Facebook Hits 2 Billion Users, Takes On “Expanded Responsibility”

With great power comes great responsibility. That may not have been an exact quote, but it was the sentiment echoed by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg as the social media site passed the 2 billion user mark.

The announcement about Facebook passing the milestone came courtesy of a post from the official Mark Zuckerberg page on Tuesday of this week. “As of this morning, the Facebook community is now officially 2 billion people!” he wrote. “We’re making progress connecting the world, and now let’s bring the world closer together. It’s an honor to be on this journey with you.”

Facebook passed the 1 billion mark in October of 2012, so it took then less than 5 years to capture their second billion. When you break that number down, it means Facebook averages a staggering 580,000 signups every single day.

Of course, with an audience that large, Facebook has moved beyond simply a platform to communicate with friends. The site truly has become a way to tackle local and global problems, and a way to unite causes like never before. And that’s not something the company is taking lightly.

“We feel like our responsibility is expanding, especially around passing this milestone of 2 billion people in the community,” Zuckerberg said in an interview. “We’ve been thinking about what our responsibility is in the world and what we need to do.”

To take on the challenges of the next generation, Zuckerberg feels, it’s going to take a more connected world. And that includes “everything from stopping climate change, to stopping pandemics, to funding research.” Those aren’t just problems localized to one particular country anymore, he said, and “you need to build a world where every person has a sense of support and purpose in their life so they don’t just focus narrowly on what’s going on in their lives, but can think about these broader issues as well.”