Facebook's name

[View in browser]( [Bloomberg]( Hi, it’s Drake in New York. Speculation about a possible rebranding for Facebook could be addressed at the company’s AR and VR event Thursday. But first… Today’s top tech news: - Twitter stock had its worst day in six months after it issued a [disappointing forecast]( - Microsoft’s market cap is [catching up]( to Apple’s - Robinhood users want to be able to buy [Shiba Inu]( cryptocurrency What’s in a name One of the minor characters In “Turn of the Century,” the semi-satirical 1999 novel by Kurt Andersen, is a journalist-turned-marketing impresario named Zip Ingram who goes to the National Lamb Board and convinces them that their product would benefit from a refresh. “They need a new name for lamb that isn’t so beastly,” Ingram explains to a friend, “that doesn’t remind Americans they’re eating a cute animal.” He does his research, looking overseas for options—“hammelfleisch” tests well—before settling on his own piece de resistance: “baby mutton.” “It’s classic, ‘mutton,’” Ingram says. “But ‘baby mutton’ is totally new and just a little sexy, right? Stylish.” It’s easy to mock rebranding. The exercise has the whiff of desperation and obsolescence and middle-aged vanity. But Andersen’s National Lamb Board (IRL, it’s the American Lamb Board, apparently) is not the first institution to place its faith in the power of communication to finesse away squeamishness. This week, Facebook Inc., with its more than 3 billion users and nearly $900 billion market capitalization, may also roll out a new name for itself, according to reporting by the Verge [earlier this month](. At 10 a.m. California time the company will kick off its annual Connect conference, dedicated to augmented reality and virtual reality technology. The Verge reported that the company may reveal its new brand identify during the event. But Facebook as a company, product and brand is so ingrained in the global psyche that overhauling its image would be extremely difficult. Joshua Glenn is, like the fictional Zip Ingram, a former journalist (we were colleagues at the Boston Globe) who now serves as a brand consultant. Glenn’s work draws heavily on semiotics, the Continental-theory-steeped study of how meaning is encoded into signs and speech. He’s particularly intrigued by the widely reported idea that Mark Zuckerberg wants the new Facebook to present itself no longer as a social network but as the portal, through software and hardware, to the so-called “metaverse”—a nerdier term for virtual reality. The term “metaverse” itself is a loaded one, coined in Neal Stephenson’s 1992 science-fiction novel Snow Crash, which describes a future where corporations and organized crime wield Facebook-like power over an otherwise lawless world. “How do you represent that in a very iconic, simple, gettable way?” Glenn said. More importantly, if you’re Facebook, how do you represent it in a way that doesn’t freak out a public already leery of you? Whatever effect a rebranding would have—if it did have one at all—will take awhile to emerge. But even if it doesn’t happen, or it fails to achieve its goals, the very idea is suggestive. Facebook, after all, has two big problems right now. First: It’s scary. Second: It’s uncool. The fact that it has gone all-in as the real-world avatar of a dystopian but darkly sexy techno-future suggests that it sees the second one as the far greater threat. —[Drake Bennett](mailto:dbennett35@bloomberg.net) If you read one thing Meet the man in charge of [Facebook’s hardware]( as the company pivots toward AR and VR. Here’s what you need to know DeFi protocol Cream Finance suffered yet [another hack](—this time totaling $130 million. EBay’s investors worry its pandemic [glow is fading](. The European Commission warned that Nvidia’s bid for U.K. chip developer [Arm risks]( bringing “higher prices, less choice and reduced innovation.” Follow Us More from Bloomberg Dig gadgets or video games? [Sign up for Power On]( to get Apple scoops, consumer tech news and more in your inbox on Sundays. [Sign up for Game On]( to go deep inside the video game business, delivered on Fridays. Why not try both?  Like Fully Charged? | [Get unlimited access to Bloomberg.com](, where you'll find trusted, data-based journalism in 120 countries around the world and expert analysis from exclusive daily newsletters. You received this message because you are subscribed to Bloomberg's Fully Charged newsletter. If a friend forwarded you this message, [sign up here]( to get it in your inbox. [Unsubscribe]( [Bloomberg.com]( [Contact Us]( Bloomberg L.P. 731 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10022 [Ads Powered By Liveintent]( [Ad Choices](