Grads To Pen Mock Facebook Guide

Evan J. Lushing ’04 and Gregory R. Atwan ’05 are planning to make a career out of an activity college students nationwide use as fodder for amusement­—surfing the Facebook.

This spring, the duo aims to release a facetious guidebook for the popular social networking Web site created by Harvard dropout Mark E. Zuckerberg, formerly of the Class of 2006.

The book, Lushing said, will feature joke pieces, satires, urban legends, and “fictional and fanciful” anecdotes.

“The book is like a Facebook number from the Harvard Lampoon,” said Lushing, a former member of the semi-secret Sorrento Square social organization that used to occasionally publish a so-called humor magazine.

The book’s main chapter categorizes Facebook users into one of five stereotypes.

Among them are “newsers,” who use Facebook as a liveblog to document their most trivial actions; “self-promoters,” who exaggerate their features to make them appear more exciting; and “performers,” who treat their profiles as “avant-garde works of art.”

Besides describing the site’s users, “The Facebook Book” also recounts tales and urban legends surrounding the site’s founding.

Lushing’s favorite story details that Zuckerberg’s original creation, a program called “Face Mash,” which collected pictures of students and allowed others to rate them as “hot or not.”

But when administrators discovered the site, Zuckerberg was asked to change the premise to something more appropriate.

After coming up with idea for “The Facebook Book,” both authors quit their jobs.

Atwan, who was working at an Internet startup in New York, said he persuaded Lushing to travel cross-country to pursue the project with him. They started writing in August.

The book is the first collaborative project for the pair, who were childhood friends.

Atwan and Lushing devised most of the original material for the book, but they also incorporated personal accounts from friends and acquaintances.

The duo, self-proclaimed fans of the three-and-a-half-year-old social networking site, said the appeal of using Facebook as a subject comes from its growing popularity.

“Facebook is the biggest thing right now and [is] the Google of online networking sites,” Lushing said.

But at least one Harvard student believes Facebook’s dominant presence may not be enough to attract an audience for the book.

“I wouldn’t buy the book, but if I saw it, I would definitely pick it up and flip through it,” Vivian P. Liao ’08 said.