Jun 15, 2009

Coye Cheshire Discusses Facebook's Vanity URLs

From the San Francisco Chronicle

Facebook user names leave their cyber mark

By Alejandro Martínez-Cabrera

David Beckham was one of the first, along with Britney Spears and Donald Trump. Even companies like McDonald's and Puma jumped on the bandwagon.

They all were among the nearly 6 million Facebook users who registered a vanity URL with the social-networking Web site over the weekend.

At the stroke of midnight Saturday, Facebook allowed its members to sign up for unique names for their profiles on a first-come, first served basis....

UC Berkeley Assistant Professor Coye Cheshire, who researches social-exchange environments, wasn't surprised by the rush to compete for a piece of virtual real estate.

"If Facebook continues to be the premier social-networking utility, then vanity URLs very well could be as important for individuals as domain names are for organizations and companies," he said....

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Last updated: October 4, 2016