Facebook 2006: I was there.
A few years ago when I was still working at Facebook, my co-worker Kim gave me this copy of Fortune magazine and said"turn to page 8!"
At first, I didn't notice... You see, Facebook stories were commonplace in all of the magazines by then, so I didn't know why she was so excited. And then after a double-take, I noticed my floating head in the background along with Ezra. But at least you can see his whole body, and you've probably already heard of him anyway.
It was a lifetime ago, but I remember that day. I had only been at the company for a few months, weeks maybe. The photographer asked Mark to do something fun, young and hip...evocative of his hot, new start-up. "Jump up in the air or something," he suggested. Not surprising to anyone who knew him, Mark's flat response was that he didn't do that. And so when asked what he might be willing to do for the photo shoot, Mark said that he liked to sit and specified, “mostly on the floor.” And so that's just what he did. He sat on the floor, wearing his signature Adidas shower sandals and black fleece jacket.
I remember that...because I was there. Oh and I am pretty sure that is his sister Randi's sparkly shoe in the forefront (just in case you were wondering.)
I was there for all of the big moments. Like the day Mark announced he turned down a billion dollar buyout and then posted the offer letter on the wall for everyone to see. And the day he cancelled work to throw a toga party in celebration of reaching 500 million users. Half a billion, he said because it sounded more epic.
I was there when News Feed launched and the threat of users storming our headquarters was so real that we hired security for the first time. I was there the morning a crosswalk magically appeared across Hamilton Avenue conveniently connecting the Facebook engineering building to the Facebook cafe. And I was there every time MC Hammer crashed one of our parties., which actually happened a lot back then.
The picture on page 8 of Fortune magazine is such a perfect metaphor for my time at Facebook that I wish I had come up with it myself. I was there the whole time. Just look for me in the background.