Mark Zuckerberg is using 2018 as even further incentive to fix the hot mess that is Facebook.
On Thursday Zuck announced — via Facebook of course — his annual "personal challenge." It's a tradition he started in 2009 in which he kicks off each new year by committing to learning something new.
Over the years, he says, he's visited every state in the U.S., run 365 miles, built an AI for his own house, read 25 books, and even learned Mandarin. But in 2018 the Facebook CEO will work toward fixing important issues on the social media platform.
Good.
"The world feels anxious and divided, and Facebook has a lot of work to do — whether it's protecting our community from abuse and hate, defending against interference by nation states, or making sure that time spent on Facebook is time well spent," Zuckerberg wrote.
"My personal challenge for 2018 is to focus on fixing these important issues."
Though the Facebook CEO said he won't be able to stop all mistakes or abuse from happening, he acknowledged that "we currently make too many errors enforcing our policies and preventing misuse of our tools."
"This may not seem like a personal challenge on its face, but I think I'll learn more by focusing intensely on these issues than I would by doing something completely separate," Zuckerberg went on, explaining that issues rooted in social media have the potential to impact all areas of life, from history and technology to media and the government.
"A lot of us got into technology because we believe it can be a decentralizing force that puts more power in people's hands," he wrote. "But today, many people have lost faith in that promise."
In 2017 Zuckerberg and his platform came under fire for many issues, including Facebook's role in the spread of fake news and promotion of thousands of Russia-linked ads amidst the election. Since then the company has taken several initiatives to improve the site, but Zuckerberg says he hopes to work with experts in 2018 to keep making things better: "This will be a serious year of self-improvement and I'm looking forward to learning from working to fix our issues together."
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