CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the rebranding to reflect the platform’s shift in focus on building a “metaverse” which aims to normalise the world of augmented and virtual reality (AR/VR) with a variety of ongoing developments.  

“Over time, I hope that we are seen as a metaverse company and I want to anchor our work and our identity on what we’re building towards… We’re now looking at and reporting on our business as two different segments, one for our family of apps, and one for our work on future platforms,” Zuckerberg stated at a virtual conference.  

The CEO of Facebook opened Connect by explaining why the organisation plans to build a wider virtual world consisting of nonfungible tokens, virtual goods, blockchain and decentralised platforms. However, there was a notable absence of addressing privacy issues and Facebook’s main advertising business uncertainties.  

Although Facebook will be changing its name, its family of apps such as Instagram and WhatsApp will keep their current names. The rebranding has emerged during a peak period of controversies surrounding Facebook as it faced a PR crisis following negative press from whistleblower documents, lawmakers and digital watchdogs.  

A series of leaked internal documents from ex-employee Frances Haugen had showed that Facebook sat on research relating to the effect of Instagram on teenage mental health and that the platform struggled to remove hate speech from its platforms outside of the US. Moreover, the Washington Post has reported that Facebook withheld vital information about vaccine misinformation from policymakers during the pandemic.  

Apple’s privacy changes have reportedly weighed on Facebook’s digital business component as Facebook has stated quarterly revenue below market expectations. This is significantly because of iOS changes which have made it harder for brands to target and measure their ads on Facebook.  

Critics have stated that they are skeptic over Facebook’s rebranding and that the timing of the move indicates that they are trying to distance themselves from the negative publicity the company has received. However, others have said that the restructuring of the organisation will allow Zuckerberg to focus on segments of the company that “excite” him as he aims to create virtual worlds instead of being drained by the social media company’ controversies.  

What do you think of Facebook’s rebranding? Is it the future of technology or the last breath of a tech giant?