$META's culture is much better than you think
🏆 $META's culture is much better than you think
If you're an investor in the company, this should interest you. I'll try to explain it so everyone can understand.
⚙️ Case 1
Imagine you're Facebook.
You have millions of users and more than 10,000 engineers writing code… all in the same way.
But eventually, the technology you're using (PHP) just can't keep up anymore.
It's slow.
It starts breaking things.
Scaling becomes a pain.
Any software company that gets to this point usually makes one of two decisions:
1. We do what we can and accept that the experience will be pretty mediocre.
2. We rewrite everything from scratch in another, faster language. Years of work and maximum risk.
And Meta?
Nope.
Instead of migrating to C++ or Java, they did something way crazier:
they built a compiler that took the PHP their engineers were already writing and turned it into ultra-fast native code.
Without changing languages.
Without throwing out the old code.
Without forcing anyone to relearn everything.
Fucking hell.
The result?
🚀 Everything runs much faster
🔄 They don't have to redo years of work
👷♂️ Current and new engineers can keep using a language they already know
Software is built in layers. And almost everyone in this industry is afraid to touch the lower layers.
Because it's scary.
Because it's hard.
Because if you screw up, you break everything.
Not Meta.
They went all the way down and fixed the problem at its root.
More 👇
⚙️ Case 2
Meta invents React.
A framework for JavaScript.
Basically, a much more convenient way to write code for the web.
An abstraction layer that makes developers faster and more productive.
All great.
The problem?
When you abstract too much, people stop thinking about performance.
Small inefficiencies here and there…
and over time, the product gets slow. Heavy. Clunky.
Same old situation.
What does everyone else do?
“Well, I guess we'll have to rewrite parts of it.”
“We'll have to train developers better.”
“We'll have to impose more rules.”
And Meta?
Nope, not this time either.
Instead of forcing thousands of engineers to change the way they work or rewriting half the codebase, they created React Compiler.
A compiler that analyzes the code…
and *automatically adds the optimizations*.
Without the developer having to think about them.
Without touching the existing code.
Without the pain.
Same idea again:
We don't change the people.
We don't throw away the work that's already done.
We don't rebuild everything from scratch.
We get our hands dirty.
We touch the lower layer.
And make the system better *under the hood*.
This isn't about frameworks.
It's about mindset.
And as an investor, that mindset matters. A lot.
⚙️ Case 3
In the software world, there's a basic tool every programmer uses: Git
It tracks changes to code over time
and lets thousands of engineers work at once without getting in each other's way.
So far, so normal.
The problem?
The Facebook repository is so ridiculously huge
that a simple command used to take minutes to run.
Git wasn't designed to scale that much.
It never was.
What does almost every company do at that point?
Split the code into a thousand smaller repositories.
A lot of work.
A lot of new problems.
But “that's just how it is,” because Git is sacred.
And Meta?
Nope.
Instead of splitting up the code, they decided to rewrite the entire version control system.
They started with Mercurial, and Sapling came out of it.
A system designed to make everything *instant*,
even when the repository is monstrous.
Without splitting up the code.
Without accepting latency.
Without giving up.
Fuck Git.
Same pattern again:
The tool doesn't scale.
Everyone adapts to the tool.
Not Meta.
Change the tool.
Rewrite the foundation.
And make the system work at its actual scale.
This isn't just a technical anecdote.
It's a crystal-clear signal about the culture.
And when you see this pattern repeat again and again…
you start to understand why Meta is what it is.
Meta's culture is this:
Solve *the fundamental problem* without wrecking the development experience for its engineers.
Instead of taking detours. Instead of patching things. Instead of saying “well, that's just how it is.”
If something doesn't fit, they don't adapt to the problem. They build a software layer underneath so the problem simply disappears for everyone else.
Engineers keep working the same way.
The system improves radically.
And the complexity gets pushed down.
That's the pattern.
I got these examples from this video by Theo: youtube.com/watch?v=xrio-BsgkqU
I know most investors in Meta don't consume software engineering content. But that's exactly why I thought it was worth bringing this up.
