Friending means to act as the friend of someone or to include (someone) in a list of designated friends on a person's social networking site.

 

Friending的意思是“做某人的朋友”或者“将某人在社交网站上加为好友”。

 

The word comes from a term coined by Shakespeare in Hamlet, act 1, scene 5: And what so poor a man as Hamlet is May do, to express his love and friending to you.

 

这个词最早来源于莎士比亚戏剧《哈姆雷特》第一场第五幕中的一句对白：像哈姆雷特这样贫苦的人，要怎样向你表达他的爱意和友情呢。

 

The coinage was largely overlooked for centuries. With the advent¹ of the social network Facebook in 2004, friending became widely adopted.

 

这个说法被人们忽视了好几百年，直到2004年社交网站Facebook迅猛发展，friending（加好友）一词才被广泛使用。