Mark Zuckerberg to share how he’ll answer Facebook’s biggest questions

Brace yourselves. Mark Zuckerberg published a Facebook message today with news of his intention to post… more Facebook messages. 

Ok, the note is slightly more sincere and substantial than that. Zuckerberg said that as 2018 comes to a close, he will publish a series of Facebook notes that address how the CEO is approaching fixes to “the most important issues facing Facebook.”

“I’m spending a lot of time on these issues, and as the year winds down I’m going to write a series of notes outlining how I’m thinking about them and the steps we’re taking to address them,” Zuckerberg wrote.

Timed with the 2018 midterm elections, his first note will address “steps we’re taking to prevent election interference on Facebook.” Future topics will include privacy, encryption, business models, content governance, and enforcement.

Zuckerberg has used notes in the past for both messages about his personal challenges running Facebook and major announcements for the company. At this same time last year, he posted a message asking for forgiveness for the ways he and Facebook had let people down. He posted the message at the end of the Jewish holiday Yom Kippur, known as the day of atonement. This year, the Jewish High Holy Days begin Sunday night.

It’s certainly been a year of reckoning for Zuckerberg. With an appearance on Capitol Hill, a major privacy scandal, and plummeting public opinion and stock prices, Zuckerberg has a lot of tough questions to answer if he’s going to restore Facebook’s standing, and perhaps his own conscience.

Zuckerberg intends to release all of the notes in 2018, but acknowledges that the problems will extend far into the new year and beyond. He also mentions that he has consulted many experts, and weighed the sometimes conflicting challenges of issues like privacy vs. security very carefully.

“What I’ve learned so far is that when you build services that are used by billions of people across countries and cultures, you will see all of the good humanity is capable of, and people will try to abuse those services in every way possible,” Zuckerberg wrote. “It is our responsibility to amplify the good and mitigate the bad.”