13 Fun Facts about Facebook You Won’t Want to Miss

If you’re an Afghan Wireless subscriber, you know that AWCC now offers more ways to enjoy Facebook than ever, from daily, weekly, or monthly bundles to the brand-new Facebook Without Internet package. But did you know that Facebook is now officially a teenager? The amazingly popular global social networking site was launched on February 4, 2004: 13 years ago! In celebration of this milestone birthday, here are 13 fun Facebook facts you won’t want to miss:

1. Zuckerberg chose the color scheme for an unusual reason.

The blue-and-white color scheme that Facebook has become known for may invoke feelings of peace and serenity, but there’s actually a much more practical reason for this choice of hue. As revealed by a 2010 profile in The New Yorker, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has red-green color blindness; he chose blue for the site simply because it was a color that he could see.

2. Facebook used to be more exclusive.

Anyone who is over the age of 13 and has a valid e-mail address can have a Facebook account, but that wasn’t always the case. When Facebook first launched, it was for Harvard students only. Shortly after, still keeping things exclusive, Facebook expanded to Columbia, Stanford, and Yale, and later to most US and Canadian universities. It wasn’t until September 26, 2006 that Facebook adopted the free and open access model that we know and love today.

3. Facebook has a most popular person.

Real Madrid football star Cristiano Ronaldo officially claimed the title of Facebook’s most popular person in 2015, unseating Colombian singer Shakira, who had held the number-one spot since the year before. Just how many friends are we talking about? Incredibly, both stars have well over 100 million likes.

4. Facebook generates a mind-boggling amount of data.

As of the end of 2016, the approximate amount of user data stored on Facebook servers was 300 petabytes (a petabyte is 1 million gigabytes). For a little perspective, every single written work produced by humans in every known language since the beginning of recorded history would equal about 50 petabytes of data.

5. It was ahead of the mobile curve.

Facebook launched for mobile devices in 2006, before the first iPhone was released and well before our current smartphone-obsessed times. It proved to be a smart move for the company: a whopping 84% of Facebook’s advertising revenue for the final quarter of 2016 came from mobile users.

6. Virtual content is just around the corner.

Facebook is planning to make virtual reality content a major part of its future plans now that it has acquired the VR company Oculus. To give users a taste of what to expect, Facebook introduced 360-degree videos to News Feeds in September 2015; by scrolling a cursor or tilting a phone, users can immerse themselves in scrollable panoramic photorealistic views, like that of the Jakku desert from the 2015 film Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

7. There is a pirate language setting.

Scrolling through the extensive language options in your drop-down settings menu, you might have noticed a surprising choice: English (Pirate). This fun and quirky feature transforms all of Facebook’s system text into pirate speak. For example, News Feed turns into “Home Port,” and Log Out becomes “Abandon ship!”

8. There used to be an “awesome” button.

Before there was the “like” button, there was the “awesome” button. The original option to approve friends’ posts featured the now-well-known thumbs-up icon accompanied by the word “awesome.” Despite enthusiasm from Facebook engineers, Mark Zuckerberg rejected the “awesome” button in 2007 and replaced it with the more restrained “like” button.

9. Al Pacino used to be the “face” of Facebook.

The original home page for the first incarnation of the Facebook site featured a pixelated, blue-and-white image of a male face at the top of the page. The face’s owner was the subject of much debate amongst Facebook fans until the image was removed from the site in 2007; later, author David Kirkpatrick revealed in his book The Facebook Effect: The Inside Story of the Company That Is Connecting the World that the image was a photo of Hollywood actor Al Pacino in his younger days.

10. There are only 3.5 degrees of separation between users.

Six degrees of separation used to be the classic formula, but as Facebook has been growing globally, this number has been getting smaller. As of 2016, Facebook statistics estimated that, on average, two Facebook users are only separated from each other by 3.5 degrees; even less than the previous average of 4 degrees recorded in 2011.

11. More than 1 billion people are now on Facebook.

It took less than 10 years for Facebook to hit the 1-billion-user mark; the announcement that the magic number had been reached came on October 4, 2012. And the numbers just keep growing. As of its most recent earnings call, the number of monthly active users on Facebook is 1.86 billion.

12. Its IPO was huge.

Held in May of 2012, Facebook’s IPO raised $16 billion, the third-largest US IPO to date. Today, Facebook ranks at number five on the list of the world’s most valuable public companies.

13. Facebook’s founder only makes $1 per year.

Mark Zuckerberg’s annual take-home salary has been $1 since 2013. The young entrepreneur revealed in interviews that he has made enough money (not a surprising statement given that his net worth is over $45 billion), and that he wants to focus on doing the greatest possible good. Other high-tech leaders who take a $1 salary include Tesla’s Elon Musk and Meg Whitman, the head of HP.