Mark Zuckerberg may not be the most popular figure in Silicon Valley, but he can relate to how bizarre it must feel to have a movie made about your life.
During an interview on the Colin and Samir podcast on YouTube, Zuckerberg shared his thoughts on the one and only time he watched The Social Network, the 2010 film that dramatized the founding of Facebook.
“It was weird, man,” Zuckerberg said. “They got all these very specific details of what I was wearing, or these specific things correct, but then the whole narrative arc around my motivations and all this stuff were like, completely wrong.”
Facebook Employees Watched the Movie with Zuckerberg
Despite his discomfort with the movie, Zuckerberg knew his employees would be curious about it, so he organized a company screening when it was released. The film, directed by David Fincher and written by Aaron Sorkin, portrays Zuckerberg as an ambitious but socially awkward Harvard student who built Facebook while dealing with lawsuits and betrayals.
One major aspect of the movie that Zuckerberg refuted was the claim that he was motivated by a desire to find a girlfriend.
“The whole arc is like, I’m somehow motivated by trying to find a girlfriend, [but] I was dating Priscilla before I started Facebook,” he clarified, referring to his now-wife
The Facemash Controversy and Zuckerberg’s Defense
Facemash was a controversial website that allowed Harvard students to vote on their classmates’ attractiveness. To create it, Zuckerberg scraped student ID photos from private university servers, which led to backlash from both students and school officials.
Though many believe Facemash was the precursor to Facebook, Zuckerberg strongly disagrees.
“It’s an unfortunate part of the internet, how people kind of make up a lot of the founding mythology to what they want,” he said.
Even after more than two decades, he feels that The Social Network has unfairly cemented the link between Facemash and Facebook in public perception.
Zuckerberg’s T-Shirt Nod to the Movie
Interestingly, the only reason The Social Network came up in conversation was because Zuckerberg was spotted wearing a T-shirt once worn by Jesse Eisenberg, the actor who portrayed him in the movie.
Zuckerberg revealed that he purchased the shirt at an auction, possibly as a humorous nod to the film. While he was once known for wearing plain grey T-shirts, he has become more intentional about his fashion choices in recent years.
Even if The Social Network got some facts wrong, the film remains one of the most iconic and it’s clear that Zuckerberg still has mixed feelings about it.
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