Friend or Fiend?

“You don’t get to 500 million friends without making a few enemies.” This sentence is quite sticking on the poster of the movie The Social Media. Before watching the movie, I supposed this movie is just about the “thorny road” of the foundation of the Facebook. While actually, the storyline of this movie is two lawsuits. The main elements of the movie include friendship, loyalty, jealousy and betrayal, which are also the eternal topics for all kinds of works of art. Mark Zuckerberg has over 6 millions friends on the Facebook but ironically, his best friend sued him. We can see such black humor everywhere in this movie.

I found the biggest irony of this movie is that, Mark Zuckerberg, the one who founded the kingdom of the Facebook, is a socially inept computer nerd. But stepping into his inner world, I found in spite of his underdeveloped social skills, Mark Zuckerberg is the one who actually eager for social acceptance and social activity. He tried hard to be erudite and charming.

In such a place as Harvard University, some people are born with good looks and thus, attractive and charming; some are naturally more athletic than others, some are charismatic and have excellent social skills, and some come from a wealth and aristocratic family. Then there’s the rest, who are nothing special. They just look at those elite ones and say it’s ok, but they can’t even convince themselves. Mark Zuckerberg was once among those mediocre people. He is arrogant and self-congratulatory, but also he has inescapable need for acceptance. He wants to be outstanding, or at least gain other’s approval, that reflected in many places of the movie. For example, he explained to her the importance of belonging to one of Harvard University’s eight prestigious all-male social societies called “final clubs” to his girlfriend. Because he believed those members are exclusive. So when his best friend and the Facebook business partner, Eduardo Saverin became a prospective final club member, gaining the acceptance that Mark craved, he began to shut more and more doors: every effort Mark makes to gain acceptance winds up hurting someone.

Now, being the youngest billionaire in the world, Mark Zuckerberg has over 6 millions friends on the Facebook but ironically, his best friend sued him. Actually, all of us can relate to Mark Zuckerberg. We all want acceptance and equality from others. Everyone will choose different ways to achieve that acceptance. Mark Zuckerberg chosen the most extreme way, that made him lost his friends, but also help him build the Facebook.

Mark Zuckerberg is like a mirror for us to introspect. On the Facebook, we are easily to have hundreds and thousands of “friends”. But what does these “friends” mean to us? Does the meaning of “friends” remain the same in social media platform as in reality? When interpersonal communication becomes  unilateral self-display on those social media platforms, we are no longer lonely or more lonely?