Facebook is a social network service and website launched in February 2004 that is operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. As of January 2011 , Facebook has more than 600 million active users. Users may create a personal profile, add other users as friends and exchange messages, including automatic notifications when they update their profile. Additionally, users may join common interest user groups, organized by workplace, school, or college, or other characteristics. The name of the service stems from the colloquial name for the book given to students at the start of the academic year by university administrations in the US with the intention of helping students to get to know each other better. Facebook allows anyone who declares themselves to be at least 13 years old to become a registered user of the website.
Disadvantages
Affecting Relationships
Talk about long distance relationships, Facebook would be the one answer friends, family and lovers can count on. Though conducted on a distance, the system can still connect relationships right that very moment. But because relationships are built and strengthened just because of an Internet site, it tends to become weaker and it supports less emotional and most especially physical contact. Some relationships tumble down due to facts like these.
Affecting Emotions
Because Facebook adapts a free-flowing information environment, some uses it to target on other's emotional depression. Others send out procrastination just to bring down a specific person or even bully a student in the lower years. Targeting the emotions may cause a negative attitude towards a person's social relationship, physical activity, and academic issues.
Affecting Industry
Even if the system overflows with so much advantages that one can be joyful of, there are still numbers of flaws that one can pinpoint. Internet industry is greatly affected by sites popping out to render a technical community. This is where the rivalry starts. The crowding is also becoming an issue. The program is considered as a negative diversion especially to the schooling industry, affecting students to divert their attention.
Affecting Privacy
Cyber stalking is one thing. Barging into someone's privacy is another. Come to think about it, cyber stalking and invading one's privacy goes hand in hand. A person who is engaged in cyber stalking tends to know everything about a person and uses it first hand. A lot of a user's personal information is so accessible that almost everyone, even those who know you but you don't know of, can view it.
Superficiality
There are those who would want to be recognized as someone even in the Internet society. But thanks to sites like Facebook, some are already being characterized superficially because of the user's identification of their personal favorites. It's like being one with the world and being one with the trend without forming any kind of identity that one can point out to be unique.
The important thing about having Facebook is that a person be discreet in the information that is given out. Privacy and other things stated above can be prevented if the user won't give out any kind of information that he considers private.