Speaker 1: Facebook is now meta and it's building the metaverse. Let me explain. I am proud
Speaker 2: To announce that starting today, our company is now meta
Speaker 1: Oh, Facebook, Facebook, Facebook, Facebook today at the company's annual connect conference, CEO, mark Zuckerberg announced a name chain to meta and laid out its vision for the metaverse. I thought it might be helpful to answer a few questions you might have, like, why, [00:00:30] why now? Why this name, what does it actually mean for me? The user? Well, the hell's a metaverse really this obviously isn't going to be a comprehensive out of Facebook's laundry list of let's kindly call them challenges. Uh, if it was this video would be as long as the Lord of the ring's extended version on Blueray, but I can walk through some of their major scandals in recent times and give you an overview of where they are right now. [00:01:00] I'll drop some links down in the, just if you wanna read up on some of the key stories I talk about in this video, first things first Facebook is more than just a single website, you know this, but did you know it has acquired over 90 companies since its inception.
Speaker 1: You have the big names like Instagram, WhatsApp, and Oculus, but you've also got some other brands Giffy in the mix, as well as a bunch of other smaller companies that Facebook has purchased. Now, in addition to growing more and more omnipresent [00:01:30] in internet users' lives through acquisitions, Facebook has been dealing with more scandals than ever before. In 2018, the FTC said Facebook violated a previous order from 2012 in regards to user prior and hit it with a record breaking 5 billion fine. Also notable in 2018, a little scandal called Cambridge Analytica, which was a major breach of ethics involving improperly obtained data from over 87 million users that helps sway the 2016 [00:02:00] us elections. Then you have the, of antitrust lawsuits. Facebook has thus far successfully swatted away, but continues to deal with. And then more recently you have whistleblower Francis Hagan and the Facebook papers, both of which generally deal with the research Facebook commissioned about how its platform may harm specific groups of users and Facebook choice to in the words of Hagan, put their astronomical profits before people.
Speaker 1: Of course, there's [00:02:30] also the mountain of research about Facebook's psychological and sociological effects too. There's literally an entire Wikipedia page dedicated to criticisms and scandals regarding Facebook. It brought also doesn't really help that Facebook is in my experience and my personal opinion, a festering hive of disinformation chain, mail posts, and ads for snake oil. I don't care how many birthdays you think you need to remember. Some people's timelines are rough out there. A Facebook on the other hand, doesn't [00:03:00] seem terribly concerned about all this bad press and poor brand perception. At least not externally in a recent quarterly earrings call Zuckerberg called the Facebook papers, a coordinated attack and doubled down on getting those young users saying the company was going to focus on onboarding and retaining younger demographics. Even if it at the expense of older users, the reason mark Zuckerberg believes Facebook is going to be the company to usher in the next generation of computing.
Speaker 1: The metaverse. If you're not [00:03:30] familiar with the general idea of what a metaverse is, you've actually probably already seen one in books or movies, snow crashes metaverse and later ready player one's Oasis, both center around metaverses. The matrix is a version of a metaverse. Imagine if the internet was a place that you could essentially visit virtually with endless places and companies all connected together for you to experience seamlessly. Facebook is building its part of the metaverse already. It's committed to creating 10,000 engineering [00:04:00] jobs in the EU dedicated to building its vision of the metaverse. And Facebook's ownership of Oculus combined with VR experiments like horizon workrooms means they're well on their way to creating whatever vision of the metaverses inside. Mark Zuckerberg's hint at Facebook connect. Mark Zuckerberg spent over an hour talking about the metaverse and what it can do for you and the products.
Speaker 1: The company plans to release horizon will be the software used to shape metaverse experiences. And Cambria [00:04:30] is a new high end mixed reality headset aiming for a 2023 launch. And there's also project Nazare an AR glass concept. That's a ways out, but aims act as sort of a intermediary different way to access the metaverse outside of a traditional VR headset, which brings us to this rename meta. So you've stayed with me through all that other stuff. Let's talk about you. What exactly does this all mean for you? Uh, if you love Facebook and it's your favorite social network, this news [00:05:00] pretty much nothing to you in the way of your day to day experience, the apps are gonna all keep their same names. And the larger corporate structure is now similar to when Google created alphabet as a parent conglomerate to house all of its different businesses. If you hate Facebook with every fiber in your being, this news means you'll have to remember it exists under meta. So you don't sign up for any services or platforms covered by meta in the future. Honestly, this name change is sort of the equivalent [00:05:30] of putting on those glasses with a fake nose and a mustache, but for a corporation, hello,
Speaker 3: I'm Zuckerberg. I'm definitely a brand new person who's been here this whole time. You've seen me and mark together in the same room before. Absolutely not the same person, I Meta's new manager. And I'm here to get this place into tiptop
Speaker 1: Shape. Really, this is a corporate restructuring, maybe Facebook slash meta is preparing itself for the inevitable [00:06:00] regulation and potential breakups. It could face from us lawmakers who do seem to be making a rare bipartisan effort on that front. But honestly, I'm about to get real with you here because I'm tired people. I'm so tired of begging these corporations to protect of us. And they just make all these motions and grand promises and then shrug when bad people weaponize their products and say, oh, sorry, bad people just do bad stuff. Sometimes now the Facebook papers make it pretty [00:06:30] clear that Facebook, sorry, meta knows how they can at least stem some of those bad things from hap. And they choose not to in fear of seeming like they've chosen sides or whatever. And today's presentation at connect felt so wildly dystopian to see Zuckerberg cheerfully telling you about this beautiful, perfect little thing they wanna build to connect people and make your life better.
Speaker 1: We all know what's spending too my much time on platforms we use literally [00:07:00] right now can do to radicalize you in any number of ways. This presentation felt so completely tone deaf on their part, alongside the avalanche of information, coming out about how tech companies have done pretty much the bare minimum to protect their users. And I use that term very loosely in exchange for high stock prices and bigger net worth. I don't know, maybe I'm old and maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think I want mark Zuckerberg. The man who created [00:07:30] Facebook and built it into an uncontrollable omnipresent machine in charge of building the next generation of anything, much less computing. Now, if you're interested in reading more about the Facebook papers and I highly encourage you to, because it's important stuff, if you use the internet and that's literally all of us now and it ripples throughout social media, even if you aren't a Facebook user, you can hit up CNET again, check the description for those links. We've also got a ton of information and details about meta and the metaverse products that Facebook announce day. You're [00:08:00] also more than welcome to check out the links in the description and read about that too. And if you thought this video was helpful or informative, or maybe you just relate, give me a thumbs up. So I know to make more like them and subscribe to our channel for all the best tech news reviews and other content you can find on YouTube until next time be at humans.
