{"id":641621,"date":"2026-10-01T12:56:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-01T12:56:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/641621\/"},"modified":"2026-10-01T12:56:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-01T12:56:09","slug":"mark-zuckerbergs-few-coins-thrown-to-the-gaa-should-not-fool-us-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/641621\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Zuckerberg\u2019s few coins thrown to the GAA should not fool us \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you earn the average Irish industrial wage, then you\u2019re taking home roughly 10 cents a minute. Depending on the metric, Mark Zuckerberg<\/a> earns \u20ac26,000 in that timespan. So it took him just under six minutes to make the \u20ac150,000 he paid out to three Waterford GAA<\/a> clubs this week.<\/p>\n

If we take the cost of the average club lotto ticket to be \u20ac2, then we can safely say that it costs you a lot more in real terms to support the Lismore club lotto while having a pint in the Redhouse than the \u20ac150,000 he just horsed out to three local GAA clubs.<\/p>\n

It takes the average Irish person 20 minutes to earn that \u20ac2 club lotto ticket. So cheers for that this week, Mark, but if you want to support us to the tune of 20 minutes worth of work, like the average punter, you actually owe us a smidgen over half a million quid.<\/p>\n

And, let\u2019s face it, when you\u2019re in a pub minding your own business and some rapacious young lad with a fist of GAA club lotto tickets comes to your table, you know for a fact you\u2019re not getting away with buying only one. Three tickets for a fiver would be the usual tariff, so that\u2019ll be \u20ac1.3 million, Mark, please and thank you.<\/p>\n

Anyway, a short reminder for those of you who instinctively run a mile from any story containing the words Mark Zuckerberg, but are somehow contractually obliged to read this column every week. He and his wife Priscilla Chan have bought a castle in beautiful west Waterford<\/a>. And this week the couple donated \u20ac50,000 each<\/a> to Shamrocks GAA club, Tallow GAA club, and Lismore GAA club.<\/p>\n

\"MarkMark Zuckerberg and his wife bought Strancally Castle, Co Waterford, in August <\/p>\n

These are the three clubs geographically closest to their new home at Strancally Castle. But what of Clashmore\/Kinsalebeg, just a short stroll down the banks of the Blackwater? What of the always-fun-to-say Modeligo? Why are Kilgobinet being blackballed in this manner? And what about my good friends in An Sean Phobal CLG? What are we, chopped liver?<\/p>\n

I have had the pleasure of playing in both the Waterford West Board hurling and football championships. It is a unique and storied institution, made up of clubs bound together by mutual shared experience and common interest. <\/p>\n

Far be it from me to suggest that Lismore, Tallow and Shamrocks are now about to power ahead of their local rivals due to this bonanza, but in the interests of fairness … it\u2019s time to pay up, buddy. I\u2019ve scribbled down a not-exhaustive list and I\u2019ve got more than 20 clubs in West Waterford.<\/p>\n

And on a related topic, while you\u2019ve the chequebook out, you might have a look and see how that \u20ac2.5 billion fine from the Data Protection Commission<\/a> is coming along. The State has only got \u20ac17 million of that so far, as it\u2019s still under appeal, but we can stay in touch.<\/p>\n

And you can process that \u20ac50,000 for Ardmore and Ballysaggart, right after you\u2019ve dealt with the $16.68 billion settlement you agreed to last month. You know the one, where you agreed to overhaul Facebook<\/a> and Instagram<\/a> because people in states across the US brought Meta<\/a> to court to admit that those platforms were designed to addict children, and Meta admitted the company misled people about their safety and improperly collected minors\u2019 personal data.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe GAA is at the heart of communities across Ireland. As new members of the Waterford community, we\u2019re proud to support these local clubs and the important role they play,\u201d are some words that are attributed to Zuckerberg and his missus, which I suppose would meet the technical definition of a quote.<\/p>\n

\"MarkMark Zuckerberg at his home on Lake Tahoe, Calfornia, in August. Photograph: Victor Llorente\/The New York Times <\/p>\n

The three clubs came out and said their piece this week, and they are thankful. The sum of \u20ac50,000 is still a lot of money on the mean streets of Knockanore. They are delighted and didn\u2019t really abase themselves too grievously while they were thanking their new neighbours for their largesse (although talk of commemorative jerseys made me dry-heave a little). But let\u2019s not the rest of us get fooled here. This is not even back-of-the-sofa money to Zuckerberg.<\/p>\n

He has been a malign influence on the world. He has eroded democracies and poisoned the minds of young people around the globe. Like the rest of the tech barons milling around Donald Trump\u2019s White House, he presents an existential threat to the future of the planet and now he\u2019s trying to buy the West Waterford Junior B hurling cham … okay, maybe the last bit is going a bit too far.<\/p>\n

But we should not be fooled by a few coins thrown from his golden carriage. And we shouldn\u2019t be fooled when other people do it, either. His company was fined \u20ac2.5 billion by us, the Irish people, through the Data Protection Commission. That is our money, to be spent as we see fit. And it\u2019s not just fines. Taxation is how we fund our public services, not the selective largesse of billionaires.<\/p>\n

Anyway, the GAA is not something that can be bought. And volunteerism is at its heart, we\u2019re always told. So if he wants in, I have just the role for him. Zuckerberg\u2019s blink-free visage, the diminished social skills, an at-best ambivalent idea of fair play, the blank stare … this man has all the qualifications required to become your club\u2019s designated umpire. I look forward to seeing him behind a goal in west Waterford soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If you earn the average Irish industrial wage, then you\u2019re taking home roughly 10 cents a minute. Depending…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":641622,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[7026,72,23088,823,61,542,60,2597,1226,6513],"class_list":["post-641621","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-waterford-gaa","tag-business","tag-data-protection-commission","tag-facebook","tag-ie","tag-instagram","tag-ireland","tag-mark-zuckerberg","tag-meta","tag-waterford"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641621","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=641621"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641621\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/641622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=641621"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=641621"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=641621"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}