What is Facebook
Facebook is Meta’s mainstream social platform; the official page describes it as helping you “connect with friends, family and communities of people who share your interests” (official product page). The platform launched as TheFacebook on February 4, 2004, founded by Mark Zuckerberg together with Eduardo Saverin, Dustin Moskovitz, Andrew McCollum, and Chris Hughes; on October 28, 2021, the company operating Facebook was renamed Meta Platforms (Wikipedia article). For the company’s business, AI, and hardware, see the Meta entry.
History and opening up
Facebook was initially restricted to students of Harvard College and later expanded to other North American universities; in 2006 it opened registration to everyone at least 13 years old with a valid email address (Wikipedia article). This path from campuses to the general public shaped the product form built around real identities and a friend graph.
Main features
The sections highlighted on the official product page are:
- Groups: finding and joining communities built around interests.
- Watch: video content.
- Marketplace: buying and selling between people.
Beyond these, specific features and naming — the Feed, Stories, live video, and others — change with versions and regions; for current behavior, refer to the Facebook Help Center.
Relationship to other Meta products
Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger, and Threads form Meta’s social-app product line; the apps keep separate brands and accounts while sharing infrastructure and the advertising business at the company level (Meta entry). Instagram was acquired by Facebook in 2012, and Threads is Meta’s platform centered on text sharing. For Meta’s AI assistant and models, see the Meta entry.
Discussion in the show
Weekly #004’s chapter “Muse：面向普通人的 Personal Agent” (Muse: a personal agent for non-experts) discusses Meta’s Muse personal agent, and Facebook comes up as a user base and data source:
- Guizang argues a personal agent is a track that suits Meta, because its user base comes from mass-market products like Facebook and Instagram (Chinese transcript).
- Guizang says Zuckerberg “lets Muse read information from Instagram, Facebook, and Threads” (Chinese transcript) — a participant’s claim about Muse’s data sources that has not been corroborated by official statements.
- Yang Pan says Chinese internet circles lack awareness of Meta’s actual value and that he has only logged into Facebook “once in a while over the last ten-odd years” (Chinese transcript).
These are the show participants’ opinions and personal usage, not platform data or official conclusions. See the episode 004 chapter.
Frequently asked questions
Where is Facebook’s official website?
The site is facebook.com, and the product overview is at meta.com/facebook.
What is the relationship between Facebook and Instagram?
Both are Meta’s social apps. Instagram was created by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger; on April 9, 2012, Facebook announced it would acquire Instagram for approximately one billion dollars, and the deal closed on September 6, 2012 (Wikipedia article). See the Instagram entry for the product itself.
When did Facebook launch?
TheFacebook launched on February 4, 2004, initially only for Harvard students, and opened to the general public aged 13 and above in 2006 (Wikipedia article).
How do Facebook and Instagram differ?
Facebook centers on friend-based social networking and communities (Groups, Marketplace, and more), while Instagram centers on photo and video sharing; their positioning and content formats differ. See the Facebook entry and the Instagram entry.