The "Ideal" Social Experience According to Mark Zuckerberg: Holograms, Glasses, and the Absence of Presence
The deep irony of “social” media mogul Mark Zuckerberg being someone who clearly doesn’t enjoy socializing very much is well-trodden territory, but it was pretty much all I could think about while watching a recent podcast appearance involving the tech executive. Zuckerberg showed up for a live interview on the “Acquired” podcast in San Francisco last week, the video of which was shared publicly on Tuesday. The conversation covered many topics, but one of the big ones was Zuckerberg’s thoughts on social interaction as a kind of Platonic ideal.
Zuck, who often gives off the impression that he’s only recently been introduced to the human race, managed to explain his views on social interaction with all the studied and abstract rhetoric of someone who monetizes it for a living—which is, of course, what he does. Still, it was somewhat shocking (and chortle-inducing) to hear the tech executive wax philosophical about what he called the “ideal social experience” — an apparent concept he’s thought quite a lot about, and that, according to him, involves “glasses.”
“I think what you’d like to have is not a phone that you look down at that kinda takes your attention away from the things and the people around you…but what you’d ideally have is glasses and through the glasses—there’s one part of it where, the glasses, you can, they can see what you see and they can hear what you hear and in doing so they can be sorta the perfect AI assistant for you because they have context on what you’re doing. But then part of it is also that the glasses can project images—basically, like, holograms—out into the world, and that way your social experiences with other people aren’t constrained to these little interactions you can have with a phone screen.”
Got it. So, according to Zuckerberg, the “ideal” social experience involves wearing hologram-producing goggles on your head while also interfacing with a never-off chatbot. In Zuck’s formulation, the “ideal” social experience would also seem to necessitate the perpetual usage of one of Meta’s products—the likes of which can mediate whatever social interaction you happen to be having. Notably absent from Mark’s description of the “ideal” social experience is any context in which other people are physically present with you. He also seems to forego any mention of things like intimacy, fun, laughter, or other aspects of social interaction that most normal people might typically consider “ideal.”
Of course, the fact that Zuck is looking at social interaction through this lens (literally) shouldn’t be too surprising. Lately, he’s been intrigued by the idea of building a new breed of AI-fueled glasses that can integrate with Meta’s ecosystem of apps and software. Zuck’s discussion of “the ideal social experience” was meant as an opportunity to promote this concept.
Zuckerberg’s comments on social experience bear just a little bit more scrutiny. At another point in the conversation, he said: "We’re very physical beings. People like to intellectualize everything but a lot of our experience is very physical, and this physical sense of presence that you’re with another person, doing things in the physical world, is something that you’re going to be able to do through holograms, through glasses." It’s true that being with other people physically and doing stuff in the physical world is very pleasurable, which makes it ironic that Zuckerberg’s hypothetical product would seem to actually take you away from the physical world, delivering you instead into a weird digital-physical hybrid world where you’re never quite fully present.
Zuck’s weird metaphysical musings aside, there was plenty of other humorous material in the hour-ish conversation with the Acquired folks. At one point, apropos of almost nothing, Zuckerberg said: “I don’t apologize anymore”; in a bout of unintentional humor, the moderator asked the Meta CEO if what he does is akin to chiseling the statue of David out of a block of marble; Zuck also pointed out that, like Kanye West, he had begun making his own clothing.
The highlight of the event by far, however, came towards the end of the discussion when Zuck shared an anecdote about swatting down his 7-year-old daughter’s dreams of becoming the next Taylor Swift. “One day, my daughter. We took her to a Taylor Swift concert and she was like, ‘You know Dad, I kind of want to be like Taylor Swift when I grow up,’” Zuckerberg said. “I was like, ‘But you can’t. That’s not available to you.’ And she thought about it and she’s like, ‘Alright when I grow up I want people to want to be like August Chan Zuckerberg.’”
I have no idea what type of father Zuck is, although telling your young child that she definitely can’t be the next global pop star is an undeniably funny thing to do. Perhaps if he were wearing some Meta glasses that conversation with his daughter could have been even better.
Zuckerberg’s vision of "ideal" social experience is a stark contrast to how most of us understand and value human connection. His focus on technology as a conduit for social interaction raises important questions about the direction technology is taking us. Are we truly moving towards a future where virtual and augmented reality are the dominant forms of social engagement? Will experiences like holograms and AI assistants become so immersive that they eclipse the value of real-life experiences?
Zuck’s comments, while seemingly promoting a futuristic, engaging social world, actually reveal a deeply flawed understanding of human social interaction. He seems to miss the core elements of what makes social experiences meaningful – spontaneity, shared experiences, physical presence, empathy, and the messiness of human connection. His vision of "ideal" social experience feels sterile and sanitized, devoid of the emotional richness and nuance that make human connection truly profound.
Perhaps the most concerning aspect of Zuckerberg’s vision is the implicit desire for control. The "ideal" social experience according to Zuckerberg is one that is mediated by Meta’s ecosystem and controlled by AI algorithms. This raises concerns about privacy and data collection, potential for manipulation, and the potential for algorithmic bias.
As we delve deeper into the world of virtual and augmented realities, we need to be mindful of the values we want to uphold. We need to question the narrative of "ideal" experiences, recognizing that real-life interactions hold a unique and irreplaceable value. We must remain vigilant in ensuring that technologies like those Zuckerberg envisions enhance and augment human connections, not replace them. We must ask ourselves: What kind of "social" world do we want to build, and how can we ensure technology serves us, not the other way around?
