Facebook CEO Nick Clegg announced this in a blog post. “This investment is a sign of confidence in Europe’s strong tech industry and the potential of European tech talent,” the former British Deputy Prime Minister wrote.
By ‘metaverse’, Facebook means a world in which the physical reality and the cyber world merge through augmented reality and virtual reality. The term comes from the American writer Neal Stephenson, who first used it in his science fiction novel ‘Snow Crash’ (1992).
Clegg, who is in charge of the group’s ‘foreign affairs’, writes that Facebook is at the beginning of an adventure to build the future platform. “Together with other partners, we are developing what is often referred to as the metaverse – a new step in interconnected virtual experiences by using technologies such as augmented reality,” it said. The metaverse has the potential to enable access to new creative, social and economic opportunities. However, no one will own or control the metaverse. ‘Like the internet, the most important property will be openness and interoperability.’
Clegg also emphasizes that Europe is essential to Facebook. “From the thousands of employees in the EU to the millions of companies that use our apps and tools every day, Europe is a big part of our success.”
“As we begin our journey to bring the metaverse to life, the search for specialist engineers is one of Facebook’s top priorities,” Clegg said. “We look forward to working with governments across the EU to find the right people and the right markets to move forward as part of a recruitment wave in the region.”
The aim is to hire 10,000 people in the next five years. Facebook’s announcement comes when the American group is under a lot of pressure after the revelations of former Facebook responsible Frances Haugen. She stated that Facebook has been slow to act against hate messages outside the United States. The company would also know from its research that its apps harm the mental health of some young users.
Facebook also made negative headlines earlier this month due to a six-hour outage at its various apps. The same day (Sunday) that Clegg published his blog post, The Wall Street Journal made another revelation: The company’s algorithms to detect and remove hate messages are barely working.
