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SAN FRANCISCO – Facebook has stood out over the past two decades with some of the world’s most recognizable brands: A big blue letter F.

Now. On Thursday, the social networking giant took an unmistakable step towards overhauling Facebook by downgrading its name and rebranding itself to Meta. The change comes with a new logo designed like an infinity symbol, slightly distorted, almost like a pretzel. Facebook, Instagram and other apps will remain under the Meta umbrella.

The move shows CEO Mark Zuckerberg plans to refocus the Silicon Valley company on what he sees as the next digital frontier. metadata store. At the same time, renaming Facebook could help the company steer clear of many of the social networking controversies it faces, including how it works. spreading hate speech and misinformation.

Speaking at a virtual event to showcase Facebook’s tech bets of the future, Mr. Zuckerberg said with this new episode, “I’ve thought a lot about our identity.” “Over time, I hope we’ll be seen as a metaverse company.”

Mr. Zuckerberg is committed to creating the meta-universe, a composite universe that brings together the online, virtual and augmented worlds that humans can traverse seamlessly. He said that Metaverse could be the next big social platform and that several tech companies will build it in the next 10-plus years. On Monday, Facebook expressed its intention to become a major player when it splits its virtual reality and augmented reality business into a segment known as Facebook Reality Labs.

But the timing of the shift has a double advantage. Facebook grappled with some issues most intense review in its 17-year history in recent weeks. Lawmakers and the public have criticized the Instagram photo-sharing app for hurting the self-confidence of some young people, and the company has faced questions about its role in fueling misinformation and creating unrest with provocative content.

The screams then reached fever pitch Frances Haugen, a former Facebook employee leaked internal documents showing how much the company knew about the effects it was causing. Findings from Ms. Haugen’s documents were first published by The Wall Street Journal and subsequently by other media outlets, including The New York Times.

The revelations sparked a series of congressional hearings, as well as legal and regulatory scrutiny. On Monday, Mrs. Haugen Meeting with British MPs in parliament and urged them to regulate Facebook. Tuesday, He told Facebook employees “Protecting internal documents and communications since 2016” related to their business as governments and legislatures initiate investigations into their activities.

Corporate rebrands are rare, but they have precedent. It has often been used to signal a company’s structural restructuring or to steer a company away from a toxic reputation.

in 2015 Google has restructured itself Under a new parent company called Alphabet, it is splitting itself into separate smaller companies to better differentiate its internet search business from its best bets in other areas. Netflix in 2011 split the video job into two partsrenamed the company’s streaming arm to Qwikster for short.

After that Boundary When Facebook announced last week that it might change its name, social media also erupted with less desirable comparisons. Some remembered how tobacco giant Philip Morris rebranded as Altria Group in 2001 after years of reputational loss. over health costs and the effects of cigarettes on the American public.

Nicholas Clegg, Facebook’s vice president of global policy and communications, dismissed the comparisons, calling them “highly misleading”.

Today’s metaverse is largely illusory, and Mr. Zuckerberg admitted it on Thursday, saying it sounds like “science fiction.”

Still, he talked about the idea of ​​a “successor to the mobile internet” and said that mobile devices will no longer be the focus. Mr. Zuckerberg said that the building blocks for the metaverse are also already in place. In one show, she showed off a digital avatar of herself that was transported to different digital worlds while talking to her friends and family, wherever they were on the planet.

“You’ll really feel like you’re there with other people,” she said. “You will not be locked into a single world or platform.”

Mr. Zuckerberg said that creating the metaverse will require a lot of work between different tech companies, new forms of management and other elements that may not come in the short term. But he did reveal a few areas where the metaverse could be applied, referring to topics like video games, fitness, and business.

Mr. Zuckerberg showed off Horizon Workrooms, a virtual conference room product where colleagues can work together remotely on different projects they may have once done in the office. He mentioned several immersive video games. And he showed off Horizon Worlds, a virtual reality-based social network where friends and family can get together and interact.

Success will depend, in part, on attracting others to create new applications and programs that run on the metadata store. As in the mobile app economy, users are more likely to join new computing ecosystems if they have programs and software to use.

As a result, Mr. Zuckerberg said he will continue to offer low-cost or free services to developers and invest in attracting more developers through creative funds and other capital injections. Among other things, Facebook has earmarked $150 million for developers creating new kinds of immersive learning apps and programs.

We are fully committed to this issue,” he said. “This is the next part of our study.”

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.