Facebook’s own mission statement is “to give people the power to share and to make the world more connected” (emphasis mine). And if you were there when Facebook was founded, as I was, before celebrities and politicians were accommodated by them, you would have felt very empowered indeed.
>"Founded in 2004, Facebook's mission is to give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together. People use Facebook to stay connected with friends and family, to discover what's going on in the world, and to share and express what matters to them."
- Facebook's mission is "Make the world more open and transparent."
That was not their original founding mission. It was
"Thefacebook is an online directory that connects people through social networks at colleges [Harvard only][2004]"
In 2006 that mission was changed to include other universities and colleges.
Which is a long way from their current stated mission.
In other words, mission statements evolve - and the founding mission is seldom the final mission for many companies.
Before we start thinking about the future, let’s stop for a minute and take a look at Facebook, what it is, and where it has been. It was founded in 2004, with the intention of creating a friendly environment for users to share, consume, and generate social connections and information. It was designed for users to represent their true identities (remember how incredibly anonymous the Internet used to be?), and has advanced to be a great platform for businesses of all kinds to promote their products, spread their brands, and make money from applications.
I wouldn’t say 20 years later. Facebook was the way of connecting with people you just met even after 10 years after its inception. I would even say, pretty much everyone I knew had a Facebook account in 2010, and it delivered on the claims it made. Whether we agree with their mission is a different topic, but it certainly had an impact on the real world.
I remember a time when all my friends were on Facebook. Being able to connect in a concrete way with people that lived far far away seemed magical. Facebook was that scrappy SV upstart that wanted to change the world and provided an ads free experience focused almost completely on people. It seems like a hazy memory, but I do remember liking it and imagining it as an agent of good in the general scheme of things. Very different from the toxic wasteland it is today.
Has anyone ever thought of Facebook as a pioneer in anything? They've made some smart purchases and stole a few ideas. I feel like their entire existence is based on right place, right time.
I don’t think is fair to characterize Facebook as something that originated from the founder’s urge to cover basic needs such as food or shelter- their own or anyone else’s for that matter. In fact startup mode pretty much demands you forget as much as possible about those basic needs by putting the startup at the center of everything you do.
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