Facebook touts new Web surfing scrapbooks

Facebook, the No. 2 U.S. social networking site that is phenomenally popular with college students, is seeking to make it easier for other sites to appeal to its audience.

The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company on Tuesday introduced new features that allow its 11 million users to collect scraps of published content from affiliated sites--photos, news, videos--and paste these items on their own Facebook profile pages.

The move offers users of the socializing site a new way to connect with close friends by showcasing what members are reading or watching elsewhere on the Web. In effect, users can create chronological scrapbooks of their Web surfing habits.

"Gone are the days of gawking at celebrities on People.com without being able to share the link with Facebook friends in two clicks," said Chris Hughes, Facebook co-founder and product manager of "Share," as the new feature is known.

Now any site that chooses to link its own site to Facebook can participate in the program. A spokeswoman said the company has struck deals with a variety of well-known media, gaming and other Web sites to jump-start these efforts.

"These links are only the beginning. They will continue to pop up on more sites in the coming weeks," Hughes said in blog post on the Facebook site detailing the plans.

Initial partners include news sites like The New York Times, WashingtonPost.com, Dow Jones' Wall Street Journal Online and gaming sites like GameSpot.com (owned by CNET Networks, the publisher of News.com) and IDG Entertainment.

There are also links to sports sites like Time Warner's SI.com and NBC Universal's NBCSports.com, video sites such as Brightcove and PhotoBucket, StupidVideos.com and eBaum's World, and humor sites like The Onion and CollegeHumor.com.

"We're partnering with some good companies to make it easier for people to share those Web sites' content through Facebook," Mark Zuckerberg, the company's co-founder and chief executive, said in a statement.

It's the latest push by the privately held company to open up the formerly closed dating network to make the site accessible to a wider audience. Previously, member profile pages featured material that had been published inside the Facebook realm.

In May, Facebook began expanding beyond college and high school students to allow employees of major companies, nonprofit organizations and in the military to sign up. Last month, it opened registration to any Internet user.

Story Copyright © 2008 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.