The Turning Point for Facebook's Business

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Roger McNemey says Mark Zuckerberg's decision to start gathering vast amounts of data on users from all over the web was a turning point for Facebook. It could offer advertisers something they couldn't get anywhere else, he says. After his first meeting with Zuckerberg in 2006, McNemey began regularly advising the new founder. He invested in the company and says he helped Zuckerberg recruit Sheryl Sandberg, credited with driving the growth of the ad's business. But in recent years, McNemEY has started to speak out against Facebook's data gathering habits - and believes users can be manipulated by disinformation campaigns that undermine society.

Mark Zuckerberg used advertising to turn Facebook into the first global social media giant, boasting 3bn users around the world. But today there are questions about the business model that has powered it for the past 15 years, and what Zuckerberg’s new focus on building the Metaverse means for the platform that started it all. Elaine Moore speaks to veteran Silicon Valley investor Roger McNamee, one-time advisor to Zuckerberg; writer and researcher Tim Hwang, author of Subprime Attention Crisis; and Steven Levy, editor at large at Wired and author of Facebook: The Inside Story. Meta declined a request for an interview for this episode, but directed us to their Q1 2023 earnings.

Presented by Elaine Moore. Produced by Edwin Lane and Josh Gabert-Doyon, Executive producer is Manuela Saragosa. Sound design by Breen Turner and Samantha Giovinco. Original music by Metaphor Music. The FT’s head of audio is Cheryl Brumley. Special thanks to Hannah Murphy

Clips: Meta, US Senate.

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