Facebook recently announced their shift both in brand and in scope with the announcement of Meta. It was unexpected, but necessary; Facebook needed a rebrand, its core product is actively losing users particularly in the younger demographics.
Facebook has been the poster child for “Big Tech” and has been the face for criticism. There was no core investment thesis for Facebook other than Metcalfe’s law
But beyond market fundamentals Facebook rebranding into “Meta” kicks officially what Covid-19 started.
The Digitization of Everything.
Since the Pandemic of 2020 put everyone into lockdown and disrupted “normal life” people have been searching for alternatives to the physical. For many Online replaced many of these interactions. While indeed there were many hyper online individuals and communities before now. 2020 will be the infection point of their remarkable growth.
The Metaverse is wrongly seen by many, as an entertainment only medium. Facebook Announcement of the pivot showcases their approach to encompassing your life. This is beyond education or big business wanting low cost and latency visual meetings. The Books of SnowCrash and Ready Player One are well written examples if one is unfamiliar.
Metaverse is code for the plumbing for the physical manifestation of the Internet.
Second Life (Yes it’s still running) has many insights into our Metaverse future.
The Time Article is already depicting aspects Ready Player One:
“If you live a comfortable life in New York City and you’re young and healthy, you probably are going to choose to live there. If I offer you the life of an avatar, you’re just not going to use it very much,” Rosedale says. “On the other hand, if you live in a rural location with very little social contact, are disabled or live in an authoritarian environment where you don’t feel free to speak, then your avatar can become your primary identity.
Facebook has been about “digital communities” for some time. And unlike Discord it has mastered both user retention and monetization. Facebook moving into the Metaverse is merely an extension of its idea to be an all encompassing digital entity.
From a previous substack The Facebook Protocol:
From Facebook Live, to Marketplace, Instagram to its TikTok clone Reels, Facebook is about your digital life. Their strategy of mimesis is creatively boring, but capital efficient. They don’t need to be groundbreaking, they just need to be good enough to add the amalgam of the Facebook Conglomerate
The analysis above still holds up a year later and so does this about their future: