Month: November 2021

A LOOK INTO FACEBOOK’S 2022 $34B IT SPENDING SPREE

FACEBOOK’S 2022 $34BN SPENDING
SPREE WILL INCLUDE SERVERS, AI, AND DATA CENTERS

First, Facebook changed to Metaverse and now it is expected to spend $34Bn in 2022.

Facebook recently changed to Metaverse and more. It is all over the news that the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp is now
known as Meta. The name was changed to represent the company’s interest in the Metaverse.

Metaverse is a virtual world where similar activities can be carried out like on Earth. The activities carried out in Metaverse will also have a permanent effect in the real world. There are several companies from different types of industries who are going to take part in building a Metaverse. Every company will have its own version of Metaverse.

Various types of activities can be carried out like meeting with friends, shopping, buying houses, building houses, etc.

As in this real world, Earth, different country has a different type of currency for buying and trading, similarly, in the virtual world, Metaverse also needs a currency for transactions. For buying and trading in Metaverse, cryptocurrency will be required for the blockchain database. It also allows Non-Fungible Tokens as an asset.

To access the Metaverse, special devices are required such as AR and VR which will be able to access a smartphone, laptop or computer support the AR or VR device. Facebook has partnered with five research facilities around the world to guide AR/VR technology into the future. Facebook has its 10,000 employees working in Reality Labs.

Oculus is a brand in Meta Platforms that produces virtual reality headsets. Oculus was founded in 2012 and in 2014, Facebook acquired Oculus. Initially, Facebook partnered with Samsung and produced Gear VR for
smartphones then produced Rift headsets for the first consumer version and in 2017, produced a standalone mobile headset Oculus Go with Xiaomi.

As Facebook changed its name to Meta, it is announced that the Oculus brand will phase out in 2022. Every hardware product which is
marketed under Facebook will be named under Meta and all the future devices as well.

Oculus store name will also change to Quest Store. People are often confused about logging into their Quest account which will now
be taken care of and new ways of logging into Quest account will be introduced. Immersive platforms related to Oculus will also be
brought under the Horizon brand. Recently, there is only one product available from the Oculus brand, Oculus Quest 2. In 2018, Facebook took ownership of Oculus and included it in Facebook Portal. In 2019, Facebook update Oculus Go with high-end successor Oculus Quest and also a revised
Oculus Rift S, manufactured by Lenovo.

Ray-Ban has also connected with Facebook Reality Labs to introduce Ray-Ban Stories. It is a collaboration between Facebook and EssilorLuxotica, having two cameras, a microphone, a touchpad, and open ear
speakers.

Facebook has also launched a Facebook University (FBU) which will provide a paid immersive internship; classes will start in 2022.This will help students from underrepresented communities to interact with Facebook’s people, products, and services. It has three different types of groups:

FBU for Engineering

FBU for Analytics

FBU for Product Design

Through the coming year 2022, Facebook plans to provide $1 billion to the creators for their effort in creating content under the various platforms on brands of parent company Meta Company, previously known as Facebook.
The platform includes Instagram’s IGTV videos, live streams, reels, posts, etc. The content could include ads by the user. Meta (formerly, Facebook) will give bonuses to the content creators after they have reached a tipping milestone. This step was taken to provide the best platform to content creators who want to make a living out of creating content.

Just like TikTok, YouTube, Snapchat, Meta are also planning to give an income to content creators posting content after reaching a certain milestone.

Facebook also has a Facebook Connect application where it allows to interact with other websites through their Facebook account. It is a single sign-on application that lets the user skip filling in information by
themselves and instead lets Facebook Connect fill out names, profile pictures on behalf of them. It also shows which friend from the friend’s list has also accessed the website through Facebook Connect.

Facebook decides to spend $34Bn in 2022 but how and why?

Facebook had a capital expenditure of $19bn this year and it is expected to have a capital expenditure of $29bn to $34bn in 2022. According to David Wehner, the financial increase is due to investments in data centers,
servers, and network infrastructure, and office facilities even with remote staff in the company. The expenditure is also due to investing in AI and machine learning capabilities to improve rankings and recommendations of their products and their features like feed and video and to improve
the performance of ads and suggest relevant posts and articles.

As Facebook wants AR/VR to be easily accessible and update its feature for future convenience, Facebook is estimated to spend $10bn this and thus it is expected to get higher in this department in the coming years.

In Facebook’s Q3 earnings call, they have mentioned they are planning more towards their Facebook Reality Labs, the company’s XR, and towards their Metaverse division for FRL research, Oculus, and much more.

Other expenses will also include Facebook Portal products, non-advertising activities.

Facebook has launched project Aria, where it is expected to render devices more human in design and interactivity. The project is a research device that will be similar to wearing glasses or spectacles having 3D live map
spaces which would be necessary for future AR devices. Sensors in this project device will be able to capture users’ video and audio and
also their eye-tracking and their location information, according to Facebook.

The glasses will be capable to work as close to computer power which will enable to maintain privacy by encrypting information, storing uploading data to help the researchers better understand the relation, communication
between device and human to provide a better-coordinated device. This device will also keep track of changes made by you, analyze and understand your activities to provide a better service based on the user’s unique set of information.

It requires 3D Maps or LiveMaps, to effectively understand the surroundings of different users.

Every company preparing a budget for the coming year sets an estimated limit for expenditures. This helps in eliminating unnecessary expenses in the coming year. There are some regular expenditures that happen every for same purposes, recurring expenditures like rent, electricity,
maintenance, etc. and also there is an estimation of expenses that are expected to occur in case of an introducing new project for the company, whether the company wants to expand in locations or wants to acquire
already established companies. As the number of users in a company
increases, the company had to increase its capacity of employees, equipment, storage drives and disks, computers, servers, network
connection lines, security, storage capacity.

Not to forget that accounts need to be handled to avoid complications. The company needs to provide uninterrupted service. The company needs lawyers to look after the legal matters of the company and from the government.

Companies will also need to advertise their products showing how will it be helpful and how will it make the user’s life easier, which also is a different market.

That being said, Facebook has come up with varieties of changes in the company. Facebook is almost going to change even how users access Facebook. Along with that Facebook is stepping into Metaverse for which
they will hire new employees, AI to provide continuous service.

FACEBOOK AND THE METAVERSE: HOW DOES IT AFFECT THE FUTURE OF IT?

What is Meta-verse?

Metaverse started to become popular when Neal Stephenson used the term “metaverse” in his 1992 novel Snow Crash. It was mentioned to refer to a 3D virtual world inhabited by avatars of real people. Many science fiction media picked up the metaverse-like systems concept from Snow Crash. Still today, Stephenson’s book has been the most referenced point for metaverse supporters, as well as Ernest Cline’s 2011 novel Ready Player One.

In Snow Crash’s metaverse, Stephenson has shown a humorous corporation-dominated future America by telling a story of a person who is a master hacker who involves in katana fights at a virtual nightclub. Ready Player One’s virtual world named the OASIS to purely represent and imply the terms, and Cline portrays it as an almost ideal source of distraction in a horrible future.

Earlier in science fiction stories and media, the concept was tried to explain, an idea was put up to people, a topic to imagine over but now moving forward from fictional stories, samples of the metaverse are now tried to bring outside the television, trying to make it more realistic especially now that the concept is coming into gaming platform and real companies are incorporating the concept in their companies.

According to Matthew Ball, author of the extensive Metaverse Primer:

“The Metaverse is an expansive network of persistent, real-time rendered 3D worlds and simulations that support continuity of identity, objects, history, payments, and entitlements, and can be experienced synchronously by an effectively unlimited number of users, each with an individual sense of presence.”

How does Metaverse work?

Augmented reality involves visual elements, sound, and other sensory stimuli onto a real-world setting to let the user experience places, or do several activities as they would have done on Earth. In comparison, virtual reality is completely simulated and brings fictional realities almost in real life. VR comprises a headset device, and users control the system.

Metaverse is a merge of the prefix “meta”, meaning beyond, and “universe”.

It is a virtual world made with similar features to earth where land, buildings, avatars, and even names can be purchased and sold by using mostly cryptocurrency. In these worlds, people can wander around with friends, enter buildings, buy goods and services, and attend events, as in real life.

The concept became more famous during the pandemic as lockdown measures and work-from-home policies pushed more people online for both business and pleasure.

Metaverse could include workplace tools, games, and community platforms.

The concept required blockchain technology, cryptocurrency, and non-fungible tokens. This way new kind of decentralized digital asset can be built, owned, and monetized.

BLOCKCHAIN – it is a database that can be shared across a network of computers. These records can’t be changed easily and thus ensure that every data remains the same throughout the copies of the database. It is used to underpin cyber-currencies.

NON-FUNGIBLE TOKENS (NFTs) – these are virtual assets used for the growth in the metaverse.

it can be said that they are collectibles having intrinsic value because of their cultural significance, while others treat them as an investment, speculating on rising prices.

The metaverse has two distinct types of platforms:

FIRST – this step includes the blockchain-based metaverse, use of NFTs, and cryptocurrencies.

SECOND – this involves the creation of virtual worlds in the multiverse for virtual meetings for business or recreation. This section includes the companies with gaming platforms and several other companies which are building the metaverse platform:

ROBLOX, MICROSOFT, FACEBOOK, NVIDIA, UNITY, SNAP, AUTODESK, TENCENT, EPIC GAMES & AMAZON.

Why did Mark Zuckerberg decide to rebrand Facebook to Meta?

Mark Zuckerberg roughly mentions that the business got two different segments. One segment belonging to social apps and another for future platforms and metaverse do not belong to any of the segments. The metaverse represents both future platforms and social experiences.

So they wanted to have a new brand identity, the high-level brand identity depends on Facebook, the social media brand. And increasingly we’re doing more than that. They believe themselves to be a technology company that builds technology to help people connect with other people by taking a unique step by building technologies to enhance interaction with people.

The Facebook Company wants to have a single identity or account system like other Google, Apple but the Facebook company is confused with being a brand of social media app, which is creating a problem. The image of Facebook being a social media confuses people when they think of using the Facebook account to sign in to Quest, people get confused whether they are using a corporate account or social media account. Even after people have used Facebook accounts to log into sites, people worry if their access to the sites or device will differ if they deactivate or delete their Facebook accounts. People also worry if they log in with WhatsApp or Instagram, whether their data will get exchanged or shared over. For this, they thought to have a company that will associate with all different types of products other than any specific product. These requirements were already in the company’s conversation for months to years by now.

Metaverse is expanded to every industry. They now want to establish a relationship with different companies, creators, and developers. Metaverse will basically help the interest users not only wander in their minds but could allow them to wander around and be present in it, in the content. The user can perform several types of activities together with people which was not possible with the 2D app or webpage like dancing, exercises, etc.

According to Mark Zuckerberg from The Verge interview, metaverse delivers the clearest form of presence. According to him, the multiverse will be accessible from computers, AR, VR, mobile devices, and gaming consoles. Metaverse will help in creating an environment not only for gamers but also as a social platform. These devices will help the user to access 3D videos and experiences. This is what Facebook wants to uplift and focuses on bringing to people. It wants to bring the technology that will be used for experiencing the 3D and technology university and push ahead of the metaverse vision.

Basically, with the change of company name to Meta, it wants to show, represent its growing ambition towards metaverse.

Facebook has already mentioned having meetings for their VR devices and talking about generating employment opportunities in Europe. 

It can be seen that Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram will be seen under the same parent company.

Impact of Meta, formerly known as Facebook Company, along with the concept of the metaverse, on the future of IT.

It can be said that metaverse is a medium of contact which has been enhanced with the help of technologies. Now, to perform any action, there is a screen between us and we can’t be physically present in any location or time due to the fact that we have been interacting with tools that are based on 2D features. Metaverse will help people to be present anywhere they want to in a 3D setting. This 3D concept will be brought into people’s lives with the help of metaverse supporting devices. 

Now that Facebook has declared to be noticed by being a Meta company first and not Facebook, it plans on investing in the technologies and devices that will help in accessing metaverse like VR, AR, and even to some extent computers, mobile phones. Although these devices need to be able to be updated to be accessible.

This would in fact require a separate team of developers, creators and therefore, will have a different type of storage requirement, retrieving and sending information process which needs attention.

The introduction of the metaverse concept will affect every type of industry since it would involve every type of industry as metaverse includes virtual worlds. A person can access the world by putting on the glasses and can virtually meet, play or work. Although it is under lots of speculations, it is also in the news that metaverse may also include shopping malls, social interaction, etc.

There is no particular metaverse, every company is expected to have a different metaverse due to being separate companies.

However, the companies try to improve our experience it is necessary to see how safe are we, our data, and much privacy and security will be taken. It is necessary to be first aware of the concept than trying to have the experience without any idea which can land the person on its either good or bad side.

Metaverse is a 3D environment but over the internet which needs to be accessed with devices. The activities done in the metaverse world will have permanent effects due to synchronization. Although there are questions regarding privacy, how will the privacy be maintained? Since people are not aware, misinformation could spread. There are examples of metaverse workplaces such as Facebook’s Horizon and Microsoft Mesh. For this, companies need to have their own operating spaces within the metaverse.

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