Top Gun in Facebook

Do you remember the movie “Top Gun?” Yup, the movie where the song “Danger Zone” became popular. This was a 1986 American film with Tom Cruise and Kelly McGillis (who recently announced that she is gay). It also starred Val Kilmer and Tom Skerritt.

Back then, the US military didn’t have Facebook or Twitter to recruit “top guns.” Now, the Pentagon uses Facebook. According to Sagar Meghani, an AP writer, Army officials are using Facebook to recruit young Americans between 18 to 24 years old. He quotes Lt. Gen. Benjamin Freakley, "They live in the virtual world."

Gen. Raymond Odierno, who is the top U.S. commander in Iraq, alos has Facebook account. This provides him the opportunity in cyberspace to respond to questions about the mission in Iraq. Aside from the US Army, the Air Force and the Coast Guard also has a presence in Facebook.

I remember reading a story in the Inquirer about Jose Maria Sison also using Facebook to spread his message.

When Facebook first started in Feb 4, 2004, it was limited to a community of students in Harvard University. It later expanded to other colleges like Stanford, Columbia and Yale.

Am sure that when Mark Zuckerberg founded Facebook he didn’t see Facebook growing into a 200 million-plus community worldwide that includes the US military and many Filipinos like me.