It should come as no surprise that Meta, the company behind Facebook and Instagram, is looking for more ways to make money. The company experienced its first layoffs (ever) recently, shedding 13% of its workforce in a stroke.
The chaps on the WhatsApp and Messenger teams, as well as the metaverse group, are relatively safe because Zuckerberg reckons that’s where the money is. VR hardware is the company’s only remaining hardware and now a relatively untapped resource is about to be tapped. That may raise cash for the social network, but users are almost certainly getting the short end of the stick.
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Making money for Meta
Meta has had its eye on turning a profit from WhatsApp and Messenger for some time now. Actually pulling it off has proved to be more difficult than expected, however. The pair of apps, according to Zuckerberg, is currently “very early in monetizing”.
This means that users of both WhatsApp and Messenger can expect changes designed to generate revenue. At the moment, these changes all appear to be business-focused. Some of these, like the ability to search for businesses inside WhatsApp, are already on the way. But there will be more of them.
“We talk a lot about the very long-term opportunities like the metaverse, but the reality is that business messaging is probably going to be the next major pillar of our business as we work to monetize WhatsApp and Messenger more,” Zuckerberg said last week.
In other words, the company still thinks the metaverse will eventually be a thing. In the meantime, the fertile ground of its messaging apps will be subject to some farming of funds for the future.
Source: Reuters