Facebook’s co-founder and Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg will receive an honorary degree from the Harvard University as the 32-year-old is set to give a commencement address to the class of 2017 this May. Zuckerberg will be honored by his former university 13 years after he dropped out of it to go to Palo Alto and establish Facebook, the largest social media network on the planet that started as an experiment during Zuckerberg’s sophomore year. Harvard President Drew Faust said that the decision to have Zuckerberg speak at the 366th commencement address was an easy one to make as there aren’t a lot of people that can rival Zuckerberg’s drive to change the world using technology and even fewer individuals can compare their achievements to that of Facebook’s co-founder. In a statement given to the Harvard Gazette, Faust praised Zuckerberg’s philanthropy, as well as his desire to help advance science and education.
Zuckerberg’s commencement address to the Harvard class of 2017 will come exactly a decade after that given by Bill Gates, the first tech billionaire that dropped out of Harvard before returning to address the new graduates and receive an honorary degree from his former university. The Harvard University is well-aware of that fact and has even released a short YouTube video in which Zuckerberg is jokingly asking Gates for advice on what to say during his upcoming commencement address. The lighthearted video can be seen below, while the full schedule of Harvard’s 2017 Commencement Week is available at the source link beneath it.
In related but less pleasant news, the co-founder of Facebook was recently criticized for publishing a controversial manifesto that seemingly suggested Facebook should get involved into the democratic process of as many countries as possible. Critics claimed how Zuckerberg’s ideas suggest Facebook still lacks self-awareness, adding that people should oppose making Facebook a bigger part of their everyday lives than it already is. On the other hand, Zuckerberg’s proponents and some other parties said that Facebook’s co-founder can’t realistically be expected to advocate for people using less Facebook. The Menlo Park-based social media giant was also recently criticized for not doing enough to stop the dissemination of factually inaccurate information on its platform, though the company just debuted new anti-fake news measures earlier this week.