Цукерберг сообщил, что компания намерена развиваться, главным образом – за счет активного привлечения рекламы и мобильного контента. По его мнению, это позволит инвесторам получить значительную прибыль. ©
Пост дня: Марк Цукерберг. Анализ характера
~2 000 слов на английском.Disclaimer; I am in no way making inferences about the real Mark Zuckerberg and I am not telling you if your perception of him is right or wrong - this is entirely based upon what I see in the movie. This is going to be really jumbled because I’m just saying what pops into my head.
Alright, so since someone did this for Eduardo, I’m going to try to analyze Mark’s character. I see him, more often than not in the fandom, characterized as one of the ‘villains’ of the movie, as if a story like this can even have a hero or a villain. He’s not a villain, but he certainly isn’t a hero.
(Wow, this turned into a giant Mark-is-Not-an-Asshole post.)
HOLY GIANT POST BATMAN UM THIS ACCIDENTALLY WOUND UP TO BE 2,000 WORDS…??? OOPS????
We can tell from the very beginning of the movie that Mark has a hard time relating to people. In the first scene, we see him talking a mile a minute with his girlfriend barely able to keep up. He’s obviously very smart, so much so that it makes it hard for him to relate to other people. Mark, however, isn’t trying to one-up her, he’s just communicating in the way that feels normal to him and thinking “why doesn’t anybody get it”?. It’s very clear that he has social issues and possibly a hint of narcisism. He’s not aware that he’s insulting Erica, and when he’s saying ‘you used to sleep with the door guy’, he might even be just joking. C’mon, Erica, I’m just poking a little fun - hey! Wait, where are you going? What the hell just happened? And when she says “we’re not dating anymore” and gets up and leaves him, he just seems surprised.
Although in the fandom he’s often portrayed as not caring what anyone thinks, Erica’s opinion of him is important to him (making Facemash is to get her attention, even though he certainly permanently fucked up any chance of getting back with her with that blog post - I’ll discuss that later), and he doesn’t want the site to have advertisements because he wants it to be ‘cool’. While physical appearance might not matter to him, he definitely has an ego and he cares what people think.
Mark doesn’t know how to deal with anger. We can tell from his blog post which he writes immediately after the breakup, shaming and insulting Erica. He might have an above-average intelligence, but he has the maturity of someone a lot younger. I don’t know if anyone actually read Mark’s blog (except Eduardo) or what he intended to do with it. If it didn’t have a following, maybe it was his own way to blow off steam. If it did, he was trying to defile her with seemingly no regard for Erica’s feelings. If it’s the latter, he doesn’t seem to be writing with malicious intent, but an unawareness of other people’s emotions. There’s also the hint of ‘this girl broke up with me and that automatically makes her a bitch. How could she not like me? She must not be good enough’. Mark doesn’t want to show that he’s upset by the breakup, so he covers this with harsh words. Because God forbid he show that he actually has feelings.
When Eduardo says the infamous “I’m here for you”, Mark either doesn’t recognize the meaning behind his words or doesn’t want the comfort. I’m guessing it’s the latter, because once again, it expresses that Mark can’t show weakness, he can’t admit there’s anything wrong.
He does try to talk to Erica, I’ll give him that credit. Erica, for one reason or another, is important to him. Maybe purely because he wants people to think highly of him. I don’t think at this stage he has any intent of getting back together with her. And, as a complete shock to him, she doesn’t grovel at his feet. She calls him out, and Mark walks away completely lost, only saying “we need to expand”, as if that’ll show her! Yeah, I’ll make a giant-ass website and then she’ll want me back! He needs the success of Facebook to keep his ego intact.
Mark doesn’t like sitting idle. Facemash is “something to take my mind off [Erica]”. He doesn’t do it for the hits, he does it because he’s bored. In the depositions, there’s one scene where he’s just sitting there doodling on his legal pad. This could be a sign that the depositions are actually extremely stressful (as I only really draw when I’m stressed out) or it could simply be boredom. It’s hard to tell, but in these scenes, Mark is extremely tense, so I’m going with the former.
With Facemash as well, it’s a big joke to him. He doesn’t stop once to think that rating girls based on their appearance could be insulting. Maybe he has a touch of sexism, but once again, it’s mostly to occupy his mind and he’s not thinking that people might be insulted. It doesn’t occur to him at all. When he gets in trouble for it, he’s apathetic and even insists that he deserves credit - another sign of his inflated ego. He tells the school board that “if you had known what you were looking for you’d have seen [the algorithm] written on my dorm room window” which is a giant ‘fuck you’ to everyone. He thinks, or knows, that he is better and smarter than them. On the rough draft of the sсript, when he’s coming out Eduardo says something like ‘it couldn’t have been that bad’ and Mark says ‘Yes it was, they made me apologize’. Because Mark can’t ever admit that he was wrong, that he screwed up. He always wants to be right, and apologizing is sublimating himself and admitting that he was in the wrong. The deposition scenes are another situation and story entirely, and there’s clearly a big shift in Mark’s character in these scenes.
And then there’s the whole Winklevoss dilemma. Mark hears their idea and the only thing he thinks is “I can do that, and I can do it better”.
So we have Mark, who’s too smart for his own good, who doesn’t like sitting still. “He doesn’t have three friends to rub together to make a fourth” (This is debatable, as he has Dustin, Chris, Eduardo, Billy and probably others, but he doesn’t seem to relate to them very well. Judging by his lack of social skills I’m guessing that when he was little, he was always the kid playing by himself for one reason or another, and this lead him to immerse himself in studies as a way to dignify himself and prove himself better than the rest of them. And thefacebook is his chance to shine. thefacebook is his chance to prove that he’s better than the rest of them.
It’s no wonder that he pours all his energy into it. These scenes are the few glimpses we get of a happy Mark, an enthusiastic Mark. In fact, I think the hack-a-thon scene is one of maybe three or four times in the movie where he actually smiles. He seems to have an obsessive personality, based on the way he works himself to the bone on thefacebook until he literally falls asleep the moment it goes online. He knows that thefacebook is better than Harvard Connection. He knows that it’s cool and he knows that it’s going to be big. So, it’s no wonder than he wants to protect it. In the depositions we see with the Winklevoss twins, Mark uses every opportunity to give them a giant ‘fuck you’. The entire ‘did I adequately answer your condescending question?’ monologue, just by itself, speaks loudly of his character. He doesn’t sublimate himself and he doesn’t take anyone’s bullshit. This lawyer is in a position of power over Mark, but he’s not intimidated, in fact, he uses that as even more fuel to prove himself. He’s making one very specific point with that monologue; I am better than you. You do not intimidate me. You will never underestimate me again. He showed no hostility towards the twins before, but now that they’re trying to take something from him, he’s a monster.
Mark disregards things that aren’t important to him specifically. When Eduardo is freaking out about the chicken story, Mark finds it humorous and tosses the paper aside even though his friend is in a panic. This is where we see him cheating on his art history test, showing no concern of getting in trouble. Because, lol, his professors will be none the wiser, right? If he can cheat the system, why can’t he? Because he’s /better than them/, he’s better than Harvard. The entire depositions with the Winklevoss twins are a joke to him.
thefacebook’s popularity only inflates Mark’s ego.
He admires Sean Parker for all these reasons. Sean’s entire character is a giant middle finger to everyone else. He’s confident, egotistic, and he doesn’t give a fuck about anything else. Yeah, he got sued, so what? He’s still made millions and he still showed up everyone in the music industry. He’s ruthless, and Mark likes that.
So (the)Facebook becomes his life. It’s his pride and joy, his baby, and god damn it, he’s working his ass off, why shouldn’t it be? His obsessiveness takes over and he works on it day-and-night. So when Eduardo doesn’t come out to California, Mark takes that personally. Eduardo doesn’t want to be where Facebook is, and that, to Mark, is a slap in the face. Eduardo thinks he’s too good to be here. And of course, Eduardo is Mark’s best friend. Mark cares about him even if he can’t show it, so if Eduardo doesn’t come out, Eduardo must not want to be with him. He’s deeply hurt by that, and the hallway scene, Mark’s lashing out at him is his way of expressing that.
AND THEN - AND then! And then Eduardo freezes the account. Jeopardizing all of Mark’s hard work. Eduardo’s threatening to ruin everything and he has to be stopped. I can completely understand Mark’s actions, but the way he carries them out, going behind Eduardo’s back, lying to him, is more evidence of his social ineptitude and complete lack of couth. In the final confrontation scene, the remorse he shows for kicking Eduardo out is very clear. He didn’t think he’d lose his best friend. He had to protect his company, what he worked for, and he took Eduardo’s actions as signs that he wouldn’t care. Once again, misinterpreting everything, his ego too big for his own good. The last scene where Mark stays until the office is closing and picks up one of his business cards clearly shows the remorse and regret on his face when he realizes he’s just lost his best friend and maybe even that it wasn’t worth it.
BUT THEN EDUARDO SUES HIM!! And Mark can’t say sorry. He still can’t admit that he was in the wrong. He takes the lawsuit as a personal attack and retaliates as if it is. Before the depositions, he’s an egotistic and socially-awkward college kid, but in the depositions, he’s much darker, much more introverted. And yet he still shows signs of regret, and Eduardo is still his friend. It’s mentioned that Mark defended Eduardo when the chicken issue was brought up, and there’s even a split second where Mark’s trying to get a lawyer’s attention during the matter, presumably to defend him. So he still cares. Eduardo was his best friend and that can’t just be forgotten.
tl;dr Mark doesn’t know how to communicate. He’s too smart for his own good. He thinks he’s better than everyone and if his ego is ever scraped he takes it as a personal attack. Mark used (the)Facebook as a way to inflate his own ego. Facebook is his pride and joy and he defended it the way any CEO would, but he didn’t think it would hurt Eduardo. He does’t stop to think about people’s feelings, not because he’s mean, but because they just don’t occur to him, or he honestly doesn’t see how people would be hurt by his actions.
tl;dr;tl;dr: Mark is socially inept and ego-tistic but he doesn’t try to hurt anyone.