F (AP Photo/ Rajanish Kakade)
NEW YORK (AP) — A billion people logged in to Facebook on a single day this week, marking the first time that many members used the world’s largest online social network in a 24-hour period. The number amounts to one-seventh of the Earth’s population.
Monday’s milestone was mostly symbolic for Facebook, which boasts nearly 1.5 billion users who log in at least once a month. But CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who founded the network in his Harvard dorm room 11 years ago, reflected on the occasion with a post.
“‘I’m so proud of our community for the progress we’ve made,” he wrote. “Our community stands for giving every person a voice, for promoting understanding and for including everyone in the opportunities of our modern world.”
Facebook achieved 1 billion overall users in 2012, but this week’s milestone is perhaps more significant. It means the social network has become an essential service in many of our lives, a sort of online connective tissue that binds us to friends, family and even strangers who find themselves in similar circumstances. We need it daily, or more.
Most of the billion people who logged in to Facebook on Monday were outside the U.S. and Canada. Of Facebook’s overall users, more than 83 percent come from other countries.
AP Technology Writer Michael Liedtke
