#018 When Big Tech Betrays You, Where Do You Turn?
#018 When Big Tech Betrays You, Where Do You Turn?
In the face of Meta's Spark AR shutdown, what should creators do next?
Thumbnail is a new segment from This Outfit Does Not Exist. As a complement to my technology deep dives, thumbnails are a shorter, more personalised, set of musings on the future of fashion and tech. If this sounds exciting please:
This week’s thumbnail saw an about-turn following Meta’s announcement they were shutting down Meta Spark. As I’m rushing to offer my thoughts to affected creators, I’m writing this from my family holiday in Scotland whilst wearing a Zombie Girl Face Filter by paigepiskin and a jumper by 032C.
The thumbnail
On Tuesday, Meta announced they’d be removing the work of 600,000 creators from the platform in the next 5 months.
On January 14, 2025, creators will no longer be able to log into Meta Spark Studio, Meta Spark Player or Meta Spark Hub. On the same date, third-party effects will no longer be visible on Meta platforms like Instagram, Facebook and Messenger. Users will no longer see third-party AR Effects when accessing the camera.
— The Meta Spark Team
The announcement came as part of the company’s decision to cull Meta Spark — an augmented reality (AR) toolkit provided by the platform since 2017. Meta Spark allowed creators to make AR filters that could be used on Instagram, Facebook and Messenger, as well as in countless games. At the time of the announcement creators from 190 countries had made AR work with Meta Spark used by ‘hundreds of millions of users’, ‘billions of times’ according to Meta itself.
In the words of TechCrunch reporter Sarah Perez, nothing about Meta’s announcement suggests that the closure of Meta Spark stemmed from a lack of traction. So, as I think we can all agree, it seems like a bit of a dick move.
Having said that, in the 4 years since its rebrand, Meta Platforms Inc, has lost a reported $50 billion through its metaverse-focused division Reality Labs. While Zuckerberg is not axing Reality Labs just yet, he has been periodically chopping off Meta’s other metaverse-infected limbs. In 2022 Meta announced it would be shutting down Portal and in March 2023 it declared intentions to ‘wind down’ NFT efforts.
But even in light of these moves Meta Spark’s closure hits different.
The announcement comes less than 4 years after Mark’s lengthy founders letter committing to ‘help build ecosystems so that more people have a stake in the future and can benefit not just as consumers but as creators’, and 2 years after Meta launched its $1 billion Creator Grant.
If this weren’t bad enough, this current closure does a lot more than disenfranchise consumers with the end of a service. The deletion of Meta Spark involves Meta removing all user generated AR work from its platforms and archiving the Meta Spark Community Group that supports over 141,000 AR-creating members with community-led resources.
Taking all this into account it’s hard not to see Tuesday’s announcement as a betrayal. Meta’s only advice to its over half a billion (mostly grieving) creators is to ‘download and save your project files, assets and demo videos prior to January 14, 2025'.
But where are these creators — left without tool kits, support networks, and income streams — meant to turn?
The double click
Most modern societies are built on John Locke’s theory that man holds the rights to the fruits of his labor. Locke argued that only by protecting man’s rights to the work he produces, will that work persist. Put simply if you think your work could be taken away from you at any point, why would you bother working at all?
Comments across Meta and Reddit make it clear this question is front of mind for many newly disenfranchised creators.
Filter creator Adrian Steckeweh, aka. omega.c, posted an Instagram story yesterday detailing the thoughts of the group:
‘Most of us are accepting the situation, but some of us are suddenly robbed of their main income source… I feel for everybody suffering from this. I’m not sure if we deserve this after all of our efforts, but I guess it’s just business’ — omega.c
Other AR leaders like Johanna Johwska and Ines Alpha have further echoed his sentiment in both stories and posts.
In spite of petitions imploring Meta not to shut down the service it's most likely that January 14th will be the last day for filters on Meta. So, I’ve spent the past 48 hours detailing the three most obvious paths affected creators could take next:
Move to another big tech platform:
If you’re a creator looking for the most obvious post-Spark step, using a software like Lens Studio or Effect House and reuploading your filters is the most solid and simple option
Snap’s Lens Studio and TikTok’s Effect House are currently used by an estimated 330,000 and 400,000 creators respectively. Both offer similar propositions to Meta in providing an in-house AR toolkit, access to hundreds-of-millions of active users and opportunities for monetisation from both in-platform creator-payouts and brand sponsorships.
BUT whilst you’ll get similar benefits on Snap and TikTok as you would on Meta, the platforms come with the same risks. After all, if Meta Spark can be deleted, with no justification, from one day to the next, who says Lens Studio or Effect House will be any different…?Use open source softwares:
Open Source softwares are defined as softwares with source codes that anyone can inspect, modify, and enhance. Usually released under a license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, change, and distribute the software freely, open source tools are developed transparently and owned by no one.
A cursory look across Facebook and Instagram shows Unity, Blendr, Needle and Blippar as popular open source or platform agnostic resorts for Meta Spark creators in the face of their exodus. These softwares allow their creators to feel secure that their work won’t disappear at a moment’s notice, and can be moved across the web.
BUT most open source tools come with a steeper learning curve than creator toolkits like Effect House or Lens Studio, and equally lack comparable traction with users and brands. Many of AR creators' largest clients dislike the friction of opening a web page to access filters. Plus WebAR suffers from the need for a perfect internet connection in order to display its high-quality graphics. On top of that most of those who pay for augmented reality do so from a need to up social media engagement. So whilst the traction of open source products are growing, a place to deliver the fruits of creator labour to an abundance of users is still needed.Leverage blockchain-based platforms:
For creators suffering from PTSD after Meta’s about-turn, and for those to whom monetisation is a must, blockchain-based apps like Filta, though nascent, are a compelling place to look.
Though NFTs have gotten a bad name in recent years, blockchain technologies allow creators to own their work and get paid from it, as detailed in my piece Non-Fungible Fashion.
Filta specifically, allows users to upload any AR project with no wait time or permission holds. Optimised for face filters (much like Instagram) it combines Unity powered graphics and face tracking by Apple, with a direct-to-consumer (D2C) marketplace where AR work can bought and sold. Plus as it’s all built on blockchain work uploaded to Filta can never be deleted!!!
BUT whilst as a Web3 evangelist I’d recommend any creator head over to MetaMask, set up a wallet, and give Filta a go, it's still worth noting that Web3 tools are higher friction than their Web2 counterparts. Plus, for those searching for sponsorships (rather than monetising D2C) many brands are icked out by the any reference to Web3. (For now..)
Zooming Out
A few years ago I had the honour of moderating this conversation with Yat Siu, the entrepreneur behind $5.9 billion metaverse company Animoca Brands.
Siu described the current state of the internet as a feudal system, where ‘Lords’ (Mark Zuckerberg of Meta, Evan Spiegel of Snapchat, Shou Zi Chew of TikTok etc.) presided over ‘peasants’ (their platform’s users) reaping the benefits of their labor (creations and data) to grow at their users’ expense.
To Siu a new equitable internet will only be realised when big tech’s users revolt—so fed up with their own exploitation that they refuse to use platforms like Meta under the status quo. Naive as it may sound, the closure of Meta Spark seems to me like something close to a catalyst. However, for this revolution to be realised creators need a better place to turn.
It’s apparent that tools are not the problem for those making AR. What’s needed is a place to get their work used and seen. With this in mind, decentralised social media sites like Lens and Farcaster could pose an interesting alternative to Snap and TikTok if they commit to building-out AR support.
The aim of decentralised social media is to give users control over their information, so platforms’ use blockchain to allow each post to be owned by its creators. This allows creators to monetise the work they share, and gives them the security that each post/filter is immutably stored, never to be deleted. What’s more, its highly likely that over time platforms like Lens will transition to a decentralised token governance model. Whereby its users, rather than its execs, can decide which tools are prioritised and built.
Imagine if that was the reality on Meta.
BUT as of August 29th, whilst this brave new world is still coming into existence, I’d advise creators to hedge on the side of practicality. Yes, get a MetaMask and download Filta, but also migrate your work over to SNAP and TikTok.
And if there are any ways I can support, please let me know.
— Dani 👽
I am currently compiling a list of the tools, platforms, communities and educational resources that can help with the transition away from Meta Spark. So if you have any resources that could be useful please reply to this newsletter or DM me on Instagram at @thisoutfitdoesnotexist
Yes this is a great use case for blockchains. I didn’t know a market for filters existed.