Facebook let it be known last week that it was planning to change its name to reflect its interest in the "metaverse" of augmented-reality—and, between the lines, to distance the company itself from the increasingly-reviled social network it operates. The new name is Meta.
"I've been thinking a lot about our identity as we begin this next chapter. Facebook is one of the most used products in the history of the world," Zuckerberg said on Thursday. It is an iconic social media brand, but increasingly it just doesn't encompass everything that we do.
"Today we're seen as a social media company," he added, "but in our DNA, we are a company that builds technology to connect people. And the metaverse is the next frontier just like social networking was when we got started."Zuckerberg, who said he loved studying classics in school, said the name was inspired by the Greek word meta, which means "beyond." "For me, it symbolizes that there is always more to build."
