21923 - SCTE Broadband Aug2023 COMPLETE v1 (1)

67 Vol. 45 No. 3 - September 2023 Issue from the industry only 13 months earlier, in September 2021, the stock was trading at over $360 per share. While the stock has steadily recovered, it’s important to point out the obvious elephant in the room. It hasn’t recovered because the Metaverse is finally becoming a (virtual) reality and living up to the hype. It’s not because the entry-point devices—some of which cost an eye-watering $1500—have been widely adopted and well received. No, the stock has recovered because Meta fired a lot of employees and branded 2023 as a “year of efficiency.” And that efficiency also marks the end of Zuckerberg’s delusional optimism surrounding the Metaverse. It won’t come with a press release, flashy statement, or another rebranding effort—because that would involve admitting failure—but it appears Zuckerberg has put his Metaverse dreams on ice. And he’s already ready to pivot from the pivot and capitalize on the newest shiny object. Meta joins the AI grift shift “I believe that we are working on some of the most transformative technology our industry has ever seen. Our single largest investment is in advancing AI and building it into every one of our products.” Those were the words of Zuckerberg in a recent update on Meta’s year of efficiency. In a completely shocking move, Meta is reverting to the Copy-Acquire-Kill playbook, abandoning any form of innovation in pursuit of the current popular thing. Which, of course, is all things AI, and stuffing them into as many products and services as possible. It appears Meta has been busy playing catch up. The company debuted LLaMA, an AI large language model, in early March. What it can do isn’t entirely clear because Zuckerberg didn’t offer many details in his announcement post. How it stacks up against competitors is even less clear. Shortly after came the announcement that the company was developing AI personas and considering other ways to implement artificial intelligence into its suite of products. What I think we’ll see is the company looking to use AI to improve ad targeting, something that has been hampered by Apple and the economic pullback. They will likely dabble in adding it into its content management and moderation systems, which still proves to be a stumbling block. I also think this might prove disastrous. With the company’s history on that front and the huge issues AI models face with accuracy and guardrails, incorporating a poorly trained or thought-out AI model into moderation policy could make things even worse. Yet, the cynic in me thinks it’s not about any of that. It’s not about innovating, or improving products, or because the company holds true beliefs in AI I think it’s more reasonable to assume it’s more of a PR manoeuver. Simply put, the Metaverse has lost its shine, and the cool kids have moved onto AI. Talking it up, and the fanciful ways it can be integrated into WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram gives the company some breathing room and helps them stay relevant. Credit: Stephen Moore