Category: Facebook

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Crypto News Facebook NFTs

YouTube CEO Hints at NFT Integration

In a letter to creators, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki has flagged that the company is interested in “expanding” its ecosystem to possibly include NFTs. This comes soon after competitors such as Twitter and Instagram announced they would also be expanding into the NFT space.

Wojcicki didn’t specify what the team at YouTube is planning, or even when, but this does mark the first time Alphabet Inc, the platform’s owner, is looking to become involved in the NFT space.

“We’re always focused on expanding the YouTube ecosystem to help creators capitalise on emerging technologies, including things like NFTs, while continuing to strengthen and enhance the experiences creators and fans have on YouTube,” Wojcicki wrote in the letter.

YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki. Source: wired.com

She also noted that Web3, a term used for internet models built around crypto, has been “a source of inspiration” for the company, adding that NFTs and decentralised autonomous organisations (DAOs) have the “unimaginable opportunity to grow the connection between creators and their fans”.

YouTube Already Has NFT Options in Place

Although its NFT expansion has not yet been confirmed, YouTube already has a number of ways it could allow creators to showcase their NFTs. The platform offers a “merch shelf” option that can appear under a creator’s video where they can, for example, feature products through an increasing number of supported retail partners. YouTube could also partner with NFT platforms and integrate crypto wallets to allow digital contributors to feature their NFTs there as well.

NFT holders are are naturally excited about the possibility, despite YouTube recently being at the centre of a massive crypto scam. Circle of Ninjas creator and Bored Ape Yacht Club #1334 owner David Gokhshtein expressed his enthusiasm, albeit in a sarcastic fashion:

Another Passenger on the NFT Bandwagon

The news from YouTube comes as a welcome surprise considering many of its competitors have already expanded their reach into the NFT-sphere. Twitter has just launched its latest in-development feature, implementing a verification tool for users who want to display their NFTs as profile pictures.

Meta, formerly Facebook, is also delving deeper into the space by reportedly drawing up plans to allow its users to create and display NFTs on both their Instagram and Facebook profiles.

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Crypto News Facebook Metaverse NFTs Social media

Meta is Experimenting with an NFT Marketplace on Instagram

Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, is looking to launch an NFT marketplace on Instagram, reportedly drawing up plans to allow its users to create and display NFTs on both their Instagram and Facebook profiles.

Meta Makes More Moves in the Metaverse

According to a report by the Financial Times (FT), Meta will allow its users to create and display NFTs on their profiles, along with a prototype feature for minting tokens in the pipeline. The report comes after Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri admitted it was “actively exploring NFTs and how we can make them more accessible to a wider audience”, and after Meta announced its upcoming metaverse product would support NFTs.

Nothing to announce yet but we are definitely actively exploring NFTs and how we can make them more accessible to a broader audience. I think it’s an interesting place that we can play … and also a way to hopefully help creators.

Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri

No Particular Blockchain in Mind … Yet

According to the FT report, it is still unclear which blockchain network these features would be built on. At the moment, NFTs exist on several blockchains including Solana, Tezos, Ethereum, Flow and WAX. The report says teams at Facebook and Instagram are looking at NFT integration, with Meta discussing the possibility of an NFT marketplace.

Meta’s digital currency wallet Novi is also said to be a key component in its push into NFTs. Novi is a new crypto wallet used for sending digital payments through WhatsApp, and is currently being trialled for a limited number of people in the US.

However exciting the news, users are urged to keep in mind that the initiative is still in the planning stages.

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Blockchain Crypto News Facebook Payments Stablecoins

Meta’s Crypto Project Novi Begins WhatsApp Stablecoin Payments Trial

Novi, a new crypto wallet for sending digital payments through WhatsApp, is available now and being trialled for a limited number of people in the US. Transferring money to friends is now as easy as sending a text message and you can do it all within the WhatsApp chat app, instantly and with no fees.

Novi is a new way to send and receive money – instantly, securely, and with no fees. With Novi on WhatsApp, you can transfer money without ever leaving your WhatsApp chat.

novi.com/WhatsApp

Stephane Kasriel, Meta’s head of cryptocurrency and fintech at Novi, officially announced the rollout of Novi via Twitter on December 9:

Meta Fine-Tunes its Fintech Ambitions

It’s no secret that Meta head Mark Zuckerberg has huge ambitions for his company, formerly known as Facebook, to claim its space in the world of crypto and fintech. Facebook first launched its cryptocurrency project, Libra, in 2019. Then it was rebranded to Diem, a stablecoin to be pegged to the US dollar.

Despite facing opposition from regulatory parties who have concerns over giant tech companies entering the world of blockchain-based finance having too much power, Novi has partnered with stablecoin provider Paxos and is now live through WhatsApp.

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Crypto News Facebook Tokens

Microsoft Follows Facebook Into The Metaverse

Microsoft is hot on the heels of Facebook, now known as Meta, and has entered the metaverse race by introducing 3D avatars and immersive meetings, according to a Tweet by Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.

Soon after Facebook announced it would be rebranding as Meta to reflect its engagement with the metaverse, Microsoft is also now gearing up to launch its own version, “Mesh”, which will likely focus more on the corporate world. Nadella tweeted about the metaverse, a space where digital avatars of people can interact at work and play, saying that it is “not only transforming how we see the world but how we participate in it”.

Nadella’s tweet included a video that shows how Microsoft plans to integrate itself into the virtual world. Microsoft intends Mesh to be a collaborative platform for shared virtual immersive experiences on Microsoft Teams.

Microsoft Meshes into the Metaverse

According to Microsoft officials, Mesh for Teams will start to roll out in preview during the first half of 2022, with a set of pre-built immersive spaces for both corporate and social meetings. Microsoft has also indicated it will add tools to allow customers to customise their own spaces.

Mesh for Teams as a feature of Teams will “combine the mixed-reality capabilities of Microsoft Mesh, which allows people in different physical locations to join collaborative and shared holographic experiences, with the productivity tools of Teams, where people can join virtual meetings, send chats, collaborate on shared documents, and more”.

While Facebook – now Meta – says it is dedicating its efforts to the future of the internet “more than any other company in the world”, Microsoft’s new take to Teams is a massive step in the right direction for metaverse fans.

Microsoft intends to utilise AI to “listen” to users’ voices and thus animate their avatars. “We are able to interpret your vocal cues to animate that avatar, so it feels present [as if] it’s there with you,” said Katie Kelly, principal product manager for Microsoft Mesh.

Facebook Shifts Its Focus

As Facebook/Meta deals with issues of privacy, security, and its failure to control fake news, misinformation and hate speech, the rebrand has many speculating it’s merely a diversionary tactic to diffuse criticism against the company.

Although Facebook has said it intends to build the metaverse “responsibly” and has vowed to invest US$50 million into building toward this goal, many remain doubtful.

The news of Facebook’s rebranding has, however, been very bullish for other blockchain-based metaverse projects. Since the announcement, The Sandbox (SAND) surged 158 percent, and Decentraland (MANA), as well as Axie Infinity (AXS), have also seen big surges in price.

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Blockchain Crypto News Facebook Gaming Tokens

Metaverse Tokens Soar Amid Facebook Announcement, SAND Up 158% in a Week

It’s no secret that the gaming sector is the hot focus of crypto right now, with social media giant Facebook announcing its re-branding to “Meta”. The ripple effect has seen The Sandbox token SAND surge 158 percent since the announcement. And it’s not the only one.

I believe the metaverse is the next chapter for the internet. And it’s the next chapter for our company too.

Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook/Meta CEO

Zuckerberg added: “We’re a company that focuses on connecting people.” He says that “while most other tech companies focus on how people interact with technology, we focus on building technology so people can interact with each other”.

The Facebook name only represents one product, Zuckerberg says. Facebook is rebranding to Meta in order to “encompass everything that we do. Over time, I hope that we are seen as a metaverse company.”

As an example of Meta’s ambitions, a partnership with sunglasses manufacturer RayBan aims to produce augmented reality glasses to interact with the real world for immersive experiences that include: displays, audio, input, haptics, hand tracking, eye tracking, mixed reality, sensors, graphics, computer vision, avatars, perceptual science, AI and more.

Metaverse Tokens Soar Upon News

Although Facebook is building its own metaverse, the news has been bullish for other blockchain-based metaverse projects besides The Sandbox (SAND). Decentraland (MANA) and Axie Infinity (AXS) are among others to have seen big spikes in price since the Facebook/Meta announcement.

SAND token performance. Source: coinmarketcap.com

Celebrities are also starting to enter the metaverse, with rapper Snoop Dogg announcing in September that he will build his own house – or a virtual reconstruction of his mansion, at least – in the Sandbox Metaverse and offer his exclusive NFT collection to fans, perform live concerts and interact with players.

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Crypto News Facebook Interviews Social media

Why Facebook’s Rebrand to Meta Could Spark a Mass Exodus of Employees

Facebook’s parent company rebrand to Meta, announced this week, could cost it dearly in terms of retaining existing employees and attracting new ones.

“I doubt this will redeem or protect the employer brand much,” says Georgetown University business professor Brooks Holtom, who is also a corporate human resources specialist based in Washington DC. “With Facebook facing so many missteps and public criticism tarnishing the brand, people in the know won’t be fooled by this rebranding.”

Is the Facebook Rebrand a Convenient Distraction?

Mark Zuckerberg launches Facebook’s Meta rebrand. Source: latimes.com

Scrutiny of CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook has intensified in recent weeks over its handling of misinformation, fake news and hate speech, as well as ongoing criticism over its failure to answer allegations that some of its platforms are damaging the mental health of children and teenagers.

Earlier this month, former Facebook employee turned whistleblower Frances Haugen released internal company documents that show Facebook knows its products and services can cause harm but that it struggles to address the issue. Zuckerberg has denied the claims, saying they “paint a false picture of our company”, and that the problems Facebook experiences are simply “a reflection of society”.

News of the company’s rebrand, already labelled by some as a distraction from its slate of allegations, could spark higher employee turnover, according to Holtom.

Facebook has talented people, and competitors in the market are looking for that talent. It [the tech market] is extremely competitive. You can be sure other companies are preparing to reach out selectively to inquire about people thinking of moving. It’s a precarious time for Facebook from a talent perspective.

Brooks Holtom, professor of business, Georgetown University, Washington DC

Facebook’s reputation as a top company to work for has slid since it claimed the top rung in 2018, based on employee ratings on US review site Glassdoor. It dropped one spot in the 2019 list after reports that political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica had improperly accessed the data of 87 million Facebook users. Its ranking plummeted to #23 in 2020 and this year clawed its way back to #11.

Jobs for Metaverse Specialists, For Others Not So Much

The Meta rebrand could bolster retention and hiring efforts for highly specialised employees involved in metaverse operations for “the chance to work on something really revolutionary with a large budget”, Holtom allows. But he says it’s unlikely the company will see a positive impact among the public or employees not involved in metaverse work: “I think they’re at big risk.”

Facebook is already experiencing employee churn at third-party sites in the US that hire content moderators for its social media platform. Earlier this month, flagship TV current affairs program 60 Minutes aired a harrowing story headlined “Thumbs down” in which former Facebook moderators described the horrors they were forced to deal with on a daily basis.

“I saw a lot of child abuse, a lot of gore. We had quite a few beheadings,” ex-Facebook employee Allison Trebacz told the program. “It was really messed up.”

“You see a whole lot of nudity, you see aborted foetuses, people killing themselves live,” said Spencer Darr, another former moderator. “Within the first week or two I was having nightmares about some of the content I’d seen.”

$15 an Hour to Witness the Worst of Humanity

Former Facebook moderator Shawn Speagle (right) with podcaster Patrick Bet-David.

Also this month, in a shocking YouTube interview with US podcaster Patrick Bet-David, former Facebook “graphic violence and hate speech” moderator Shawn Speagle attested to witnessing bestiality, live shootings, animal cruelty, public stonings, violence against children and women – including vivisection and organ harvesting – and all manner of sexual exploitation in his six months as an employee of Cognizant Technology Solutions, a third-party Facebook site in Tampa, Florida. All for a princely US$15 per hour, in less than ideal working conditions.

“When I started at Facebook, I thought the least I could do was try to help the people and animals whose last moments were being desecrated,” Speagle said, stressing he had no “revenge motive” against Facebook.

Still Waiting For Compensation

Without admitting any wrongdoing, Facebook agreed in May 2020 to pay $US52 million in damages to former moderators who had suffered severe mental health disorders as a result of their employment. The settlement was to include a US$1000 payment for each and additional funding for a shared support service. All are reportedly yet to receive either consideration.

“It’s just not enough, especially for a company that makes US$55 billion a year in revenue,” commented Spencer Darr in his 60 Minutes interview. “It felt like an insult.”

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Facebook NFTs Social media Virtual Reality

Facebook Rebrands as it Shifts Focus Towards the Metaverse

Troubled social media giant Facebook sees the growing metaverse – think of it as the internet on steroids – as the future of its business, and has now made it official by announcing the company will henceforth be known as Meta.

Meta will be the name for the overall company, although most of its individual apps and services – such as Facebook itself, Messenger, WhatsApp and Instagram – will maintain their current branding under the Meta umbrella.

“The metaverse isn’t a single product one company can build alone,” tweeted Nick Clegg, Facebook’s Global Affairs VP, exactly a month ago. “Just like the internet, the metaverse exists whether Facebook is there or not. And it won’t be built overnight. Many of these products will only be fully realised in the next 10-15 years.”

It’s clear that, by very definition, Meta fully intends to own the metaverse, starting right now. “I think we’re basically moving from being Facebook first as a company to being metaverse first,” CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg said after announcing the name-change during the streaming keynote for this week’s annual Facebook Connect event.

What, Exactly, Is the Metaverse?

So what, exactly, is the metaverse? It’s a term loosely describing the future evolution of the internet, in which the flat apps and websites used today are gradually replaced by 3D environments and shared spaces, making interactions more “immersive”, to use a word Zuckerberg is especially fond of.

The metaverse won’t be a single entity, rather a conceptual collection of open worlds and settings joined by interoperable assets and experiences. Collectible NFT assets, for example, could be turned into 3D avatars that owners could place into all sorts of web spaces, whether for work, play, exercise, or social interactions.

Facebook – sorry, Meta – clearly wants to lead the charge into the metaverse. The company has announced it will invest US$50 million over the next two years into research and partnerships, and that it aims to hire 10,000 people across Europe in the next five years to aid in the effort.

The Ultimate Diversionary Tactic?

The company has said it will help build the metaverse “responsibly”, and took time in this week’s keynote to highlight its focus on privacy and open collaboration with external creators and firms. Cynics might say that’s a direct response to criticisms directed at Facebook over the years (and especially lately, by whistleblower and former employee Frances Haugen) in regards to privacy, security, its failure to control fake news, misinformation and hate speech, and accusations of incipient harm to teenagers’ mental health.

The US Federal Trade Commission has also filed an antitrust lawsuit against (pre-Meta) Facebook accusing it of anti-competitive practices. As Forrester Research director Mike Proulx has said, changing FB’s name to Meta “doesn’t suddenly erase the systemic issues plaguing the company”. In other words, never mind all that, look at our new, shiny name!

On December 1, FB/Meta shares will start trading under a new ticker symbol, MVRS. Hmmm … wonder what that stands for?

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Blockchain Crypto News Facebook Regulation Social media

US Lawmakers Ask Facebook to Terminate Crypto Pilot

Just hours after it had made the announcement of a pilot of its cryptocurrency wallet, Novi, Facebook was ordered by US lawmakers to cease the project in a letter to CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

In the letter, five Democratic Senators urged the company to halt the pilot, citing concerns over the handling of cryptos by the social media giant.

‘Facebook Cannot Be Trusted’

Many concerns have been raised surrounding Facebook in recent times regarding the company’s “relentless pursuit of profits at the expense of its users”. Joining the backlash the company has received, the senators’ letter stated that:

Facebook cannot be trusted to manage a payment system or digital currency when its existing ability to manage risks and keep consumers safe has proven wholly insufficient.

Letter to Facebook signed by five Democratic US Senators

When Facebook first unveiled plans for its crypto project in mid-2019, it already faced a global regulatory backlash. Concerns were raised that the launch of private money by a company of Facebook’s magnitude and user base could destabilise the entire monetary system.

The backlash prompted several partners to leave the project, and the project underwent a rebranding from Diem to Libra.

Facebook responded by saying lawmakers misunderstood the relationship between Diem and Facebook. “Diem is not Facebook”, wrote the company, making it clear Diem is an independent organisation, and that Facebook’s Novi is only one of more than two dozen members of the Diem organisation.

Facebook has said that Novi, once it goes live, will make cross-border payments more efficient and reduce transaction costs.

Lawmakers Remain Critical of Facebook

In the letter issued to Zuckerberg, the senators wrote:

Facebook is once again pursuing digital currency plans on an aggressive timeline and has already launched a pilot for a payments infrastructure network, even though these plans are incompatible with the actual financial regulatory landscape.

This is certainly not the response Facebook was hoping for, though it is not entirely unexpected. Earlier this month, Facebook announced it would hire 10,000 new employees over the next five years to start building its metaverse. However, many are sceptical of this effort and are instead calling on the company to move toward creating a safer, more responsible, and ultimately more trustworthy social platform.

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Facebook Gaming Social media Virtual Reality

Facebook Promises 10,000 Jobs For Its ‘Metaverse’, but Users Aren’t Buying It

Facebook recently announced that over the next five years it plans to hire 10,000 new employees in specialised fields to start building its metaverse. However, many are calling on the multinational tech company to instead shift its efforts toward creating a safer, more trusted and responsible social network.

According to an official blog post on October 17, Facebook is full steam ahead for its metaverse project. To make this dream a reality, the company will need many more staff with specialised skills. To this end, it will be offering 10,000 new jobs across Europe alone.

Over the next five years, Facebook is looking to find new recruits for roles varying from software engineering to product design, and associated business functions. Many jobs are expected to be remote, which should appeal to a wide variety of EU residents.

Facebook’s global business group vice-president, Nicola Mendelsohn, stated in an interview that “these 10,000 highly skilled jobs are really, for us, going to put Europeans at the heart of our plans for the company’s future”.

Facebook’s Metaverse Will Be ‘Open and Interoperable’

According to Mendelsohn, no single company will own the metaverse. “It’s going to be like the internet – the key feature(s) will be openness and interoperability,” she said. The sentiment stands in stark contrast to the reputation Facebook has garnered, for years, as a not very transparent centralised entity.

Founder Mark Zuckerberg has described the metaverse as an “embodied internet” which will unlock access to “new creative, social, and economic opportunities” for all those who participate. With the aim being that “Europeans will be shaping it right from the start”.

A metaverse is an online world where people can game, work and communicate in a virtual environment, often using VR and AR technologies. In an interview with the BBC, Verity McIntosh, a VR expert at the University of the West of England, stated that:

Part of the reason Facebook is so heavily invested in VR/AR is that the granularity of data available when users interact on these platforms is an order of magnitude higher than on screen-based media […] it’s not just about where I click and what I choose to share, it’s about where I choose to go, how I stand, what I look at for longest, the subtle ways that I physically move my body and react to certain stimuli. It’s a direct route to my subconscious, and that is gold to a data capitalist.

Verity McIntosh, VR expert, University of the West of England

Doubts have previously been voiced about Facebook’s US$50 million investment to build a ‘Responsible Metaverse’, as reported by Crypto News Australia last month.

Some Say Facebook Should Focus Its Attention on More Pressing Matters

Cybersecurity expert Jake Moore told the Daily Mail that there is no doubt the metaverse will make serious amounts of money, but that the current Facebook platform “clearly needs attention” as to how well the platform deals with online abuse and the way misinformation is currently spread. 

Facebook has made building the metaverse one of its big priorities. However, many people feel that they should be focusing their efforts elsewhere. As Ben Sizer, a software engineer from Nottingham, UK, tweeted: “Facebook is a company that has roughly 15,000 moderators who are mostly underpaid outsourcers.” 

The metaverse announcement comes as the company deals with the fallout of a damaging scandal, major outages of its services, and calls for regulation to curb its pervasive influence. Facebook also faced a barrage of criticism after former employee Frances Haugen leaked internal studies showing that it knew its sites could be harmful to the mental health of teenagers. 

Last month, The Washington Post suggested that Facebook’s interest in the metaverse is “part of a broader push to rehabilitate the company’s reputation with policymakers and reposition [the social media giant] to shape the regulation of next-wave internet technologies”.

In April, Ireland’s Data Protection Commission launched an investigation into Facebook over a data leak of hundreds of millions of its users’ personal information. At the moment, Facebook is facing the prospect of defending itself in court, on the one hand, while trying to gain political allies through economic initiatives such as this new jobs pledge, on the other.

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Australia Crypto News Facebook Oxen Social media

Facebook Ecosystem Outage Begs The Question, ‘Time for Decentralised Networks?’

In the early hours of Tuesday, October 5, social media giant Facebook, along with Instagram and instant messaging service WhatsApp, went down due to what it has called a “faulty configuration change”. The massive outages, announced on Twitter, left billions worldwide unable to communicate, and as a result the question on everybody’s lips is: “Is it time for decentralised networks?”

Early on October 5, the outage tracking website Down Detector had logged thousands of reports for all three sites. Facebook would not load at all, while Instagram and WhatsApp were accessible but users could not send messages or load new content.

Outages reported in the affected period. Source: Down Detector

Facebook Under Fire

A mere two days after US data engineer and Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen claimed that the social media conglomerate is fully aware of how its platforms are being used to spread misinformation, hate and violence, and has actively tried to hide this evidence, Facebook and its associated platforms went down for approximately six hours. Facebook has denied the claims.

Still, the outcry against Facebook is only adding to the company’s woes. At a US Senate hearing on September 30, Senator Richard Blumenthal hounded global head of safety for Facebook, Antigone Davis, about Facebook-owned Instagram and its potential negative impact on children, specifically young girls and their body image.

The outage and general bad press surrounding Facebook and its founder, Mark Zuckerberg, saw Facebook’s share price drop 4.8 percent and Zuckerberg’s personal fortune lose A$8.11 billion in a matter of hours.

Apparently, No Data Was Compromised

Facebook is citing the root of the problem as a faulty configuration change that was made to the company’s systems. Santosh Janardhan, vice president of infrastructure for Facebook, explained that FB’s engineering teams learned that “configuration changes on the backbone routers that coordinate network traffic between our data centres caused issues that interrupted this communication”.

Janardhan added:

The underlying cause of this outage also impacted many of the internal tools and systems we use in our day-to-day operations, complicating our attempts to quickly diagnose and resolve the problem.

Santosh Janardhan

According to Facebook, there is no evidence that user data was compromised as a result of the downtime.

Concerns Over Control

When seeing the fury and anger that an outage of such a centralised ecosystem can cause, many start to question its value. A lot of criticism is directed at Facebook’s oversight and control.

Earlier this year, the social media giant banned Australian news sites from publishing on Facebook, and the Crypto News Australia page was not immune. The level of control centralised companies such as Facebook can have over society has heightened calls to open up the playing field for decentralised social platforms in the future.

Facebook recently announced it would be investing US$50 million in building a “responsible metaverse”. Advocates of the metaverse, which is a system of shared online spaces for games and social interaction, believe it will help change the nature of work and offer new digital economic opportunities to users across the globe.

All are not convinced of Facebook’s intentions. Many believe such announcements are simply a diversion to deflect heavy criticism about its track record on user privacy and spreading misinformation.

Decentralised Alternatives to WhatsApp

If you, like many others, rely on WhatsApp to facilitate your communication, are concerned about privacy and possibly another outage, there are decentralised alternatives to consider.  

Oxen is a comprehensive ecosystem of privacy-focused applications supported by the $OXEN cryptocurrency and backed by Australian not-for-profit Oxen Privacy Tech Foundation.

The company currently offers:

  • Session, a private messaging system; and
  • Lokinet, an anonymous internet access service.

Session is a free end-to-end encrypted anonymous messaging app that allows users to send messages securely and anonymously. The blockchain-based app is currently used by over 200,000 people in more than 200 countries and is available for both mobile (Android and iOS) and for desktop (Mac, Windows, and Linux).

Lokinet is a low-latency onion router that can be used for private browsing, voice and video calls.