The parent company of the social network Facebook will change its name, announced Thursday, October 28, its founder, Mark Zuckerberg, during a Facebook Connect event : the Facebook and Instagram platforms, WhatsApp and Messenger messengers now belong to Meta, but their names will remain the same, just like Portal, the connected screen. No changes are made to the structure of the group.
Zuckerberg also unveiled the new logo, – a blue icon reminiscent of an infinity symbol – and the Oculus virtual reality glasses, which is owned by the group.
The objective is to highlight the metaverse, a contraction of “meta” (“beyond”, in ancient Greek), to show that there is “Always more to build”, and “universe”. According to Mr. Zuckerberg, the metaverse represents the future of the Internet, after computers and mobile phones, to which the public will have access to interact, work or play through technologies (augmented reality glasses, virtual reality headsets, etc. etc.). It’s supposed to reach a billion people.
Still according to Mr. Zuckerberg, the project should create “Millions” jobs over the next decade, including 10,000 in Europe.
In the tournament
This announcement comes in the middle “Facebook Files” case, massive documentary revelations about how American society has ignored internal reports and warnings about the damage created by the social network around the world, especially on adolescents.
The company, already targeted by numerous investigations and prosecutions, is also facing a new investigation by the US government, based on internal documents the whistleblower Frances Haugen, former engineer of the group, handed over to the authority the country’s stock market, the SEC. On Tuesday, Facebook asked all its employees to keep all documents for several years to be able to respond to possible legal requests.
In his presentation, Mark Zuckerberg spoke very little about the concerns of his company, and only in an abstract or positive way. “The last few years have given me many lessons in humility”, he said.
“I have come to the conclusion that the lack of choice and high prices stifle innovation, prevent people from building new things and delay the whole digital economy”, he continued, in reference to his rivalry with its neighbor Apple and its ecosystem built around the iPhone.
Our selection of articles on the “Facebook Files”
All our articles devoted to the “Facebook Files” are available in the dedicated section.
- The algorithm out of control : “How Facebook’s algorithm escapes the control of its creators”
- The limits of moderation : outside the United States, the fiasco of moderation in Arabic and, more broadly, loopholes in moderation in dozens of languages, to which is added the blind spot of automatic recommendation tools.
- The difficult fight against disinformation: January 6, 2021, during the assault on the Capitol, but also during the Covid-19 pandemic, with anti-vaccination messages
- User self-censorship: people with moderate convictions, on the right and on the left, no longer dare to express themselves there
- Internal disarray: “At the heart of Facebook, depression and frustration in the teams responsible for making the site“ healthier ””
- The portrait : “Frances Haugen, a whistleblower with a very structured approach”