Political scrutiny isn’t stopping Mark Zuckerberg from building the metaverse.
Facebook’s plan to change its company name, as first reported by The Verge, comes at a peculiar time. The nearly $1 trillion company that owns Instagram and WhatsApp is facing its biggest scandal in years over damning internal documents leaked by a whistleblower, as well as mounting antitrust scrutiny from lawmakers and regulators. So what’s really going on? Is the name change meant to be a distraction from its bigger problems? A sign of more company changes to come? And when did Facebook first come up with this idea? There’s still a lot we don’t know, including what exactly Facebook’s new corporate name will be. The Verge indicated it will connect to the company’s focus on the “metaverse,” a developing digital platform enhanced by augmented and virtual reality where people interact through digital avatars. “We don’t comment on rumor or speculation.” said Facebook spokesperson Joe Osborne in response to Recode’s questions about the company. But one thing this rebrand makes clear is that despite the massive challenges Facebook is facing, it isn’t slowing down or staying in a defensive crouch. It still has its sights set on expanding its domination and world-building, which is what it’s trying to achieve with its metaverse plans. Rather than announcing serious reforms in response to the whistleblower’s revelations, CEO Mark Zuckerberg has made no apologies. Instead, he and his company have dismissed the whistleblower’s complaints and evidence, and are plowing ahead with a longstanding plan to turn the science-fiction concept of a metaverse into a business reality. For Facebook, this isn’t a new idea. Zuckerberg sees the metaverse as the next phase of major technological innovation akin to the invention of the internet or mobile phones.
