Everything You Need to Know About Facebook’s Name Change.
I’ll also briefly explain what the heck the Metaverse is… if that helps.
Our good ol’ FAANG stocks have suddenly turned into MANGA stocks, and if you have no idea what that means, then this article is probably for you.
Recently “Facebook” as a company has changed its name to “Meta” to encapsulate the vision that Mark Zuckerberg claims to have for being a leading company in metaverse technology.
There has been a notable amount of confusion following this announcement of the name change, and this article is simply here to address the basics of what is happening with Facebook and Mr. Zuckerberg right now.
Here’s what we’ll address:
1.) What is actually changing about Facebook as a company, and how it will affect you in day-to-day life.
2.) A handful of reasons Facebook would be making this name change.
3.) What the metaverse actually is.
First off, the name change is for the COMPANY… not the APP.
It is known that Mark Zuckerberg started a social network in his dorm room at college back in the early 2000s.
Starting as a way for students on campus to connect with each other, the platform eventually became worldwide and became what we know as Facebook.
Facebook being the name of both the network and the whole company.
Now over time, Facebook as a company has added other apps and products to its arsenal.
Today, Facebook (or Meta, now) owns Instagram, WhatsApp, and Oculus… to name the main ones.
Since they own more than just the platform that is Facebook, it’s safe to say that it was time to give the company its own name.
This simply means that Facebook is now an app owned by Meta.
So… Why?
Surely there are a handful of reasons for Mark to suddenly want to change the name of his zillion-dollar company.
Here are the main ones… which are mostly just coming from theory.
1.) Facebook wants to attract newer (younger) users.
According to Zuckerberg, the metaverse is coming and he wants his company to be at the forefront of all things meta.
Facebook, as an app, has become known sort of as the “old people’s social media” and competition (cough cough… Tik Tok) has gotten fierce in the online/social world.
Part of the change could easily be to reframe the country as an innovator or pioneer in fresh, new technology. Technology that young and fresh customers will be interested in.
2.) Relieving the tension the network has built up over time.
Facebook has built quite a reputation over the years of basically destroying people and their lives (along with social media as a whole.)
Maybe the name change could act as a friendly reminder that there is more to Facebook than, well… Facebook.
Will this really work for them? Probably not.
3.) PR
While it’s probably nowhere near THE reason for a company to change their name, it’s fair to note that this name change has put Facebook into A LOT of headlines at once.
Sometimes it feels like companies shake things up just to shake things up. They want the general public to focus in a specific area or a specific detail… and a name change of a massive company with a relatively bad reputation can stir up a lot of articles.
What is the Metaverse?
Lastly, let’s address what the metaverse is.
The metaverse refers to a fully immersive reality that takes place online and is completely computer-generated.
Maybe you’ve seen some talk about having “virtual offices” in the future, or attending sporting events virtually.
In other words, you would wear a VR headset, be in your living room, but be able to attend a Lakers game almost as if it were real life.
The “virtual offices” also give a sense of how the metaverse would have a social element.
You wake up in the morning and put your headset on, Steve from accounting wakes up and puts his headset on, and then you both log on to work and can talk to each other from each end of a virtual table in a virtual office.
