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  • Web site connects people, reunites long-time friends

    Lisa Wauters
    Intern

    Issue date: 12/3/04 Section: Undefined Section
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    When Arlington freshman Jennifer Lemmers moved away from Wiesbaden, Germany in the 5th grade, she thought it would be last time she would ever talk to her best and only friend, Stephanie, from Heidelberg Elementary.

    "I moved away and she moved away and we never talked to each other again," Lemmers said. That is until a week ago when Lemmers discovered the profile of her long-lost childhood friend on www.thefacebook.com.

    "I was sitting around bored and searching random names when I found someone I thought might be her," she said. "And I thought, 'Hmm, perhaps it is her.'" Lemmers sent a note asking if the girl had gone to elementary school in Germany and received confirmation of her suspicion a few days later -- the Stephanie on FaceBook was the Stephanie from 3rd grade.

    The FaceBook, founded in February 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg, is "an online directory that connects people through social networks at colleges and universities." Through the FaceBook, students can find friends from their university or high school and add them to a list of friends. Students can send friends messages or network with other students by joining groups.

    Zuckerburg, an undergraduate at Harvard University, had the idea to begin the FaceBook when other students at Harvard wanted a way to identify people in other residential houses. Zuckerburg started building a code for an online directory for the school and within a week had created the basic workings of the site.

    Before long, the site had extended to other schools like MIT, Yale and Stanford. Now, the FaceBook includes students from over 100 schools and is approaching the 1 million-member mark. Around 750 male and over 1,000 female NT students are registered with the FaceBook. There are 544 NT groups registered, ranging from groups for art majors and members of fraternities to groups called "Captain Planet Rocks My World!" and "The Albino Squirrel Destruction Society."

    "The groups here are pretty different from other blog/journal programs because you can start a group with whatever criteria you want, like my Albino Squirrel Destruction Society" said Peter Hofstad, Flower Mound junior. "I just started it a week ago, and it already has 14 members. Most of them are people I've never met before." Other students use the site to meet new people.

    "It's a way to waste time and meet new people here at the university," said Ashley Shinn, Mineral Wells freshman. "I've already met a girl who loves my favorite band, which is pretty amazing considering not many people know who the Manic Street Preachers are."

    For Lemmers, the FaceBook is not just about meeting new people, but also a way of reconnecting with her past.

    "I am very happy to have connected with an old friend. I've always wondered what she's been up to," she said. "I couldn't have found her without FaceBook."

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