Last fall, Facebook Inc. renamed itself Meta. The basic idea may certainly be due to the company’s XR efforts: to offer AR and VR devices, environments and applications. Bringing the social network Facebook from a 2D environment to a 3D world (“metaverse”). Of course, it wasn’t just praise from the community that rained down for this. Some accused Facebook of making headlines; after all, they have and have had one or two scandals. Or maybe it’s a mix of distraction and realignment. Whatever the case. We were concerned with the question of whether people outside the community are even aware of this change in the corporate brand – and what reasons they attribute it to.
Research: Facebook inc. or Meta?
To find out, we conducted on an open-ended question at the end of a thematically different survey and asked if they had heard of it and, if so, why they thought that was the case (n=314).
Results
41% knew nothing about the rebranding. 23% say it is an attempt at rebranding. 22% knew about it, but do not know the reasons. Only 6% associated the metaverse issue with it. That’s not a great deal, especially if you assume that online panelists tend to have an above-average affinity for digital or online.
Conclusion
Outside the community, the rebranding received only moderate attention. There, it was mainly perceived as a PR campaign. Reason enough for the XR community to bring the idea of a meta-verse to the public!
Bildquellen: Facebook / Meta; Pfeil: Pixabay