"No More Apologies": Why Has Zuckerberg Changed Over 8 Years?
by Jeong Hyunjin
Published 11 Jan.2025 07:00(KST)
"Announcement of the Abolition of Fact-Checking on Facebook and Others"
The Man Who Apologized in 2016 When Trump Was First Elected
Changes His Attitude... Aligns with Trump's Stance
"We take misinformation seriously. We know that people want accurate information, and we take responsibility for that seriously. While we have made significant progress, we feel there is still much more to be done."
On November 28, 2016 (local time), Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook, posted a lengthy message on his account. This was at the time when Donald Trump, the Republican candidate, unexpectedly defeated Hillary Clinton, the Democratic candidate and former Secretary of State, in the U.S. presidential election. At that time, Facebook was criticized for being a social networking service (SNS) where fake news and conspiracy theories were rampant and influential. CEO Zuckerberg expressed a sense of responsibility for this situation and apologized.
This stance reversed completely after eight years. Although it was after former President Trump succeeded in entering the White House again, on the 7th of this month, CEO Zuckerberg announced that the company would no longer conduct third-party fact-checking to identify fake news and verify facts on its platform in the United States. He stated, "We want to return to our roots, reduce mistakes, simplify our policies, and focus on restoring freedom of expression on the platform," adding, "We will remove fact-checkers (those responsible for fact-checking or the function) in the U.S."
Regarding this, The New York Times (NYT) evaluated that CEO Zuckerberg has politically shifted from his previous 'mea culpa' stance (a Latin phrase meaning apology or reflection) to a position where he no longer apologizes.
CEO Zuckerberg has been regarded as a representative liberal figure. After dropping out of Harvard University in 2004 and founding Facebook, he emphasized freedom of expression. However, when Facebook became flooded with fake news and violent content such as hate speech, he began to respond. Since 2016, with the help of former COO Sheryl Sandberg and others, he judged that indiscriminate freedom of expression should not be allowed and took measures. During this process, his appearance testifying before the U.S. Congress with a flustered expression was broadcast live worldwide.
Why Did Zuckerberg Begin to Change?
NYT, citing sources, reported that after 2016, CEO Zuckerberg was constantly criticized and repeatedly told his close aides that he wanted to weaken content censorship, that is, to return to a way that better preserves freedom of expression. He also reportedly said that the various measures introduced so far were mistakes. Discomfort with continuous censorship by external fact-checkers such as scholars and researchers led to an internal reduction of the team responsible for content monitoring at Facebook, and the intensity of content monitoring was also limited.
CEO Zuckerberg’s change became more prominent during the four years of the first Trump administration and Trump’s election last November. It is interpreted that the characteristics of President-elect Trump and his supporters, who were often embroiled in controversies related to fake news rampant on SNS, influenced his SNS policies.
Eight years ago, CEO Zuckerberg took various measures to eliminate fake news, but he has officially revealed that negative perceptions of content censorship have gradually increased. In a 2019 speech at Georgetown University, he emphasized that he founded Facebook to give people a voice and said, "We must continue to fight for freedom of expression." During the January 6, 2021 U.S. Capitol riot, he told investors that he was considering measures to reduce political content on Facebook.
CEO Zuckerberg’s change in perception was further strengthened by management difficulties. In 2021, he undertook a major transformation by changing Facebook’s corporate name to Meta Platforms. He showed his intention to make the metaverse, a new technology, a future growth engine. However, the advertising business suffered a major blow, users left, and the company’s market capitalization fell out of the top 10, experiencing a stock price plunge and management difficulties.
When he apologized in 2016, CEO Zuckerberg wore a black suit and tie, but now he shows a changing image by posting informal photos on his SNS, such as participating in extreme sports. Additionally, ahead of the inauguration of the second Trump administration on the 20th, he is making efforts to improve relations with President-elect Trump. He donated $1 million (about 1.4 billion KRW) to the inauguration, promoted Joel Kaplan, a Republican close to the Trump administration, to Meta’s global policy chief, and appointed Dana White, CEO of UFC and considered a close aide to Trump, as a Meta board member.
Ultimately, in the announcement on the 7th, CEO Zuckerberg explained that fact-checkers who have been verifying the facts of content posted on the platform were "too politically biased and have damaged trust in us rather than creating it." This aligns with the Trump camp’s claim that SNS mainly wields excessive censorship against right-wing claims.
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