Tech Billionaires: Mark Zuckerberg

Ambitious, tenacious,

the internet entrepreneur and tech innovator

with a gift for computer program.

The man who became the planet's youngest billionaire at 23

and who created one of the world's most popular

social network, Facebook.

Along with Amazon, Google, Apple, and Microsoft,

Facebook is one of the big five companies

in the US tech industry.

So what did it take to build such a revolutionary business?

Well, it took someone like Mark Zuckerberg,

the young genius who connected people in ways

never thought possible.

In 2021, his net worth is estimated at $96 billion.

The giant social network has had a vertiginous growth

since its creation.

Take a journey into how Mark Zuckerberg built the giant

that has changed billions of lives

and the way people interact with the world.

They are masterminds, ambitious, competitive, and ruthless

not afraid of failure,

dedicated to their mission of bettering the world,

always reaching for excellence.

They lead by example.

Unlike many industries, the tech billionaires are mostly

self-made.

It is true they're genius, that they revolutionize

the industry and together they change the world.

Join us in this series as we take a look at

some of the wealthiest entrepreneurs in the modern world,

the tech billionaires,

Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos.

Together they're worth a collective of more than

900 billion US dollars.

They will be remembered in history

as the most influential people of the 21st century.

Mark Elliott Zuckerberg was born on May 14th, 1984

in White Plains New York,

into a comfortable well-educated family.

He was the second of four children and the only son.

He grew up with his three sisters in the suburbs of New York

Dobbs Ferry.

His father, Edward Zuckerberg was a dentist

and his mother, Karen a psychiatrist.

Young Mark developed an interest in computers

at an early age.

He began programming in middle school

with the active support of his father.

And he was learning fast.

When Mark was about 12, he used the Atari BASIC program

his father had taught him to create his own

messaging program named ZuckNet.

His father used the program in his dentist's office,

so that the receptionist could inform him

of a new patient without yelling across the room.

The family also used ZuckNet to communicate within

the house.

Together with his friends, Zuckerberg also enjoyed

creating computers games just for fun as he said.

To keep up with their son's enthusiasm and growing interest

in computers, his parents even hired a private tutor,

David Newman, while he was still in high school.

Newman later told reporters that it was hard to stay

ahead of the prodigy.

Zuckerberg studied at the exclusive Phillips Exeter Academy

in New Hampshire.

There he showed talent and fencing,

becoming the captain of the school's team.

He excelled in classes and earned a diploma in Classics.

Yet he remained fascinated by computers

and continued to focus on his passion

of developing new programs.

While in high school, he created an early version

of the music software, Pandora, which he called Synapse.

It was clear that he had an entrepreneur's mindset

from an early age.

Even before he founded Facebook,

he was actually on Microsoft's radar.

The company and several others including AOL

approached the teenager for buying the software

and hiring them before graduation.

He declined the offers.

After graduating from Exeter in 2002,

Mark Zuckerberg enrolled at Harvard University

where he studied Psychology and Computer Science.

By this time he was already a programming prodigy,

by the sophomore year, he developed a reputation

as the go-to software developer on campus.

It was at that time that he built a program called

CourseMatch, which helps students choose their classes

based on the course selections of other users

and also help them form study groups.

But the young freshmen was a bit of a troublemaker.

In 2003 he invented a website,

by far the most talked about things that he created.

The site was called FaceMash,

and it allowed students to judge the attractiveness

of other students by comparing two pictures

and vote on one who was most attractive person.

The software then ranked the results.

Even though Zuckerberg created it just for fun,

it became wildly popular,

but people didn't like that their pictures were being used

without their permission.

And Zuckerberg actually violated university policy

by hacking into Harvard security network.

FaceMash was deemed offensive and inappropriate

and was shut down a few days later by the school.

Zuckerberg apologized for his actions,

saying he thought of it as a fun computer experiment.

He faced serious charges of violating individual privacy.

Harvard nearly expelled him, but then put him on probation.

This would be the first time he ever got into trouble,

but his journey was just starting.

The genius had seen his future

and had an undeniable potential.

People wanted to see what he would do next.

Based on the buzz of his previous projects,

three of his fellow students, Divya Narendra and twins

Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, reached out him

to work on an idea for a social networking site

they called Harvard Connection.

They wanted to create a dating site for the Harvard elite

by using information from the student networks.

Zuckerberg agreed to help them in the beginning.

But while working on coding for the program,

he got a fantastic idea for his own social network.

Soon, he decided to pursue his own adventure.

It all started in 2004 when the freshmen Harvard student

and his friends decided that they would start

a social project together.

Zuckerberg's fellow students and roommates included

Chris Hughes Andrew McCollum, Eduardo Saverin,

and Dustin Moskovitz.

It turned out to be the perfect combination of people

to found a company that would later become

the most popular social network in the world.

So on February 4th, 2004 out of his college dorm room

and surrounded by the elite, Zuckerberg co-founded

and launched a site that allowed students to connect online,

Thefacebook.

Those who signed up could create their own profiles,

share information about their lives, upload photos

and communicate with other users.

His goal, giving people the ability to share information

in a safe environment.

Well, I mean, I think our focus is just on building

the best, simplest and easiest product

for people to share information in all the ways

that they want.

So we started off just incredibly simple.

There are only a few different ways to share information.

And over the last few years we've added photos, videos,

notes, messages, just to all these different types

of things.

And each of these are just used massively.

So photos, for example, there are more than

a hundred million photos uploaded a month in the UK alone.

Our goal is really just to enable all of that.

And we think that if we provide the easiest

and the best simplest way for people to share

all of these kinds of information that they want

with exactly the people that they want,

then that's just a longterm, very valuable thing.

Giving people complete control over their privacy,

actually while creating a safe environment

it also makes it so that people can share more information.

So it's a really important part of what we do.

Facebook was a hit from day one.

Within two weeks, half of the student body had signed up.

We're not gonna share people's information

except with the people that they've asked for it

to be shared.

And everyone gets privacy settings.

It has always been one of the big differentiators

for Facebook.

A really different service for people is you can say,

"I want this photo album to go to these people,"

or "I want this note to go to these people."

And the privacy controls on Facebook are really unparalleled

by anything else

The group of friends ran the site

out of their dorm room until June, 2004.

Zuckerberg recall the early days with nostalgia years later

in his Harvard commencement speech.

I remember that night, I launched Facebook from

that little dorm in Kirkland house.

I went to Noax with my friend kayaks

and I remember telling him clearly that

I was excited to help connect the Harvard community,

but one day someone would connect the whole world.

The thing is, it never even occurred to me

that that someone might be us.

We were just college kids.

We didn't know anything about that.

But the social network has a complicated

early history.

Zuckerberg faced a challenge shortly

after Facebook launched.

His three former classmates and creators