OH, YEAH?… YEAH!
Zuckerberg fires back at Apple CEO’s barbs
Mark Zuckerberg has escalated a war of words with Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook, accusing the iPhone maker of “just serving rich people” with its pricey gadgets.
Facebook’s billionaire founder delivered the testy allegation after Apple’s boss last week blasted the social network for violating users’ “human right” to privacy by selling their personal data to third parties.
“You know, I find that argument, that if you’re not paying that somehow we can’t care about you, to be extremely glib. And not at all aligned with the truth,” the 33-yearold Zuckerberg said in a podcast interview with Vox.
“The reality here is that if you want to build a service that helps connect everyone in the world, then there are a lot of people who can’t afford to pay,” Zuckerberg added.
Last week, Cook made headlines when he said in an interview that Facebook’s recent Cambridge Analytica scandal — in which the social network was found to have leaked the private informa- tion of over 50 million users to the political consultancy with ties to the Trump campaign — has shown the social network needs government regulation.
Apple’s CEO said that the company views privacy as a “civil liberty” in addition to a human right.
“The truth is we could make a ton of money if we monetized our customer, if our customer was our product,” Cook said. “We’ve elected not to do that.”
On Monday, Zuckerberg shot back at Apple — ignoring the topic of Cook’s barbs and focusing instead on Apple’s notoriously pricey products. Facebook, Zuckerberg said, has a goal “to build a service which is not just serving rich people.”
In a tit-for-tat that appeared to focus on proving the other was more evil, Zuckerberg insisted that it would be crazy to suggest Facebook has anything other than its users’ best interests at heart.
“I think it’s important that we don’t all get Stockholm Syndrome and let the companies that work hard to charge you more convince you that they actually care more about you,” Zuckerberg said. “Because that sounds ridiculous to me.”
Cook isn’t the only Silicon Valley heavyweight to take a swipe at Zuckerberg of late. Facebook pages for Tesla and SpaceX disappeared two weeks ago after CEO Elon Musk got dared to delete them on Twitter.
Musk claimed he “didn’t realize” SpaceX even had a Facebook page, saying he had “literally never seen it even once.”
Facebook shares dipped 2.8 percent on Monday, closing at $155.39.