Word on the grapevine is that social media nightmare platform Facebook is planning on changing its name. This mighty rebrand, according toThe Verge, is happening for one reason:the metaverse.In more real terms, the Zuck wants to position Facebook as more than a social media company. On the information we have, it seems this move is likeGoogle reorganizing under the Alphabet name. That means it’s unlikely the Facebook app itself will receive a name change, instead there’ll be an umbrella business that all the company’s separate units sit under....

Reutersreportsthat Facebook’s revenue for the first half of 2011 hit $1.6bn, with its Net income falling just short of $500 million. Reuters’ source chose to remain anonymous, given that Facebook is still a private company and doesn’t publicly disclose its financial details. Last December, it wasreportedthat Facebook was on track for $2bn revenue in 2011, and if this latest report proves accurate, then it’s on course to more than meet that figure....

You might remember back in April whenFacebook introducedits Send button. The idea was that you could use it to send a link or story (or just about any other content) to any of your Facebook friends or an email address without having to publicly “Like” it. The advantage of the system is that it has allowed for more private sharing. It seems like this is something that people have wanted to do, as Facebook is stating in a post to theDeveloper Blogthat over 100,000 websites have implemented the buttons....

Facebook’s smart glasses ambitions are in the news again. The company has launched a worldwide project dubbedEgo4Dto research new uses for smart glasses. In September, Facebook unveiled itsRay-Ban Stories glasses, which have two cameras and three microphones built-in. The glasses capture audio and video so wearers can record their experiences and interactions. The research project aims to add augmented reality features to smart glasses using artificial intelligence technologies that could provide wearers with a wealth of information, including the ability to get answers to questions like “Where did I leave my keys?...

Advertisers and brands that run ad campaigns on Facebook will know that sponsored stories provide an incredible return on investment, as a viral ad platform that drives new fans to Pages and spawns incredible word of mouth marketing. One of the reasons that sponsored stories work so well is that friends of fans don’t necessarily realise that what they’re seeing is an ad, because you’re not directly advertising a product or promotion, but feeding back organic Page activity to people’s walls....