[mindgam3]

So, there are two ways of looking at Zuckerberg's idealistic positioning of Facebook as a force for good, which is how he pitched to me when I was recruited as a PM there in 2007 (and offered a job which I ultimately declined due to a counter offer, much to the detriment of my current net worth, but that is irrelevant to the current discussion):

1. Either this reflected a sincere belief by Zuck to build a different kind of product/corporate entity governed more by ethics than by money and power, or

2. This utopian positioning was a calculated recruiting strategy to attract the best and brightest recent grads from Stanford and other elite universities, who were extremely attracted by the idea of getting paid six figures to work on a fascinating product without having to sell our soul, like our friends in finance etc.

Or it could be some combination of those two.

My point is that if the underlying motivation were truly to do good, Facebook would have done something differently over the last 5+ years as the capacity for its product to cause harm became abundantly evident.

Instead, at every crisis/opportunity to fix the underlying issues, Facebook chose to brush problems under the rug in the pursuit of growth.

From my perspective, as someone who drank the Facebook kool-aid more than just about anyone in the early days, this represents a painful betrayal. I feel like one of the "dumb fucks" who trusted Zuckerberg's pitch to me back in the day.