Inside Peter Thiel and Mark Zuckerberg’s Strange Relationship
- Peter Thiel and Mark Zuckerberg have known each other since 2004, when Thiel became Facebook’s first major investor.
- Zuckerberg saw Thiel as a mentor, but those inside the company say he became increasingly dependent on Thiel.
- A new biography reveals details around Thiel’s influence on Zuckerberg and their roles in the 2020 election.
Peter Thiel and Mark Zuckerberg have a lot in common.
Aggressively ambitious, socially awkward, and unapologetically controversial, the tech billionaires — two of the most powerful in Silicon Valley — have enjoyed a somewhat symbiotic relationship over the years.
Thiel was the first big investor in Facebook, and Zuckerberg, 15 years younger, considered him a mentor. Some believe Thiel acted as Zuckerberg’s “puppet master,” and Facebook employees noticed that Zuckerberg seemed to rely on Thiel in an unusual and sometimes concerning way.
We’ve compiled seven of the most interesting details about Thiel and Zuckerberg’s strange relationship from Max Chafkin’s new biography, “The Contrarian: Peter Thiel and Silicon Valley’s Pursuit of Power.”
1. Thiel and Zuckerberg were “kindred spirits” who connected over their shared social awkwardness and cutthroat approach to business.
Zuckerberg looked up to Thiel, naming him one of four members of Facebook’s original board of directors—and even said he modeled his famously ruthless equity negotiations with co-founder Eduardo Saverin after Thiel’s tactics at PayPal.
“Zuckerberg’s reticence and awkwardness impressed Thiel, who saw in the young man’s indifference a sign of intelligence,” wrote Chafkin.
2. Zuckerberg depended on Thiel to keep Facebook’s relationship with the right wing alive.
In 2016, Thiel helped orchestrate a meeting in Menlo Park between Zuckerberg and 16 well-known conservative figures, including Tucker Carlson, Glenn Beck, and Dana Perino, after claims erupted that Facebook was censoring right-wing opinions.
Even as Zuckerberg’s own political leanings diverged from his mentor’s, he still relied on Thiel as his “liaison to the American right” and Facebook’s “conservative conscience.”
Caroline Tompkins and Penguin Press
3. After The Social Network…
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