It began at Harvard University in 2003 as Facemash, an online service for students to judge the attractiveness of their fellow students.
The new name reflects the company's growing ambitions beyond social media. Facebook, now known as Meta, has adopted the new moniker, based on the sci-fi term metaverse, to describe its vision for working and playing in a virtual world.
Facebook, initially titled as thefacebook.com and limited to Harvard students, launched on Feb. 4, 2004. In 2006, Facebook became open to general public. Mark Zuckerberg along with fellow Harvard mates, Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Moskovitz and Chris Hughes founded Facebook.
On October 28, 2021, the parent company of Facebook changed its name from Facebook, Inc., to Meta Platforms, Inc., to "reflect its focus on building the metaverse". According to Meta, the term "metaverse" refers to the integrated environment that links all of the company's products and services.
The company formerly known as Facebook is now called Meta, CEO Mark Zuckerberg announces today.
Mark Zuckerberg's Meta Platforms underscored its commitment to the Metaverse, announcing that its old familiar stock symbol FB – for Facebook, the company's old name – will change to META on June 9.
Is Facebook Being Rebranded? Facebook the social media platform is not being rebranded. The name change applies to the parent company, which will now be called Meta rather than Facebook, much like when Google reorganized as Alphabet a few years ago. What Is Facebook's New Name Going to Be?
Meta can be used as an acronym for “most effective tactics available,” and calling something “meta” means that it's an effective way to achieve the goal of the game, whether it's to beat other players or beat the game itself.
The name was chosen to echo the key product that Zuckerberg hopes Facebook – now Meta – will be represented by: the metaverse, the name for a shared online 3D virtual space that a number of companies are interested in creating as a sort of future version of the internet.
The English word meta is derived from its Greek counterpart, which acts as a prefix meaning beyond, transcending, or more comprehensive. It is commonly used in academia to refer to the self-referential nature of art or a body of work.
Myspace. The one that got away, Myspace is the pre-Facebook social network site that everyone remembers. Founders Tom Anderson and Chris DeWolf learned from Friendster's mistakes and prioritised Myspace's scalability in order to avoid the same fate as Friendster.
Friendster. At one point, Friendster was considered the premier social media site. Within just a few months of its launch, the company had more than three million monthly active users. In 2003, Friendster's founder, Jonathan Abrams, was offered $30 million by Google to purchase the site.
The Facebook company has changed its name to Meta, but the social networking app Facebook will keep its name. It has also adopted a new logo (is it just us or does that look familiar…).
Mark Zuckerberg is the founder, chairman and CEO of Meta, which he originally founded as Facebook in 2004. Mark is responsible for setting the overall direction and product strategy for the company.
Facebook (FB) changed its corporate name last fall to Meta, part of a strategic shift in focus from social media to a future, immersive — and so far largely theoretical — form of the internet powered by AR and VR technologies called the metaverse.
Critics Argue Meta's Lack Of Policing In Metaverse Is Harmful For Underage Users: Washington Post Report. For years, Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ: META) has argued that the best way to protect people in virtual reality is by giving users tools to control their environments, like blocking or distancing other users.
The active user drop isn't as bad as it sounds.
At that rate of decline, it would take more than 900 years for Facebook to be used by no one.
Expansion of virtual and augmented reality
In 2023, Facebook plans to further expand its VR and AR offerings, including new features and applications that will change the way people engage with the platform.
Because meta- means transcending, encompassing, or 'a superset of...', then infra- would would be a proper antonym describing within, or 'a subset of...' If metadata is that data that describes the data within itself, then infradata should be that inferior data which is described.
The Meta symbol
It is designed to be experienced from different perspectives and interacted with. It can resemble an M for “Meta,” and also at times an infinity sign, symbolizing infinite horizons in the metaverse.
Social meta tags allow website owners to have some control over what content shows up when a web page is shared on social media platforms (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.). Social meta tags, also commonly referred to as open graph meta tags, rely on the Open Graph Protocol.
Who owns Facebook? Facebook is a publicly-traded company, so a single individual or company doesn't own it. Among its majority owners is Mark Zuckerberg, who owns the majority shares of the company. Several other individuals and institutions hold essential stakes in the company.
Meta Platforms sells ads on social media websites and mobile applications and also sells augmented- and virtual-reality products and services. Advertising sales are the primary source of Meta's revenue.
The tech giant changed its name to 'Meta Platforms' or 'Meta' for short, with a new brand logo that resembles a distorted infinity symbol. The decision outlines Zuckerberg's intentions to further the virtual connections between people, which he regards as the 'metaverse' plan.