At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Michael Arrington interviewed Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg. This is Sandberg's first interview since joining the social network in March 2008.
In describing her first year, Sandberg explains why Facebook matters: "You go to different things from users to marketers to people like Obama running for office, who really want to connect with
people and want a more authentic way to communicate and to listen and I think we are one of the forces and in some ways the leading force helping to provide that and that's just a really exciting
thing to be a part of."
Indeed, you can find an astounding one in five worldwide Web users on Facebook. "So we have 4 in 5 more to go," Sandberg remarks. Joking aside, she adds: "we want
everyone in the world to be connected," and "we really believe in enabling people to be their authentic selves on the Web, and enabling people to communicate directly with each other in a very
personal way."
So personal, in fact, that Sandberg says Facebook will soon drop the 5,000 friend limit. "We look forward to your having 80,000 friends... 100,000 friends," she says. "I'm not
going to give you a specific date, but I will reinforce the message that this is coming, and more importantly tell you why we think it's important. Because you have these friend requests because
people genuinely want to hear from you and genuinely want to connect with you. We're not providing that functionality and we think that's important so we are working on this and we're working on it
currently.
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