Facebook and the Global Network
Two months ago, Facebook reached 2 billion users on its site, and is continuously aspiring to reach bigger milestones. According to this CNBC article, on September 1st, Facebook officially mapped the entire human population of Earth as it prepares to build an Internet in space. So not only does Facebook have direct data to 2 billion users, it is also able to know where 7.5 billion humans live, everywhere on Earth within 15 feet, according to this article. The purpose of this information is to try to connect people to the Internet from the stratosphere and from space. This goal, if implemented, would change the world, especially in the areas that currently don’t have strong access to the Internet. This new “space based Internet” is part of the broader effort by the U.S to take advantage of a slew of data now available from the hundred of satellites orbiting the Earth. While the prospect of this “space based Internet” and Facebook mapping the entire human population sounds impressive and likely to gain support from the majority of society, Facebook is not a company that faces no rivals. For example, Facebook rival Google, sold its satellite-imaging business (Skybox), because they figured out a way to get data without having its own satellites, according to the CNBC article. Technology is always advancing rapidly, and there’s no way to tell which of the big technology companies will make the next breakthrough.
This new information connects to the network topics covered in class, such as strong ties and weak ties. As of now, major cities such as New York City and San Francisco have a strong connection to the Internet. This can be represented as a “strong” tie. However, there are many other societies in the world that have consumers who still have no or very low quality internet connections. These societies can be characterized as having “weak” ties. Companies like Facebook are trying to find ways to make these weak ties into strong ties in order to create a fully connected world. In class, we discussed that networks are often in clusters of nodes. If this goal succeeds in the long run, the world connected by the Internet would become just one huge global network.
Link: https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/01/facebook-has-mapped-human-population-building-internet-in-space.html