The billionaire’s wife, Priscilla Chan, also reacted to the image, joking, “Anyone seen my husband???”
No, Mark Zuckerberg did not grow a beard — but he does see your thirsting!
The Meta founder and CEO, 39, was trending this week after an altered photo of him went viral for looking very different and, at least according to the internet, very good.
On April 18, Zuckerberg shared a Instagram video of himself announcing a “new version of Meta AI,” and — thanks to a carefully photoshopped screenshot from the clip — let’s just say people’s biggest takeaway was not about artificial intelligence.
After the Meta CEO posted the video, Mike Rundle, whose username on X (formerly Twitter) is @flyosity, added a beard and mustache to a screengrab of Zuckerberg smirking slightly and shared it on X.
Me: Bearded Zuck you have to stop. Your smoked meat's too tough. Your swag too different. Your open source LLM is too bad. they'll kill you
Bearded Zuck: pic.twitter.com/pdKwMUmpKS
— Mike Rundle (@flyosity) April 18, 2024
Rundle’s original post garnered more than 2 million views, and a side-by-side of Zuckerberg beardless with the altered pic — captioned “it’s crazy how much a beard can change a man’s life” — racked in more than 22 million views.
Thinking that the billionaire had actually gotten a makeover of sorts, people went on various social media platforms to comment on his new look.
After the snap made it to Instagram — where The Shade Room reposted it and asked, “Y’all think he needs to go ahead and grow that beard out?” — it even caught the attention of Zuckerberg himself.
“Okay who did this?” the Meta CEO commented.
When people learned that the photo was not, in fact, real they were disappointed, to say the least.
On Zuckerberg’s original video, he received comments like, “THE BEARD WAS FAKE??” and “Not me getting catfished.”
Others urged him to make the photo a reality. “Bro, grow your beard,” one user wrote, while another added, “You gotta get the beard for real.”
And Zuckerberg seemingly took the recommendations to heart. In a now-expired Instagram Stories post shared by several journalists as well as Rundle, the billionaire shared a photo of a razor alongside a thinking face emoji.
He also nodded to people favoring the fake, untrimmed look over his usual, clean-shaven face, soundtracking the post to Jack Harlow’s song, “They Don’t Love It.”
Addressing the change of heart, Rundle said, “Love that Zuck went from wondering who made the beard edit to contemplating not shaving anymore in just a few hours. It’s happening!”
Even Zuckerberg’s wife, Priscilla Chan, got in on the obsession, sharing the bearded photo on her own Instagram Stories and joking, “Anyone seen my husband???”
“And who is this guy?” she added.