- Social Capital LP founder + CEO and major Virgin Galactic shareholder Chamath Palihapitiya expressed his opinions on social media in an interview with Yahoo recently
Social Capital LP founder + CEO Chamath Palihapitiya recently made the headlines for Virgin Galactic going public recently. Social Capital owned about 49% of the space tourism company when it started publicly trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the SPCE symbol late last month. Social Capital had invested $800 million in Virgin Galactic.
“This is a business that has almost 70% operating margins, which means that it is as good of a business as a Google or an Apple or a Facebook,” said Palihapitiya in an interview with Yahoo Finance.
Palihapitiya previously ran the instant messaging division at AOL and left in 2007 to join Facebook. Then he left Facebook in 2011 to launch Social Capital.
A couple of years ago, Palihapitiya became outspoken for criticizing Facebook and other social media services. Palihapitiya cited the “short-term” and “dopamine-driven feedback loops” created from social media that is destroying “how society works.”
So Palihapitiya does not use social media anymore. “I have not used them myself for six or seven years, and I find myself to just be in a much better mental state as a result,” acknowledged Palihapitiya via Yahoo Finance.
Palihapitiya does not allow his children to use social media either.
“I just think that there is a pretty positive correlation with too much device use and social media at too young of an age, and frankly, a lack of really good mental health,” added Palihapitiya.
Palihapitiya explained that he wants his kids to grow up in the world “outside, playing, running, winning, losing, failing, all the typical things that a child needs to do to build a robust sense of self.” Then they can buy their own phones and choose social media sites when they are grown up.
Why is Palihapitiya looking into outer space now?
“The totality of that, to me, I find deeply inspiring, and the exploration of life outside of just the Earth in which we’ve lived, I think, is really important for humankind. So for me, it’s just an opportunity to be around great people and help usher that along in my own way,” commented Palihapitiya.
Next year, Virgin Galactic is going to take launch its commercial space tourism flight with company founder Sir Richard Branson as one of the passengers. The cost of a ticket is $250,000 and 600 people from 60 countries placed deposits totaling $80 million dollars.
