by Sharon Mcavinue

Created on: May 07, 2010

Facebook is one of the busiest social networking sites where more than 400 million users log onto it each day, according to the website. Facebook was originally created as a social networking site for college students where it allowed them to communicate with other students of their peers. Later on, the site started to expand their membership by accepting non college members. This site is popular because it allows people to communicate with old and new friends, look up family members, old high school classmates and socialize with foreigners from Europe, South America, Asia and Australia and it has been well known for its high percentage of young people between the ages of 13 17, according to Istrategylabs.com.

Another good advantage is that aspiring artists such as musicians, film makers and writers are able to post their content on their Facebook pages for the general public to view and listen to. The site has also become an educational community where people are learning more about other countries, different cultures and religion. The bad advantage to Facebook is that it can have a darker side to it. The majority of Facebook users are mostly teenagers; they are destroying other kids by posting inappropriate materials that will emotionally hurt them later on. Cyberbullying.us is a website that presents information to the general public about the reason why teenagers want to hurt their own peers. According to this site, the majority of people who use Facebook are using it for the wrong reasons. The Cyberbullying Research Center has printed a graph that contains a recent sample they have taken from school districts located in the southern United States, the graph shows weekly activities of young people between 12 18 where they have been tormenting their victims by using different types of electronic and digital media.

Another danger is cyber predatory where adults develop their own Facebook pages then disguise themselves as other teenagers in order to lure in their victims. ABC News's late night program Nightline did a story about the "Darker side of Facebook," where they reported on a case in England where a 17 year old girl was murdered by a man she had met on the social networking site. The website has now gained another good advantage by incorporating a safety feature; kids can now have a safe experience thanks to a new system Facebook has added to their website. Click onto accounts, then scroll down to Account Settings, click on it, there will be a variety of task that is offered to each member, such as personal information, contact or block contact. With Block contact it prevents specific members (who are considered harmful) from contacting certain members.

For further information about Facebook,log onto the following websites: ABC News Nightline: The Darker side of Facebook http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/video/dark-side-of-f acebook-10431544 New Scrutiny for Facebook Over Predators, by brad Stone, The New York Times, July 30, 2007 http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/30/business/media/30f acebook.html Cyberbullying Research Center http://www.cyberbullying.us.aboutus.php Facebook Demographic and Statistics Report 2010, http://www.istrategylabs.com/2010/01/facebook-demogr aphics-and-statistics-report-2010-...

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