New Dad Mark Zuckerberg Will Give 99% of His Facebook Shares to Charitable Causes
On the so-called national day of giving (#GivingTuesday), which falls after the capitalistic rush of Black Friday and Cyber Monday, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Dr. Priscilla Chan, pledged to donate 99% of their Facebook stock—currently worth 45 billion big ones—to charitable purposes. On Tuesday, the couple posted a message titled “A letter to our daughter” onto Facebook (where else?), one week after the birth of their first child, a daughter named Max. “Like all parents, we want you to grow up in a world better than ours today,” they wrote. They continued:
As you begin the next generation of the Chan Zuckerberg family, we also begin the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative to join people across the world to advance human potential and promote equality for all children in the next generation. Our initial areas of focus will be personalized learning, curing disease, connecting people and building strong communities.