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Opinion
Leonid Bershidsky

Facebook Plans to Rewire Your Life. Be Afraid.

Mark Zuckerburg's manifesto offers a vision of social dystopia.
His plans involve you.

His plans involve you.

Photographer: David Paul Morris

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg's manifesto, penned clearly in response to accusations leveled at the social network in the wake of the bitter U.S. election campaign, is a scary, dystopian document. It shows that Facebook -- launched, in Zuckerberg's own words five years ago, to "extend people’s capacity to build and maintain relationships" -- is turning into something of an extraterritorial state run by a small, unelected government that relies extensively on privately held algorithms for social engineering.

In 2012, Zuckerberg addressed future Facebook investors in a letter attached to the company's initial public offering prospectus. Here's how he described the company's purpose: