The internet was invented in the 20th century and ever since then it has been a great phenomenon. Not one day goes by that it is not daily used, and the majority of people that use it are kids to be more exact teenagers. Last week in my American Literature class my teacher showed us this movie called Social Networking that basically explains how Facebook came to be. Now if you did not know Facebook is a very famous social networking site that is used by many people mostly by teenagers and people in their early 20’s. The creator of Facebook is Marcus Zellbegger who appears to be the youngest billionaire of the world at the The Social Network is the story of Facebook, a website created in a Harvard dorm room in 2004 that has redefined how we connect and communicate in the 21st century. At its core, the film is much, much more than just the story of one website. It is a story of success and failure and the trappings of ego and greed. The film is based on real people and real events.
The film opens with one of its strongest scenes, a five-minute interchange between a 19-year-old Mark Zuckerberg and his girlfriend. Zuckerberg, brilliantly portrayed by Jesse Eisenberg, speaks a mile a minute, quickly moving from one topic to the next, leaving his companion to exclaim, “Dating you is like dating a StairMaster.” Throughout the course of the conversation, an acutely unaware Zuckerberg proceeds to insult his girlfriend, belittling her background, intellect and future life prospects. Having had enough, she ends the relationship and tells him off. This scene, one of the most significant seeing as it introduces the audience to Mark, a man who is clearly brilliant, but who is also deeply insecure, awkward and more than a bit antisocial. It also sets up the motive behind the project that would become the precursor to Facebook, Facemash. With Facemash, a Hot or Not for female students at Harvard, Mark brings down the university network, gets in some trouble with the administration and makes himself an outcast on campus. It also brings him to attention of Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, two good-looking, athletic and privileged twins. The Winklevosses and their friend, Divya Narendra, are looking to build a social dating site for Harvard men. They want Mark to work on the code. He readily agrees. The dating site spawns a much bigger idea in Mark’s head — and that idea is Facebook. Partnering with his best friend and financier Eduardo Saverin, Mark builds The Facebook. What follows is an almost viral spread of user adoption and rapid growth and expansion.
The second and third acts of the film primarily involve the massive ascent of Facebook and the parallel breakdown between best friends Mark and Eduardo. As Eduardo Saverin he’s the most relatable character in the film, but that isn’t to say he’s the hero. On the contrary, while the film makes it easy to empathize with his position — being cut out of one of the biggest companies founded this decade — it equally makes it clear that if Eduardo Saverin had run the business end of Facebook, Facebook wouldn’t be anything close to what it is today. The second and third act of the film primarily involve the massive ascent of Facebook and the parallel breakdown between best friends Mark and Eduardo. As Eduardo Saverin, Andrew Garfield is particularly good at gaining our sympathies. He’s the most relatable character in the film, but that isn’t to say he’s the hero. On the contrary, while the film makes it easy to empathize with his position — being cut out of one of the biggest companies founded this decade — it equally makes it clear that if Eduardo Saverin had run the business end of Facebook, Facebook wouldn’t be anything close to what it is today. The undisputed facts regarding Facebook are that by May 2005, just over 15 months after thefacebook.com launched, the company already had 2.8 million registered users and had received its second round of funding for $13 million. In six years, the site has gone from being something meant to bring the college experience online to something that is quickly altering multiple forms of media and gaining more and more users from every corner of the globe. Whether Facebook is the next Google or not, I’m not sure, but it has utterly encapsulated the zeitgeist of this era of computing and communications. Facebook’s legacy and influence over the future is something that cannot be in disputed. There is a cost for great success and a cost for changing the world. Oftentimes, those costs are paid in relationships. That’s true for widget salesmen, and it’s true for founders of social networks. This underscores how adroit the tagline for the film really is: “You don’t get to 500 million friends without making a few enemies.”
Now after seeing this movie what I ask myself is the internet mostly good or bad? Wed 2.0 brought the world together harboring a sense of community in which the common person could post their thoughts and experiences on the web to share with others. But yet so many bad things happen through the internet such as that one case where a college student got kicked out of his Christian college because he posted some gay pictures of himself and some administrators kicked him out, “College student Michael Guinn thought the photos he posted of himself dressed in drag would be seen only by friends. But he made a mistake. And when someone showed the photos to administrators at John Brown University, a Christian College in Siloam Springs, Ark., it was “the last straw for them” say Guinn, 22, who is gay. In January, he was kicked out of school, his virtual paper trail of musings about boyfriends and visits to clubs a clear sign to the administrators that, despite repeated warnings, Guinn’s activities were in violation of the campus conduct codes stating that behavior must “affirm and honor Scripture” (11TH Grade Contemporary Composition Course , Text 4: “What You Say Online Can Haunt You” by Janet Kornblum And Mary Beth Marklein pg 167). Now when I read this with some of my classmates there was a lot of controversy about it because some thought that it was right to kick the student out because obviously he shouldn’t have been posting up such pictures on the internet about himself. He should have known that on the internet there is no such thing as privacy! You are always prone to computer hackers who can always expose your information everywhere. Then again some say that his sexual orientation should have nothing to do with what the school did to him they should have left him continue school there. Now me I am kind of in a neutral position because the guy shouldn’t be judged on his sexuality and that was his personal Facebook page no one should have showed it to the administrators at the college, but then again kids can be mean. Also the college is a Christian college so they have certain standards you have to uphold too if you want to go there and if you want to argue with that then choose a different college.
The internet plays a big role in our lives, this New York Times article that I read goes on to say that the Internet is also causing us to sleep less (by 8.5 minutes) and that it reduces contact with family members by 23.5 minutes per day. The researchers acknowledged that they cannot answer the question of whether or not it strengthens or weakens social relationships. That's been a burning question since the rise of the Internet, in my opinion I do thin it affects relationships because you’re on the computer for so darn long you forget about your friends and family because you’re so into your virtual self. The article estimates that 75% of the country has Internet access now. Unfortunately, we still have some elected leaders in our communities that don't think any of this is important, because they are viewing it through the lens of their own (somewhat limited) experience, rather than trying to look at the community as a whole. When 75% of your constituents are using the Internet, it's not a fad or a luxury for the well off--it's a necessity of daily life. In rural communities, the Internet has broken the chains of rural isolation and dramatically improved the quality of life in areas like shopping. Living in a rural area no longer means long drives (or doing without) to obtain needed items--a couple of clicks online and the products are delivered to your door, or even via broadband, if you don't live near a well-stocked music store, as just one example, 1995 was the year the Internet really took off. Ten years later, we've gone from a tiny number of people who had Internet access back then to 75% of the country--that's the fastest diffusion of a new technology ever. We're on to something here, and I believe it's mostly for the good. We're more aware of world events, better informed on local, national, and international issues, have more control over our time, and have all kinds of new business and work opportunities available to us. Just one example: despite the sheer awfulness of the tsunami, we all know about it in a way that we never could have even five years ago, to say nothing of ten or twenty years ago. Is the knowing a good thing? Well, charitable giving, propelled by hundreds and thousands of Web sites helping to organize aid, will likely break every fund-raising record in the world. In the face of horrible suffering and pain, the Internet gives us an opportunity to demonstrate our basic humanity and caring for others--an opportunity to rise above our own needs, to rise above political, social, economic, and language differences--and we are doing so.
