Book Review - "The Accidental Billionaires"

There is no denying that social networking, and in particular Facebook, have transformed the way that people interact in the 21st century. The phenomenon is so big that one of the most anticipated movies of the year comes out this weekend, The Social Network, based on the early years of Facebook. However, this movie was based on a best-selling book The Accidental Billionaires.

The book is written with Eduardo Savarin, who provided the startup money in the early Facebook years, as a consultant. He provides a first-hand glimpse at the mindset of the genius behind what was then known as "The" Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg. Zuckerberg and Savarin were both socially inept guys at Harvard who had the typical problems meeting girls that a lot of guys their age went through. They just decided to do something about it, and to take advantage of a growing market that had not been completely captured yet.

Zuckerberg goes about creating a place where all the co-eds at Harvard can look at one another's pictures. He accomplishes this site by hacking the various internal web sites that existed at various fraternities and sororities. He puts up the site and sends an email to a few friends to ask what they think of the idea, and then goes to class. When he comes back, he realizes that he's basically shut down the university's servers because the whole campus is checking it out within a matter of hours, as all his friends have sent along the link to others who did the same. It is then that Zuckerberg realizes the possibility of what he's created.

Although he is reprimanded by the university, he is allowed to stay in school. But with Sabourin's money, Zuckerberg begins to care less about his studies and starts devoting his efforts around-the-clock into The Facebook. Around Harvard, the website is a hit, except with twin rowing sensations Cameron and Tyler Winkleross, who think Zuckerberg stole the idea from them when he did some brief consulting work on a web site idea they had. They become the first of some enemies that Zuckerberg makes along the way, and the first lawsuit that Facebook would face, though their idea was merely another dating site and much of the lawsuit seemed to be bred in jealousy of not thinking of the idea themselves. As Zuckerberg was all too happy to point out, there are thousands of designs of chairs, but the designers of all those chairs don't go around suing one another.

Part of what makes Zuckerberg so compelling and yet so aggravating is his personality. Make no mistake, he created the site to meet girls as he didn't know how to do so in the conventional sense. Walking around in a hoodie and flip-flops as his usual uniform, he eschewed the usual Harvard preppy attire. Even those close to him could often not get a read on this thoughts or mindset, or his dry sense of humor. This attitude leads to the eventual breakup of the Zuckerberg-Savarin pairing.

As Facebook grows, Zuckerberg and some of his associates move to Silicon Valley to grow the business on hiatus from Harvard. Savarin stays behind in the Harvard area with trips to New York City to grow the business financially. Zuckerberg wants Savarin to come to California as he thinks all the necessary funding is available in that area, but Savarin wants to finish his senior year of university. On a weekend trip, Savarin signs some papers given to him by the lawyers, but soon realizes he has signed away much of his share of the company (note: even though his share was diluted down to a mere 5% or so of the company, Savarin is still worth about $1 billion based on his investment of about $30,000. I wish I could get screwed over so badly). Even so, Zuckerberg becomes a bit of an awkward douchebag as he makes more and more money, complete with business cards that just say "I'm CEO bitch!" I have a feeling the movie will play up those tendencies in the name of appealing to the younger audience.

Reading this review, you would think Savarin paints Zuckerberg in a bad light, but that is far from the case. Zuckerberg was simply obsessed with the Facebook project and for Savarin, it was something of a side project and an investment. Anyone who was not completely dedicated to Facebook became an afterthought. At one point, Savarin becomes so jealous that he is putting in all the money and freezes the company's bank accounts. In many ways, Savarin had become a liability that a rapidly growing company could not afford to keep around, and Zuckerberg (as well as his new advisor, Sean Parker of Napster fame, and also the guy who suggests they just call it Facebook) realized they had to let him go.

At a little over 200 pages, The Accidental Billionaires made for a quick, easy read. As I finished it, I realized it reminded me of Bringing Down The House, the story of card counters from MIT who make millions in Las Vegas by counting cards, and then I also realized that they are written by the same author, Ben Mezrich. While many are hailing The Social Network as a breakthrough movie, if it is anything like the movie interpretation of Bringing Down The House ("21"), I don't hold much hope for it. The fact that Kevin Spacey brought both books to the big screen doesn't help matters.

Grade for the book: B
Grade for the movie: TBD