Michael Phelps Has One Million Facebook Fans

by Jarrett Martineau | August 19, 2008 at 09:18 am

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Michael Phelps iz popular on teh internets. Second only to Obama on Facebook? That's quite the meme-like social media accomplishment. Who cares about gold medals when you're the longest running "trending topic" on Twitter? I'm only half-kidding.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past week and a half (and probably even if you have), you’ve undoubtedly heard the name Michael Phelps many, many times. The record setting swimmer from the US not only won an unprecedented eight gold medals at the Beijing Olympics, but is perhaps (and waaay more importantly) the longest running “trending topic” on Twitter search.
And today the 23-year-old from Baltimore has yet another accomplishment to add to his social media resume: one million Facebook fans! With a little prodding from the social network (the site has been congratulating him and directing US users towards his fan page - see below), Phelps is now second only to Barack Obama in fans, and is quickly approaching 50,000 wall posts too.