said revenue is expected to grow 70 percent this year.
In marking the milestone, Facebook also updated its statistical records. The Palo Alto-based social networking leader says that 100 million users visit the site every day, and users have an average of 120 “friends” on their networks. The service is available in 40 languages, with more in the works.
Facebook also invited users to celebrate the milestone by visiting the site’s Gift Shop to purchase digital gifts for friends to benefit an array of 16 charities. More than 90 percent of the proceeds would go to the charity, with the remainder covering transaction
costs. Facebook said it would not retain any of the proceeds.While noting Facebook’s “good start,” Zuckerberg said the ambition is much larger: “We’ve always known that in order for Facebook to help people represent everything that is happening in their world, everyone needs to have a voice. This is why we are working hard to build a service that everyone, everywhere can use, whether they are a person, a company, a president or an organization working for change.”
Several Facebook users who commented on Zuckerberg’s post questioned how Facebook’s redesign seemed influenced by the rising popularity of Twitter, a social network based on text messaging. A tech insider waggishly congratulated Twitter founder Evan Williams.
Another offered advice that seemed grandmotherly: “Please make it so we don’t have to see everything our friends are doing all the time, Mark. It is just too much and overwhelming for us oldsters. Like all the quizzing and things. Thank you, dear.”
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