What Did CNBC Interviewer Ask Mark Zuckerberg in 2004 -Just 3 Months After Launch?

“When we first launched, we were hoping for maybe 400 or 500 people” – Mark Zuckerberg

CNBC caused quite a stir today on Twitter with it’s post that said, “11 years ago today, someone named Mark Zuckerberg appeared on CNBC to discuss a social network that had 100K users.”

Host, Dylan Ratigan, opens the interview by asking, “is this perhaps the next big thing?”

Well…

When asked about the “magnitude” of what he had launched, 19 Year old Zuckerberg said it was hard to tell, but after a very successful launch, he was optimistic about Facebook’s future.

The interview is quite telling about the state of mind of Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg, at that time, and the newness of “social networking” in general.

The interview was held just shy of three months after the site had launched. Thefacebook (as it was originally called) was still in its infancy but was already making an impact.

Zuckerberg describes Facebook in a nutshell for his interviewers:

• What the platform is – an online directory that connects people through universities and colleges
• Who they are targeting – college students and universities
• How it works – you sign on, create a profile about yourself by answering questions, entering some information, such as your concentration or major at school, contact information, phone numbers, instant messaging screen names, anything you want to tell, interests, what books you like, movies
• Most important aspect of your profile – who your friends are
• How to use Facebook – then you can browse around, see who people’s friends are and just check out people’s online identities, and see how people portray themselves and just find some interesting information about people

Watch the video below

 

Here are a few of our favorite quotes from the interview:

“What is Thefacebook exactly?” – CNBC Co-host

“From there, we’re gonna launch a bunch of site applications, which should keep people coming back to the site, and maybe we can make something cool.” – Mark Zuckerberg

“Now we’re at a 100,000 people, so who knows where we’re going next?” – Mark Zuckerberg

Well… it worked! As it stands today, Facebook has nearly 1.4 billion users, with 880 million people accessing the website on a daily basis.

Now it’s Your Turn

Where do you think Facebook is going in the next 11 years?

We want to hear from you. Let us know what you think by leaving a comment below.

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