Facebook has officially changed its name

Facebook has officially changed its name to “Meta” as it focuses on bringing the metaverse to life.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the rebrand at Connect 2021, the company’s annual virtual and augmented reality conference.

Meta will bring together all of the company’s apps and technologies under one new brand.

“The metaverse will feel like a hybrid of today’s online social experiences, sometimes expanded into three dimensions or projected into the physical world,” a release from the company reads.

“It will let you share immersive experiences with other people even when you can’t be together — and do things together you couldn’t do in the physical world. It’s the next evolution in a long line of social technologies, and it’s ushering in a new chapter for our company.”

The company said its corporate structure is not changing, nor is the way it uses and shares data. How they report on their financials will, though. The fourth quarter of 2021 will see Facebook report on two operating segments: Family of Apps and Reality Labs.

As of December 1, the company will also start trading under the new stock ticker MVRS.

In a Founder’s Letter released today, Zuckerberg discussed how technology has transformed to allow people to “express themselves more naturally,” going from text to photos to videos.

“The next platform will be even more immersive—an embodied internet where you’re in the experience, not just looking at it,” he wrote.

“We call this the metaverse, and it will touch every product we build.”

Meta’s defining quality will be a “feeling of presence”—users will feel like they’re right there with another person or in another place.

Within the metaverse, users will be able to do “almost anything” they can imagine, including getting together with friends, working, learning, playing, shopping, and creating.

They’ll also be able to have completely new experiences that Zuckerberg said “don’t really fit” how computers or phones are thought about today.

This includes being able to teleport as a hologram, spending more time on what matters, and reducing their carbon footprint.

“All of our products, including our apps, now share a new vision: to help bring the metaverse to life. And now we have a name that reflects the breadth of what we do,” Zuckerberg said.

“I’m proud of what we’ve built so far, and I’m excited about what comes next—as we move beyond what’s possible today, beyond the constraints of screens, beyond the limits of distance and physics, and towards a future where everyone can be present with each other, create new opportunities, and experience new things.”

“It is a future that is beyond any one company and that will be made by all of us.”