Facebook changes its name to ‘Meta’
According to a source with direct knowledge of the matter, Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg is expected to announce the name at the company’s Connect conference on October 28, reports The Verge. As per the report, the rebranding would likely position the Facebook app as one of the many products under a parent company overseeing groups like Instagram, WhatsApp, Oculus, and more.
Facebook first announced its plans to build out the metaverse — a term used to describe virtual, interactive spaces in the digital world — last month.
Facebook earlier this month announced to hire 10,000 people to help the social network build the metaverse — a new phase of interconnected virtual experiences using technologies like virtual and augmented reality (VR/AR).
According to the company, the next computing platform has the potential to help unlock access to new creative, social and economic opportunities.
“We are announcing a plan to create 10,000 new high-skilled jobs within the European Union (EU) over the next five years,” said Nick Cl egg, VP Global Affair at Facebook.
“Beyond emerging tech talent, the EU also has an important role to play in shaping the new rules of the Internet,” he said. Facebook in September announced that it will invest $50 million to partner with the organization to responsibly build the metaverse.
The “metaverse” is a set of virtual spaces where one can create and explore with other people who aren’t in the same physical space.
Zuckerberg in 2004 said that the key to Facebook’s future lies with the metaverse concept — the idea that users will live, work and exercise inside a virtual universe. Skeptics point out that it also appears to be an attempt to change the subject from the Facebook Papers, a leaked document trove that has revealed the ways Facebook ignored internal reports and warnings of the harms its social network created or magnified across the world.
Zuckerberg says he expects the metaverse to reach a billion people within the next decade. The metaverse, he says, will be a place people will be able to interact, work and create products and content in what he hopes will be a new ecosystem that creates “millions” of jobs for creators. The announcement comes amid an existential crisis for Facebook. It faces legislative and regulatory scrutiny in many parts of the world following revelations in the Facebook Papers. In explaining the rebranding, Zuckerberg said the name “Facebook” just doesn’t encompass “everything we do” anymore. In addition to its primary social network, that now includes Instagram, Messenger, its Quest VR headset, its Horizon VR platform and more.
“Today we are seen as a social media company,” Zuckerberg said. “But in our DNA, we are a company that builds technology to connect people. Metaverse, he said, is the new way. Zuckerberg, who is a fan of classics, explained that the word “meta” comes from the Greek word “beyond”. Facebook, WhatsApp, apps retain name, as parent finds a new one, Meta somewhat predictably, Zuckerberg downplayed that this rebranding, the first in Facebook’s 17 years of existence, is to divert a barrage of bad PR.
“We are a company that builds technology to connect,” Zuckerberg said. “Together, we can finally put people at the center of our technology to reflect who we are and what we hope to build.”
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