Greg's Corner

What will it take to remove Facebook’s top brass?

In response to last week’s expose from the New York Times, Facebook has responded in typical fashion. In a blog post published by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Mr. Zuckerberg denies using the right-wing PR firm it hired to launch anti-Semitic attacks against Facebook’s critics. If that’s true then that means that Mr. Zuckerberg was unaware of the tactics the PR firm was using. That’s not much better than ordering them to do so as it shows that Mr. Zuckerberg has either lost control over what goes on inside his company or is simply unaware of how his company runs. Because of the many accusations against the embattled social network, many investors have called for Zuckerberg and COO Sheryl Sandberg to step down. However, you shouldn’t expect it any time soon.

Facebook may be a publicly traded company, but the way their stock options are set up it allows Zuckerberg to run Facebook like his own private republic. As Business Insider points out, there is a class system when it comes to Facebook stock. There is Class A stock which is held by everyday investors, then there is class B stock which Zuckerberg controls most of. The Class B stock gives these shareholders 10 times the votes as Class A shareholders meaning that Zuckerberg’s word is law. While Facebook is not the only tech company that divides stock like this, none of the other companies are facing such a myriad of world-influencing accusations like Facebook is.

So as of right now, the only way to get Mark Zuckerberg removed from the CEO chair would be some kind of Congressional action. While Congress might be on the warpath against Facebook, they don’t seem to have a clear and concise plan of dealing with them as the country has never experienced a company like Facebook before. It is possible they could try to break up Facebook treating it like a monopoly since Facebook also owns popular apps like Instagram and WhatsApp. However, it would be highly unlikely that would remove Mark Zuckerberg from power. Unless Facebook is somehow ordered to restructure its stock classes we’ll probably see the same face at the helm of Facebook for years to come.