Summary
In California, Eduardo meets with lawyers who get him to sign documents confirming Eduardo’s 34% share in the newly incorporated company. Sean, Dustin, Thiel all own about 7%, while Mark owns 51%. In the future boardroom, lawyers ask Eduardo if he realized at the time that he was signing his own “death certificate.” He says no, and that it was insanely stupid not to have his own lawyers look over the documents. He says he thought they were his lawyers. He tells Mark he was his only friend.
Eduardo later returns to California and goes straight to the new offices of Facebook. He says he was called out for an ambush, not the million-member party. A lawyer is waiting with a document for Eduardo to sign. He looks at it and leaves the room, stomping over to Mark’s desk, where he breaks Mark’s laptop. He is enraged to learn Mark issued 24 million shares of stock in the company, thus diluting Eduardo’s stake in the company considerably.
The lawyers in the future discuss how no one else’s shares were diluted, while his were diluted to 0.3%. In the main narrative, Mark says Eduardo made a poor business decision. Eduardo says he set him up. Sean watches and says Eduardo is no longer a part of Facebook and that he has been removed from the masthead. Eduardo accuses Mark of being jealous that he got into the Phoenix Club. He tells Mark to lawyer up because he’s not coming back for thirty percent, he’s coming back for everything. Security comes to take Eduardo out of the building. Sean offers him a check for $19,000, but says he wrote it on the account Eduardo froze so he probably shouldn’t cash it. Eduardo raises his fist, making Sean flinch. Eduardo says he likes standing next to Sean because it makes him look so tough.
Eduardo leaves. Mark and Sean speak privately. Mark says he didn’t need to be so rough with Eduardo. They move on to speaking about Ashleigh, an intern Mark is interested in. She walks up and puts a package on Mark’s desk. The men watch her walk away. They refresh the user count and see there’s a million users now.
That night Sean is at a sorority house party. The cops break it up and find cocaine on Sean’s hands. They shine their light on the other people in the room with Sean, including Ashleigh. The cops ask for everyone’s age, and the four student-aged people say they are 21. Each of them is shaking, visibly terrified. Ashleigh then apologizes to the police for lying.
Sean calls Mark, who is at the office alone. Mark is not happy that Sean’s involvement in a cocaine bust with interns will make the news. Sean asks if Mark thinks Eduardo was behind it, and says someone must have sent the cocaine in. Mark tells Sean to go home. He then lifts his business card, which reads, “I’m CEO, Bitch.”
In the future, Marilyn Delphy privately asks Mark about what happened to Sean. Mark says he still owns seven percent of the company. Mark says he’s not a bad person. Mark learns from Marilyn that they are going to settle. She says he wouldn’t win a jury trial, so it’s easier to just pay them. She tells Mark he’s not an asshole—he’s just “trying so hard to be.” She leaves the room.
Left alone, Mark looks up Erica Albright’s Facebook page. He hovers over the Friend Request button, then clicks it. He leans back and looks at the computer screen, refreshing the page occasionally to see if she has responded yet. Text over the screen reads provides updates for the real-life people the film’s characters are based on. The Winklevoss twins received a $65 million–dollar settlement and signed a non-disclosure agreement, later rowing for the US Olympic Team. Eduardo Saverin received an unknown settlement and his name has been restored to the Facebook masthead as co-founder. Facebook has 500 million users in 207 countries and is valued at 25 billion dollars. Mark Zuckerberg is the youngest billionaire in the world. The film closes on a close-up of Mark’s face as he waits for Erica to respond to his friend request.
Analysis
Peter Thiel’s investment in Facebook has come with a request to move the company to Delaware, where taxes are lower. To achieve this, Mark starts a new Facebook that can buy the old Facebook. Eduardo goes to California believing that he is signing documents as a formality because of the company’s new incorporation. However, his lawyer uses the metaphor of Eduardo signing his own “death certificate” to emphasize the mistake he made in not having lawyers review the documents.
Having trusted Mark to have his best interests in mind, Eduardo does not realize that the documents he signs in 2004 will lead to his share in the company going from over thirty percent to a hundredth of that, only 0.3%. In the film’s climactic scene, Eduardo confronts Mark about the betrayal, smashing his laptop to get Mark’s attention. Although Mark and everyone else involved know they have used underhanded tactics to push Eduardo out of the company, Mark refuses to admit fault and blames Eduardo for making a poor decision.
The scene is significant because it shows how Mark is willing to sacrifice his closest friendship in his drive for total control over the company. To make the betrayal worse, Eduardo’s nemesis, Sean, stands by and treats Eduardo more harshly than Mark is willing to. Sean flexes his power over Eduardo by sarcastically offering a check for the amount Eduardo invested in the company—a move that provokes Eduardo to threaten Sean with a punch that exposes Sean’s true cowardice.
The disruptive scene in the Facebook offices is ironically contrasted with the news that Facebook has achieved the milestone of one million users. Sean celebrates the success by attending a party with underage Facebook interns to whom he gives cocaine. The scandal angers Mark, who knows it will damage the business’s reputation. In a deflated moment of epiphany, Mark realizes his mistake in not heeding Eduardo’s warning about Sean. But it is too late to undo what’s been done, and Mark looks at his crude business card and its cocky message with remorse.
Having alienated his best friend and forged an alliance with a person he can no longer trust, Mark is alone at the end of the film. Just as Erica Albright predicted at the beginning of the movie, he has become a “successful computer person” as the world’s youngest billionaire at the helm of the world’s most popular social networking website. But she was also correct in predicting that people would view him as an “asshole.” In a symbolic representation of his continued desire for social acceptance, Mark sends Erica a Facebook friend request and impatiently refreshes the page. Despite Mark’s success, Erica holds power over him because he still longs for her approval.
