At this point, it's pretty clear what donald trump wants to Mark Zuckerberg. But what does Zuckerberg, who has been to Mar-a-Lago twice since the November election, want from the president-elect?
That's the question I've been asking sources in and around Meta for the past few days. All described Meta's relationship with the outgoing Biden administration as incredibly hostile. It's safe to assume that Zuckerberg wants a MAGA regime reboot, especially since Trump not long ago threatened to imprison him for life.
In Trump's America, removing tampons from men's bathrooms on Meta campuses, a real thing that <a target="_blank" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/10/technology/meta-mark-zuckerberg-trump.html”>just happened – is as much a business decision as it is a political one. Destroying “woke” ideology is a key pillar of Trump’s stated mandate. Others who know they need to play, like amazon, are also starting to line up. Still, Zuckerberg is transforming Meta for this new political reality at an unusual speed for a company of its size and influence. Founder mode.
in your conversation with Joe Rogan and your video on instagramZuckerberg shares a long list of issues Trump could help him with: fighting other countries that are stepping up surveillance of their platforms, stopping Apple from dictating how it builds mobile apps and smart glasses (the latter of which are increasingly important to the future of Goal). and, perhaps most importantly, prevent domestic ai regulation from slowing down its efforts to crush OpenAI. Elon Musk has bought Trump's ear. But the more time Zuckerberg spends at Mar-a-Lago, the more Sam Altman and Tim Cook I should be worried.
Then there is the US government's case to dismantle Meta, which will go to trial in a few months. After the confusion of the last four years, it's easy to forget that this lawsuit was filed at the end of Trump's first term by a Republican FTC chairman, not Lina Khan…
Most of the headline reactions last week focused on Zuckerberg's decision to end Meta's third-party fact-checking program. He was a convenient scapegoat for executives at the company that, frankly, never lived up to the goal of bringing more neutrality to facebook and instagram. The Community Notes alternative that Meta is copying from x was not on the product roadmap before this week, so it will probably be a while before everyone sees it in the wild.
The announcement that American moderators would be moved from California to Texas is perhaps the most cynical of all; Talk to anyone who knows and they'll tell you that the vast majority of moderators are already based in Austin.
The hate speech now allowed on Meta's is shocking and will deserve further scrutiny in the coming weeks. The decision to start recommending political content again is a 180-degree turn for Zuckerberg. But experts believe the most impactful change for users of Meta apps will be the softening of its systems that remove content for potential policy violations.
Outside all the announcements that Meta made Last week, this is the one I think is least connected to Trump. Meta executives have been pointing out for a while that they know they are mistakenly removing too much content that doesn't actually break the rules; I have been told that it is one of, if not hebiggest complaint in user surveys. If done right, fixing moderation errors may be the one thing Zuckerberg announced that makes everyone happy.
Elsewhere
- CES is now to negotiate: Every year, the official CES show—the expansive showroom and flashy keynotes—feels more like a publicity exercise and no longer a place to launch real products. Most of the energy has shifted to private meeting rooms and happy hours at Wynn, Aria and Cosmopolitan, where tech executives chat with CMOs and close deals with partners all week. At this shadow CES, everyone seems to agree that the show is more alive than ever. Booths on the show floor have become marketing tools to show customers before taking them out for a steak dinner. The challenge for CES organizers will be figuring out how to marry the growing influence of this part of the show with their current business model of charging people to walk around booths filled with smart toasters and concept cars.
- TikTok may be banned: Imagine an alternate world where the Chinese government is about to ban instagram from operating in the country and Mark Zuckerberg It is hidden. That is the situation with ByteDance and its founder Zhang Yi Mingwho resigned as CEO after the latest US ban attempt, but <a target="_blank" href="https://www.wsj.com/tech/tiktok-founder-zhang-yiming-has-a-formula-for-everything-can-it-crack-the-supreme-court-c40cb55d”>still controls the company. He allowed TikTok to be banned in India and apparently has no interest in the app surviving this time, so why wouldn't he let the same thing happen again?
- Google and OpenAI preview what follows: Google's DeepMind unit is starting “an ambitious project to build generative models that simulate the physical world,” which it believes “is on the critical path to artificial general intelligence.” Meanwhile, OpenAI is returning to its initial roots. starting a “general purpose robotics” team that will build hardware and drive “towards AGI-level intelligence in dynamic real-world environments.” We may have hit a scaling wall in text data, but big labs clearly see an opportunity in 3D. (See also what Nvidia <a target="_blank" href="https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/nvidia-launches-cosmos-world-foundation-model-platform-to-accelerate-physical-ai-development”>announced last week.)
- Other headlines you may have missed: Tencent (a major investor in Epic Games, Snap, and American tech companies) was blacklist the Pentagon for allegedly being under the influence of the Chinese army. Tim Cook total compensation increased 18 percent last year to $74.6 million. Elon Musk is organize a housewarming party for Trump in DC with Uber and The free press. Sam Altman His sister filed a sexual abuse lawsuit against him.
job board
Some recent and noteworthy job changes in the world of technology:
- A lot of changes in Meta: UFC CEO Dana Blancoformer CEO John Elkann, and Charlie Songhurst united the board. Joel Kaplan is executing policy and communications now. After a while at Google, they told me Michael Levinson returns as VP of Product for Integrity org. (Good luck!) Civil rights chief, Roy Austinhe leaves And the former head of the DEI Maxine Williams He is now head of “accessibility and participation”.
- Elon Musk unknown <a target="_blank" href="https://x.com/lindayaX/status/1877141384970514585″>named a couple of new leaders: Romina Khananisho He is the new head of government affairs and John ninety He is head of “advertising innovation”.
- Calista Redmonorth united Nvidia as vice president of “global ai initiatives,” where she will “drive adoption of the NVIDIA platform for national and regional ai initiatives.”
- Sofia DominguezSnap's AR platform director is leaving.
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