Oprah Blesses Facebook Founder Zuckerberg's $100 Million School Gift
You have to be impressed with Mark Zuckerberg. Not just because the 26-year-old has packed a lifetime of achievement into a period when most late adolescents are still trying to find themselves. In seven years he's gone from being an awkward college freshman to a reported net worth of nearly $7 billion.
And suddenly it's Oprah time, with Zuckerberg making a splashy appearance on today's program.
What makes Zuckerberg so impressive is how he has taken the threat of a negative portrayal in the soon-to-be-released movie The Social Network and turned it into an opportunity establish himself as a creative and flexible philanthropist by donating $100 million to Newark's public schools.
Cynics will point out the obvious about the staged Oprah show announcement this morning involving Zuckerberg, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and Newark Mayor Corey Booker coming exactly a week before the movie's opening. But Oprah declared that Zuckerberg had intended to make his gift anonymously. She even ran a short film that showed Zuckerberg's anything-but-fabulous lifestyle as a way of highlighting his modesty.
The world will have to wait until October 1st to see just how bad Zuckerberg comes off in the movie. But it is hard to imagine anything worse that what's filtered out through the pre-release publicity. Facebook tried everything it could do to stop the movie from happening. Most billionaires would have hunkered down and waited for the bad press to pass.
It's not like Facebook doesn't have plenty to keep it busy over the next few months as the company deals with its customer's skepticism about Facebook's respect for their privacy. That's hardly the bulk of it. There's dealing with the much-expected planning for the company's IPO, hand-holding with the current investors and rolling out a variety of new products ranging from a Facebook phone to fending off competition from Twitter and Four-Square.
Yet with all of that going on, Zuckerberg had the presence of mind to craft this clever PR solution. Although America's two leading Billionaires, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, are engaged in a prolonged campaign to persuade the country's richest citizens to give a bulk of their wealth to charity, the gift to Newark's public schools is no simple check-book gesture.
Consider the complexities of Zuckerberg's vast and accelerating nominal net worth. Last year, Forbes estimated he was worth a mere $2 billion, this year he's marked by the magazine which released its 400 list yesterday at $6.9 billion. It's safe to say that Zuckerberg doesn't have any of those billions locked in a vault. Judging from his lifestyle in a rented house close to Facebook headquarters and no meaningful possessions, Zuckerberg has no reason to take cash out any of his Facebook stake.
That's good for him. The less cash he takes, the more control he retains over the kudzu-like company as it grows. The movie makes clear that control is an important asset to him. Even though the $100 million represents a tiny fraction of his ownership stake, Zuckerberg surely isn't writing a full $100 million check immediately.
Even for a billionaire, $100 million in cash is tough to come up with on short notice. But Zuckerberg's net worth is more nominal than most entrepreneurs. Facebook doesn't have publicly traded stock. Almost all of the money raised so far has gone into the operation budget of the company. The world may assume Zuckerberg is good for the money but if he wants to lay his hands on $100 million tomorrow, he's going to have to borrow it or sell a sliver of his precious control.
What this tells us is that Zuckerberg's gift is no last-minute gesture. The boy-mogul is showing that he's wise beyond his years. He chose Newark not because it had any personal connection but because he would associate himself with two surprising and capable politicians. The New York Times reported that the gift was the result of converstations Zuckerberg had with Corey Booker, Newark's own prodigy Mayor. Booker is a Democrat but he's worked with with New Jersey's insurgent Republican Governor. On Oprah, the story was crafted to be above partisan bickering. By investing in Newark, Zuckerberg avoids any political bias which greatly helps when you've got 500 million customers who surely come in all political flavors Of course, who could complain about a charitable gift to public schools either.
Does this mean we've got Zuckerberg all wrong? Instead of a steely, back-stabbing control-freak, we should see an Olympian genius who is above petty scrambling for power? Not at all.
Everything from the carefully manipulated New York Times leak yesterday to the association with Oprah who gave her benediction to the gift and Zuckerberg himself bespeaks a crafty, confident strategy. But each element still confirms the broader outlines of the character portrayed in the movie, even if it is a character that Aaron Sorkin, the movie's writer, says was created for story effect more than accuracy.
Judging by the pre-launch buzz, nothing's going to change the impression the world will have of Mark Zuckerberg for the next year or more. The movie looks like a hit and Zuckerberg will wear the mantle of the evil genius. Facebook's own public relations team has inadvertently provided one of the best lines about movie and the rising pop-culture story line about Zuckerberg : "Every creation myth needs a devil."
So he might as well run with that ball and remind himself that the devil of creation is a seducer. Eve gave into the serpent's charms and with the Oprah appearance, we're giving into Zuckerberg's.
In the world's creation myth we traded innocence for enlightenment. With Facebook we might be making the same bargain again.