网易100天---6、The Origin of Facebook

Facebook的发展历史：从名不见经传到全球巨头
The History of Facebook: From BASIC to Global Giant

From Brandwatch · 826 words · 8 mins

This year Facebook turned 14 years old. Now one of the biggest unicorns in the world, it’s become an everyday fixture of millions of lives the world over（脸书是世界上最大的独角兽公司之一，已成为世界上数百万人每日所必需的设备。）. So how did one young US student go from coding in his dormitory to the head of one of the most important and influential tech firms in history?

Mark Zuckerberg took the first steps of his path at an early age. Clearly understanding the importance of coding, Zuckerberg’s father Edward taught him Atari BASIC computer programming. It didn’t take long for his skills to become apparent（不久之后，扎克伯格便展现出了非凡的天赋）. When he was 11, his parents hired a software developer named David Newman to tutor him. Newman to this day calls Zuckerberg a “prodigy”（纽曼在教学期间称扎克伯格为“奇才”。）.

Within a couple of years（数年之后）, Zuckerberg created an incredibly practical programme: ZuckNet. His father ran a dentist out of the house and wanted a simple way for the receptionist to contact him without shouting through their home. ZuckNet,which worked like an internal instant messaging system, did just that.

While attending Phillips Exeter Academy（在进入菲利普爱思特中学）, an elite boarding school（一所精英寄宿学校）, his drive to create did not abate（他的创造欲丝毫未减）. He attracted interest from AOL and Microsoft. They wanted to buy Synapse, a piece of software that learned a user’s music taste through AI and listening habits he created with a friend, and give him a job.

Ultimately, he turned it down and set his sites on Harvard（最后，扎克伯格辞掉了这份工作，并在哈佛创立了自己的网站。）. It’s here where the origins of Facebook can be found.

Harvard and Face Mash（哈佛与脸书的融合）

Having turned down two of the biggest tech companies in the world, Zuckerberg headed off to Harvard in 2002. Clearly he had bigger plans. He chose to major in psychology, but took plenty of computer science classes along with it. At first the psychology choice seems strange. Why not major in programming or something similar?

But when you think of Facebook’s nature, the supposed “addictive” nature (有的似乎令人上瘾的本质)of the likes, comments, and pokes（点赞、评论和戳）， the psychology part becomes clearer. Facebook from the off （从一开始）pulls you in to share personal details and seek out interaction from other people. Being able to design something like this must involve some knowledge of the human mind.

Zukerberg attracts his first big controversy（争论） in October, 2003. He creates and publishes Facemash, a website that lets Harvard students judge the each others’ attractiveness to create rankings (similar to the Hot or Not site that launched in 2000). As he didn’t actually get permission to use student photos, unsurprisingly many were not happy with his work.

Introducing the Facebook（脸书的简介）

It wasn’t long until we saw the first iteration of a now near ubiquitous company（不久之后人们便再一次看到了这个如今无处不在的公司。）. February, 2004 saw the facebook launch. It had a profile where you could upload a photo, share your interests, and connect with other people. It also offered a network visualization（可视化 n. 形象化；清楚地呈现在心） of your connections.

Initially this was only opened to people with a Harvard email address and within the first month 50% of the college’s students had signed up. But there was a big problem Zuckerberg had to deal with from the off. He was being sued（他被起诉了。）.

Zuckerberg previously worked on a similar project with fellow students Cameron Winklevoss, Tyler Winklevoss, and Divya Narendra. He eventually quit to do this one thing, the Facebook（最终他为了脸书放弃了这个项目。）. But this ex-collaborators（前合作者们） say he stole their concept and ideas and they wanted recompense（报应 vt. 赔偿；酬谢 vi. 赔偿 n. 赔偿；报酬）.

They eventually came to a settlement in 2008, with each of the trio receiving 1.2m shares in the Facebook company. By the IPO, these were worth $300m, but more on the IPO later. （他们最终于2008年达成协议，三人各持有脸书公司一百二十万元的股权。到公司首次公开募股时，这部分股权价值已涨至三亿美元，之后会升值更多。）

You Heard of This Thing Called Facebook?（你听说过脸书吗？）

In August the “the” was dropped and the company officially became Facebook. The following month high school students are admitted, along with employees of Microsoft and Apple. The company was now ready to move beyond its student base.

Then in November Zuckerberg took an important decision about his own life. Having taken the semester off from Harvard（从哈佛退学）, he announced he was leaving entirely, returning briefly to hire some new employees. After significant investment and a growing membership, Zuckerberg was ready to fully dedicate himself to running his company, as a CEO rather than a programmer.

With the Zuck at the helm full-time, Facebook continued its expansion plans. In December Australian and New Zealand universities were included, along with high schools from Mexico, the UK, and Ireland. That meant there were now 2,500 colleges and 25,000 high schools with access to Facebook.

It wasn’t until September 2006 when the platform became open for everyone (anyone over 13 with a valid email address).

Then, finally, in December, 2009, Facebook hits a major milestone. With 350m registered users and 132m unique monthly users, it becomes the most popular social platform in the world. Of course, the company wasn’t planning to leave it at that（当然，脸书公司不会止步于此。）.

Facebook had now become a huge name, a globally used website, and at the head of the social media revolution. Not too shabby from someone who was still in school just a few years prior（对于几年前还在上学的人来说，这已是个壮举。）.