Like many people interested in Facebook, I had watched the film The Social Network. The vision presented by David Fincher’s screenplay is a striking success. Certainly, the image of Mark Zuckerberg is not particularly flattering; we see him drawing inspiration from the Winklevoss twins. However, during that same period, the decisions Zuckerberg was making seemed very interesting to me, such as the Open Graph. It was far from the portrait drawn in that film.
This book offers a view closer to reality. First of all, it is written with the help of the main people involved, primarily Mark Zuckerberg. What I appreciated most is that Facebook was far from being a smooth and peaceful journey. For example, we learn that after launching among high school students, Facebook tried to expand into companies—and it was a complete failure. Even more surprising, while Facebook was growing on the first university campuses, Mark Zuckerberg was dedicating a significant part of his time to another file-sharing project.
In this book, the author shares the early years of the company: the first fundraising rounds, monetization efforts, and recruitment. It also describes the various changes the company made in order to truly become a company. The arrival of Sheryl Sandberg is also discussed, and she notably shares her perspective.
This book may now be several years old, but it remains interesting because it focuses on the early years of the company that today connects a large part of human interactions.