Meta Is Exiting Portal Smart Display Business, Winding Down Work On Smartwatch Projects

Meta is exiting its Portal smart display business and will wind down work on smartwatch projects, reports Reuters citing company executives during an employee townhall meeting on Friday. The news comes two days after Meta announced about 11,000 job cuts, or 13% of its workforce, "the first mass layoffs in the company's 18-year history."

The company's 18-year

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

the first mass layoffs in the company's 18-year history

This sentence only makes sense if you remember that Meta is really old FACEBOOK in this story.

Meta, the bullshit rebrand of Facebook to confuse you into thinking it's not really Facebook, occurred in 2021. Therefore, if you insist on sticking to the Meta name, this is the first mass layoff in the company's 1 year history.

Re: The company's 18-year

[tysonedwards]

If they're interested in AR, then wearables are a big piece so you can track things that won't be visible or obscured from the eyes. Alle iates guesswork and motion estimation.

Re:The company's 18-year

[thomn8r]

They've had a mass layoff every year of their existence!

What to do with the Portals?

[negabit]

so what do we do with all these Portal displays? Will Zuck be cool and make them open source?

Re:

[Jhon]

Id be happy if they allowed the portal TV to just work as a webcam attached to a computer. It's a pretty damn cool cam and worth the $49 price tag (currently at best buy) easily if they can make that happen.

You can jig something using the "photobooth app" and a usb HDMI video capture card... but there's noticeable lag.

Re:

[kriston]

All they need to do is unlock the bootloader and we'll go to town modifying our Portal devices.

Practically, though, the device is next to useless and the "app store" is hardly worthwhile. Most apps don't use voice controls so you're required to be sitting in front of the device tapping the screen. It can't hold a candle to the Echo Show line.

Perhaps with third-party firmware we can actually make use out of it more than just as a photo frame with an exceptionally good-quality, large screen.

It's cool if they wind down all of Meta

[GoHawks]

Love Facebook as an idea, would pay $3 a month if they stopped all the bullshit tracking and and personal information harvesting. Until then, not using the platform.

More nonsense

[azcoyote]

Like everything Zuck does, thus seems like complete stupidity. He blewï¼11 billion on his lame, legless metaverse, and yet therebisn't even an app for watching Facebook livestreams on Roku. He will continue to blow money on fantasies, and yet he's ditching an actual working product. I don't gave a portal and I hate Facebook, but I do think the heavily-advertised product had a chance to be significant. Ditching it at this point is a waste.

Re: More nonsense

[spinitch]

Instead Meta will enter the high fiber supplements business, maybe acquire and existing brand. Hmm which one

End of Social Media as we know it

[fermion]

It really seems like we are exiting an era, like the end of pets.com. The pushback on tracking, the reduction in ad spending, the lack of innovation.

Twitter dies appear to be imploding overnight. Meta does not seem to have a coherent strategy. Unforced error after unforced error. Even google appears to be looking for fall back positions.

I suspect 2025 will be very different from today.

Re:

[alvinrod]

I'd like to think it'll be different in a few years, but social media is a the new drug on the market. People might change brands, but they won't kick the habit so easily. I genuinely believe that in 50 years we'll look at giving a 13 year old a TikTok or Twitter account no different than letting them smoke cigarettes.

Leaving, not exiting

[Generic User Account]

Nothing about Facebook is exiting.

Re:

[kriston]

exiting

That's an interesting use of that word.