I wonder if in the Meta offices they will have already created a new working group to think about the next name that the company will adopt in the medium term (it would still be too soon, of course). And yes, it is true that the alleged reason for the name change, from Facebook to Meta, was a declaration of intent about the importance of the metaverse in their future plans. But it is clear to many of us that, in reality, the main reason for the change is to try to detach the brand, as much as possible, from all the bad news carried out by Facebook.
However, it seems that the measure will not be especially effective in this regard, and who would have imagined it? Problems last even if you change your name. And, what is worse, new problems associated with your old actions may appear. The past prevails, and now it threatens to tarnish the new name, which has lasted a very, very short time without stain. Every day the voluntary departure of the company’s head of public relations is better understood.
And it is that, as we can read in Bloomberg, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC), as well as several states, are conducting an investigation into Oculus, the virtual reality division of Meta, for possible anti-competitive practices, as reported to the media by people with access to said information. Information according to which Meta could be acting outside the law to try to consolidate its position in said market.
The first of the doubts arises from the price of Meta VR devices, substantially cheaper than those of the competition. This, by itself, would not be a problem, of course, unless unfair competition techniques are being adopted to do so, such as dumping, which basically consists of selling products or services below cost price, assuming said losses. , to gain control of the market and expel the competition. In the short term, of course, it means losing a lot of money, but if it can be maintained until all the competition has fallen, we will have gained absolute control of the market, and we can do what we please.
In other words, we are talking about trying to “buy” a monopoly by driving all the competition out of the market. This method, of course, is persecuted by many countries, and regulators are vigilant to prevent this from happening, as it goes directly against competition.
The other front of the Meta investigation by Oculus has to do with its relationship with the developers. And there is developers who have reported that Meta uses his position of power to trip him up to companies that offer third-party games and services on the Oculus platform. They allege that, at the same time, the company copies the most promising ideas and makes it difficult for some applications to work correctly in Meta’s virtual reality ecosystem.
The investigation is at an early stage. and, at least for now, is not public. However, the problem is not only that another burning front opens up for Meta, it is that it also directly affects its future plans with the metaverse, a concept that theoretically sounds very interesting, but in practice It is still a long way from being truly feasible, as other technology companies such as Intel have already stated.
