Andrej Sokolow/picture alliance via Getty Images
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg sported a new luxury timepiece while announcing the end of his company's fact-checking partnerships in the US on Tuesday.
Zuckerberg's watch, a Greubel Forsey "Hand Made 1," costs over $900,000 and is assembled entirely by hand. Greubel Forsey said on its website that it only makes two to three models of the "Hand Made 1" every year.
"Hey, everyone. I want to talk about something important today because it's time to get back to our roots around free expression on Facebook and Instagram," Zuckerberg said while wearing the "Hand Made 1" on his left wrist, per a video he posted on Facebook.
When asked about the video, Greubel Forsey CEO Michel Nydegger told Bloomberg that Zuckerberg's choice of timepiece showed a "true appreciation for the most traditional approach to fine watchmaking today."
According to Greubel Forsey's website, the "Hand Made 1" has 281 parts, most of which are made in-house by the watchmaker.
Meta and Greubel Forsey did not respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.
This isn't the first time Zuckerberg has publicly demonstrated his interest in luxury timepieces.
In September, Zuckerberg wore a rose gold De Bethune DB 25 Starry Varius during an interview with the business podcast, "Acquired." The watch costs about $90,000, per listings by watch retailers The 1916 Company and The Hour Glass.
Zuckerberg was also seen wearing the Patek Philippe Grand Complications In-Line Perpetual Calendar 5236P-001 when he posted a selfie of himself with his wife, Priscilla Chan. The watch costs $141,400, according to Patek Philippe's website.
Zuckerberg has expressed some interest in timepieces to other business leaders. At Anant Ambani's pre-wedding party in March, he showed his admiration for Ambani's Richard Mille watch.
"You know, I never really wanted to get a watch. But after seeing that, I was like, watches are cool," Zuckerberg told Ambani, per a video circulated on social media.
Joseph Rosenfeld, an image consultant based in New York, told BI in September that Zuckerberg's "love for premium watches and subtle luxury" suggests a shift in the Meta CEO's style and identity.
"He's stepping into a role where his appearance reflects his position as a tech innovator," Rosenfeld said.
Zuckerberg's penchant for expensive watches appears to be one facet of a wider image transformation.
For one, the Meta chief has ditched his gray t-shirts and hoodies, opting for shearling brown jackets and gold chains instead.
But watches aside, what Zuckerberg announced on Tuesday will have far-reaching ramifications on Meta's approach toward content moderation.
Meta said it is replacing its fact-checking partners with a crowdsourced moderation tool like the community notes used by X, formerly Twitter.
"We've seen this approach work on X – where they empower their community to decide when posts are potentially misleading and need more context, and people across a diverse range of perspectives decide what sort of context is helpful for other users to see," Meta's chief global affairs officer Joel Kaplan wrote in a blog post.
"We think this could be a better way of achieving our original intention of providing people with information about what they're seeing — and one that's less prone to bias," Kaplan added.
