Twitterati in a froth over names for Facebook’s rumoured rebrand

Zuckerverse. Timesuck. Faceplant … these are a just a few of the names being bandied around online after reports that Facebook plans to rebrand itself with a new group name. The group would not comment on rumour or speculation, of course, but the Twitterati had no problem.

The debate careered from sensible to screwball to strange.

Meta was one of the more sober suggestions, referring to Facebook’s reported desire to assume a name that focuses on the metaverse, a virtual environment where users can hang out. Others were Bookface, Facegram, Facetagram, FreeFace, FreeTalk, World Changer.

On the wilder side, Twitter user Dave Pell drew a comparison with musician Kanye West who recently changed his name to Ye. “It would be awesome if Facebook changes its name to Ye,” he said.

Several humorous suggestions reflected online speculation that the alleged rebrand was driven by founder Mark Zuckerberg’s yearning to make Facebook cool again. Many younger users moved to apps like Instagram, Snapchat and TikTok, and Facebook is increasingly used by older people. Boomerville, suggested Marco, referring to baby boomers born after World War 2.

The online naming frenzy was sparked by a report on the Verge tech site that a newly named group would act as parent for all the group’s brands, including Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, and reflect a focus on virtual and augmented reality.

An announcement is expected next week, according to the report.

Suggestions such as Fakebook and Tracebook reflected public concern about user safety and hate speech. Internal documents leaked by a whistleblower formed the basis for a US Senate hearing last week.

Other people doubted that a name change would detract from mounting legal and regulatory scrutiny that has tarnished the group’s reputation.

“It’s going to be the Barbra Streisand effect thing going on,” said 20-year old Glasgow student Thomas van der Hoven, referring to the phenomenon where seeking to suppress something inadvertently revives popular interest in it.

“So they’re going to try and change it, and then that’s just going to put the spotlight on the fact that they’re changing it.

“Why are they changing this?” It’s probably going to spit back in their face at some point,” said van der Hoven.