SimplyAbuDhabi XXXVII

104 | SIMPLY INFLUENTIAL They’re not the archetypal bad guys anymore. They’re becoming the revolutionaries.” “ Mezrich says it is inarguable that Zuckerberg “genuinely set out to undermine them”. According to leaked instant messages that have come out since his book was published a decade ago, Zuckerberg was brazen about his plan to leave the twins in the dust. The brothers had asked Zuckerberg to code their social website, called Harvard Connection, later changed to ConnectU. He agreed, but never finished. Instead, he strung the twins along and then launched a rival site, thefacebook.com , which included some of the ideas they had for their social network, such as requiring Harvard University email addresses to verify identities and build a focused community. Zuckerberg allegedly said in another message at the time: “You can be unethical and still be legal — that’s the way I live my life.” The setup, then, is almost too cinematic to believe. Zuckerberg, the one-time boy wonder who Time magazine made its person of the year in 2010 for “connecting more than half a billion people and changing how we live our lives”, is today vilified as an irresponsible automaton who is corroding society. Indeed, Facebook’s co-founder Chris Hughes recently turned on his old friend, arguing that Zuckerberg was too powerful, and that Facebook should be broken up. The twins, meanwhile, may still look like they walked out of “high-school bully” central casting, but they are now “rising in this kind of revolutionary form of money” that they think will change the world for the better, Mezrich says. “They’re not the archetypal bad guys anymore. They’re becoming the revolutionaries.” What’s driving them? “You know, revenge may not be the right word,” Mezrich says. “But their lives are very intertwined with Zuckerberg and how they feel betrayed by him. And that betrayal, it sparks them every day.” When Zuckerberg offered them $65m to settle their lawsuit in 2008, they made a canny choice. Rather than taking it all in cash, they insisted that $45m of it be in Facebook stock. Their high-priced lawyers protested. One said incredulously: “Are you crazy, you want to invest in that?” They did. It turned out to be a masterstroke. That $45m eventually came to be worth $500m as Facebook’s value exploded. The twins, however, still smouldered at Zuckerberg’s backstabbing. They were determined to rewrite the narrative. Their plan: to become venture capitalists, to use Zuckerberg’s money to seed a new stage of upstarts – perhaps even a Facebook killer. The only problem, they soon found out, was that no one wanted them. SIMPLY INFLUENTIAL | 105