More than 11,000 Sun Devils have discovered what it means to be "poked."
Thefacebook.com has swept across college campuses nationwide with total membership reaching almost 2 million.
Five Harvard students, including Mark Zuckerberg who came up with the original plan, spent many late nights in the dorm poring over ideas for a universal online database with an interactive social networking interface, said Chris Hughes, co-founder and spokesperson of Thefacebook.com.
"The idea was sort of an extension of the traditional college facebooks with terrible freshman ID photos and boring information," Hughes said. Some colleges have online directories with photos and profiles they call "facebooks."
Users can provide information such as their hometown, major, relationship status and favorite movies. They can also add other users to a list called "My Friends," message other users and "poke" other users.
It can be difficult trying to exactly explain a "poke." The "frequently asked questions" section of Thefacebook.com tells users, "We have about as much of an idea as you do. We thought it would be fun to make a feature that has no specific purpose and to see what happens from there."
Hughes offers another explanation: "It's just a small hello gesture."
Thefacebook.com is becoming increasingly popular at ASU, allowing students to find people with similar interests, meet potential dates and even reconnect with people from their childhood.
"A girl from an Illinois school that I used to be friends with 10 years ago found me on [the Web site]," said nursing freshman Laura Baumrucker.
Students can also connect to users in their college classes.
Completely free to users, Thefacebook.com supports the site through advertising revenue. A student can pay $12 per day to have Thefacebook display an announcement, similar in style to Google ads, to all users of Thefacebook.com at their particular school.
Thefacebook founders, also members of the database, are pleased about the success of their creation.
"We're loving it [Thefacebook's success]," Hughes said. "It's really nice to see something you imagined turn into a phenomenon that is sweeping up almost 2 million people."
Reach the reporter at jourdan.rassas@asu.edu.
