- Mark Zuckerberg discusses some of the low points in the early history of Facebook.
- One of the hardest parts was when Yahoo offered to buy the company for a billion dollars.
- Zuckerberg and his co-founder decided to turn down the offer and continue pursuing their mission.
- Many employees left the company because they disagreed with the decision.
- Zuckerberg believes that the decision was the right one, as Facebook quickly launched successful products.
- He mentions that there have been even harder decisions since then, where the outcome is uncertain for many years.

This is an excerpt of Mark's How to Build the Future interview with Sam Altman - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lb4IcGF5iTQ

I want to talk for a second about low points because I think people never appreciate how bad they really are And I think it's always reassuring to hear that even Mark Zuckerberg went through some serious low points and came out Okay, so can you tell us about some of the hardest parts in the history of the early history of Facebook?

Yeah, I think 1 of the hardest parts for me was actually when Yahoo offered to buy the company for a lot of money.

Because up until that point, that was the turning point in the company, where before that we, every day we'd just come in and kind of do what we thought was the right next thing to do, right?

We'd open to more schools, we opened to high school, and opened beyond schools, and launched more photos, because that's what seemed like the next thing that we needed to do to help people express themselves and understand more what was going on around them.

But then, you know, Yahoo came in with this with this really meaningful offer, right?

And we had 10 million people using the product at the time.

So it wasn't as if it were obvious that we were going to succeed far beyond that.

And that was the first point where we really had to look at the future and say, wow, is what we're going to build going to actually be so much more meaningful for this?

And that caused a lot of interesting conversations in the company and with our investors.

And at the end of that, Dustin and I just decided, no, we think that we can actually go connect more than just the 10 million people who are in schools.

We can go beyond that and have this really be a successful thing.

But that was really stressful, because a lot of people really thought that we should sell the company.

And for a lot of folks who joined a startup, I feel like at that point I hadn't been very good about communicating that we were trying to go for this mission.

We just showed up every day and just kind of did what we thought was the right next thing to do.

So for a lot of the folks who joined early on, they weren't really aligned with me.

For them, they joined, and being able to sell a company for a billion dollars after a couple of years, that was like a home run.

But I think that the fact that I didn't communicate very well about what we were trying to do caused Caused this huge tension and the part that was painful wasn't wasn't turning down the offer.

It was the fact that after that, huge amounts of the company quit because they didn't believe in what we were doing.

If you look at the management team that we had-

The whole management team was gone within about a year after that.

Did you ever regret that decision in that period?

You know, we were, I was, I got really lucky because, you know, not only did, did what I believed in end up working out, but it ended up working out pretty quickly.

So it literally, you know, I think this was in the summer of 2006, and by I think the next month after that we launched News Feed, which now 10 years later, looking back at it as 1 of the most used products in the world.

And then we launched the ability for anyone to sign up, which immediately started growing the community.

So within a few months after turning down the offer, I think it was actually pretty clear that that was the right decision.

But I think Since then, there have been much harder decisions that we've had to make, where sometimes you have to bet on something and either bet the direction of the company or bet billions of dollars on something.

And it's not going to be clear whether you're right for 5 or 10 years.

And that, I think, actually can end up being much harder than this 1.


Speaker 0: I want to talk for a second about low points because I think people never appreciate how bad they really are And I think it's always reassuring to hear that even Mark Zuckerberg went through some serious low points and came out Okay, so can you tell us about some of the hardest parts in the history of the early history of Facebook?

Speaker 1: Yeah, I think 1 of the hardest parts for me was actually when Yahoo offered to buy the company for a lot of money. Because up until that point, that was the turning point in the company, where before that we, every day we'd just come in and kind of do what we thought was the right next thing to do, right? We'd open to more schools, we opened to high school, and opened beyond schools, and launched more photos, because that's what seemed like the next thing that we needed to do to help people express themselves and understand more what was going on around them. But then, you know, Yahoo came in with this with this really meaningful offer, right? I mean a billion dollars for...

And this was

Speaker 0: how far into the company?

Speaker 1: It was a couple of years in. And we had 10 million people using the product at the time. So it wasn't as if it were obvious that we were going to succeed far beyond that. And that was the first point where we really had to look at the future and say, wow, is what we're going to build going to actually be so much more meaningful for this? And that caused a lot of interesting conversations in the company and with our investors.

And at the end of that, Dustin and I just decided, no, we think that we can actually go connect more than just the 10 million people who are in schools. We can go beyond that and have this really be a successful thing. And we decided to go for it. But that was really stressful, because a lot of people really thought that we should sell the company. And for a lot of folks who joined a startup, I feel like at that point I hadn't been very good about communicating that we were trying to go for this mission.

We just showed up every day and just kind of did what we thought was the right next thing to do. So for a lot of the folks who joined early on, they weren't really aligned with me. For them, they joined, and being able to sell a company for a billion dollars after a couple of years, that was like a home run. And it is a home run. I think that that's, I get that.

But I think that the fact that I didn't communicate very well about what we were trying to do caused Caused this huge tension and the part that was painful wasn't wasn't turning down the offer. It was the fact that after that, huge amounts of the company quit because they didn't believe in what we were doing. If you look at the management team that we had-

Speaker 0: Did that whole management team leave?

Speaker 1: The whole management team was gone within about a year after that.

Speaker 0: Did you ever regret that decision in that period? Like were there times where you were

Speaker 1: like, well, we should have sold? You know, we were, I was, I got really lucky because, you know, not only did, did what I believed in end up working out, but it ended up working out pretty quickly. Right. So it literally, you know, I think this was in the summer of 2006, and by I think the next month after that we launched News Feed, which now 10 years later, looking back at it as 1 of the most used products in the world. And then we launched the ability for anyone to sign up, which immediately started growing the community.

So within a few months after turning down the offer, I think it was actually pretty clear that that was the right decision. But I think Since then, there have been much harder decisions that we've had to make, where sometimes you have to bet on something and either bet the direction of the company or bet billions of dollars on something. And it's not going to be clear whether you're right for 5 or 10 years. And that, I think, actually can end up being much harder than this 1.

Speaker 0: That's what I want to talk about next. But before we go there, have you

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Mark Zuckerberg On Yahoo's Billion Dollar Offer