Twitter what? Facebook flies past 200 million users

by Stevie Smith - Apr 9 2009, 15:45

In recent months, the online presence of Facebook may have been overshadowed somewhat by current community favourite Twitter, but that doesn’t necessarily mean the incredibly popular social networking site isn’t still pulling in the punters. In fact, Facebook has this week welcomed its 200 millionth registered user.

Writing on the official Facebook blog yesterday, network founder Mark Zuckerberg rubber stamped the landmark moment by saying that the first five years of Facebook have seen the service successfully fulfilling its goal to provide online users with a faster way to share information about what is happening around them.

“We thought that giving people better tools to communicate would help them better understand the world, which would then give them even greater power to change the world,” enthused 24-year-old Zuckerberg, who initially started Facebook as a student community while attending Harvard.

In an accompanying self-congratulatory video clip attached to Zuckerberg’s blog post, Facebook makes a concerted effort to fully drive home the true magnitude of a global community boasting 200 million members.

Specifically, it reveals that it took 20,000 years for the world’s population to reach 200 million people, it would take almost 47 years for 200 million babies to be born in the Unites States, and that if Facebook were a country, its populace would make it the fifth largest in the world, surpassing nations such as Brazil, Japan and Russia. 

“Growing rapidly to 200 million users is a really good start, but we’ve always known that in order for Facebook to help people represent everything that is happening in their world, everyone needs a voice,” added Zuckerberg.

“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.”

To that end, Facebook has rolled out a dedicated ‘Facebook for Good’ space where people can share stories of how the social networking experience has helped them give back to their communities.

The network has also announced a partnership with 16 major charitable and advocacy organisations in order to create and offer a range of non-profit Facebook profile products that are available through the gift shop.

According to Zuckerberg, the organization the gift represents will receive between 90 and 95 percent of the price, after administrative expenses for the transaction, and Facebook will not keep any part of the buyer’s contribution.

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