When I read on Mashable that a new movie about Facebook was coming to theaters soon, I couldn’t believe it!
How are they going to make a movie about Facebook? Everyone knows that Mark Zuckerberg invented Facebook in his Harvard dorm room. What else is there to know?
I was intrigued to see the movie. So, opening night, I was there with my date (well not exactly — I went with my son) and saw the movie.
At 8:30 pm, the commercials came on the big screen. They were followed by movie trailers. When I thought it was still a movie trailer, I saw two people on the screen — a college boy and girl talking. They started to talk and then they mumbled and then they sounded like robots. Finally, there was no sound.
“What the hell is going on?” a man screamed out. This was followed by commotion. Everyone was either yelling, clapping or storming out of the theater.
We just sat there and waited. As soon as the movie title appeared, the movie came back on with full sound. Many of the people watching got up, left and received a full refund. We didn’t. I figured that we really didn’t miss that much…
Even though The Social Network went to the past and to the present throughout the entire movie, it wasn’t hard to follow. It actually added to the excitement of the movie!
The movie is about Mark Zuckerberg and his friends who invented Facebook, which was originally called “The Facebook,” until Sean Parker told him to drop the “The.”
Twin Winkelvoss brothers approached Zuckerberg and asked him to help them program the Harvard Connection, to find “girls.” They went to him because Zuckerberg invented “Face Mash” one evening when he was drunk after having a fall out with his girlfriend. Face Mash asked students to compare and rate girls on campus. The site quickly became the most popular site on campus.
At first Zuckerberg told the Winkelvoss brothers he would help them. Several weeks later, he told them he wasn’t interested in the project and soon thereafter he launched Facebook.
Facebook was only offered at Harvard and then branched out to other ivy league college campuses. By the end of the movie, Facebook had more than 1 million people subscribe and it was available in several different countries around the world.
Following that, there were two law suits brought against Zuckerberg — the Winkelvoss brothers and Zuckerberg’s best friend and business partner, Eduardo Saverin. (Eduardo was eventually squeezed out of the business even after investing $19,000 to start it up.)
The Social Network did not portray Zuckerberg in a good light. He came across arrogant, self-absorbed and a loner. He was told by his lawyers to settle the cases because he would “not be liked by the jury.” And you know what, that’s the truth.
The movie was exciting and kept my attention. It was fun to learn more details about the back end of Facebook, even though most of it was probably sensationalized. Mark Zuckerberg is a genius.
One day soon, there may be bigger and better social networks that may replace it, but everyone will always remember Facebook as the first social networking site, even if it wasn’t.
Today, there are more than 400 million active users on Facebook and the numbers grow everyday through every community, no matter what’s your age.
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