Marketing campaign in Iceland mocks Mark Zuckerberg’s metavers in tourism advertising
A new marketing campaign for Icelandic tourism targets Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, and mocks his recent video announcement about the company’s name change to Meta.
The video, released by Inspired by Iceland, a public-private entity promoting Iceland and its products, featured a Zuckerberg lookalike named “Zack Mossbergsson” and identified as Iceland’s visionary chief.
Throughout the parody, Mossbergsson laughs at Zuckerberg’s infamous stiffness.
“Hello and welcome to this very natural setting,” Mossbergsson poses quietly to the camera.
“Today I want to talk about a revolutionary approach to connecting the world without being super weird.”[ads1];
“Someone said it was not possible. Someone said it was out of reach. To them we say it is already here. Seriously. Look, it’s right here, he adds as he gestures out the window to a snow-covered Icelandic landscape.
Mossbergsson goes on to introduce “Icelandverse”, which is, as he describes it, “actually improved reality without stupid headsets” – a clear digging of Zuckerberg’s ambitions for a so-called metavers virtual reality world.
“It is completely immersive with water that is wet,” Mossbergsson continues, adding that “Icelandverse” comes complete with “sky you can see with the eyeballs.”
The Icelandic verse is unlike any other open world experience with ‘-vers’ in the name, because it is real. Besides, you do not need a VR headset that looks fun “, it says in the caption of the video on YouTube.
Zuckerberg responded to the video on Facebook and took it easy.
“Fantastic. I have to take a trip to Islandverse soon. Glad you’ve wearing sunscreen too,” he said, referring to a scene in the video where Mossbergsson’s face is filled with sunscreen, mimicking an embarrassing incident for Zuckerberg last year.
The video had received more than 274,000 views on YouTube late Friday.
“Metaverse” has become a major talking point in corporate America since Facebook announced the rebrand last month, with companies from Nike and Disney to the dating app Bumble talking about how they will exploit what some believe will be the next development of the internet.
The term, coined in the 1992 sci-fi book “Snow Crash,” refers to next-generation Internet access through augmented and virtual reality hardware.
In a demo introduced by Zuckerberg last month, one user walked with headsets through the streets of ancient Rome, while another attended a virtual reality rock concert and afterparty.
Zuckerberg said the company plans to spend billions of dollars on developing the meta-verse, adding that he hopes to get 1 billion people to join the virtual world over the next ten years. Advertising dollars from Facebook’s core products will complement the development of the augmented reality project, which the company has said will not be profitable for several years.
Representatives of Facebook did not immediately return The Post’s request for comment on the “Icelandverse” video.
