People are abandoning Facebook in droves causing Zuckerberg to lose billions

When in doubt, blame it on TikTok.

In this case, Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Meta, is blaming it on TikTok. According to Meta's last quarterly earnings report, Facebook users declined by roughly 1 million.

In Q3 Meta reported 1.93 billion active daily users, in Q4 it was 1.929 billion. Zuckerberg attributed the loss of users to other platforms, "We face a competitor in TikTok that is a lot bigger, so it will take a while to compound and catch up there" he said in a conference.

This is the first time Facebook's ever reported a decline in daily users. So naturally, following the report Facebook's stock plummeted by 22%.

Zuckerberg said they would be pushing to monetize Reels - a short video format equivalent to TikTok but for Facebook and Instagram.

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However, some are highlighting the drop in daily users revealing a small hole in the company's focus.

Meta announced its name change and new product, the metaverse, in October 2021 at the beginning of Q4. The company has been pushing the metaverse, messaging, and Instagram video to users rather than updating and evolving its other products like Facebook. Leading some to believe dedicated Facebook users are fed up.

Zuckerberg seems to be banking on the metaverse's success to keep users happily returning. But with more whistleblowers and legal troubles headed their way it's unclear if Meta will prevail.

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