Facebook cancels its F8 developer conference amid growing concerns around COVID-19, says it is planning “locally hosted events” and livestreamed content instead

Facebook said Thursday it's cancelling its annual F8 developers conference, the social media giant's biggest event of the year …

CNET 2020-02-28 Queenie Wong

Context & Ripple Effects

F8 was already the second cancellation in two weeks: Facebook had scrapped its Global Marketing Summit at Moscone Center earlier in February, and days later pulled out of the Game Developers Conference alongside Sony, moving Oculus announcements online. The pattern across that fortnight was consistent — Facebook substituting digital channels for every large physical gathering on its calendar.

First-order effects

Thousands of developers who rely on F8 for Facebook platform and tooling announcements lose their single annual touchpoint, with livestreams and locally hosted events replacing the keynote-and-sessions format.
Facebook's own product teams must repackage launches — including Oculus hardware news — for online distribution rather than a stage audience.

Second-order effects

San Francisco venues and the corporate-events supply chain around them lose anchor bookings as Facebook extends the same logic that killed the Moscone summit to its biggest event of the year.
Rival platforms face the same exposure calculus for their own developer conferences, accelerating whatever virtual-format contingency plans they had on paper.

Third-order effects

The physical mega-conference may not come back even after the health risk passes: the coverage shows F8 shrinking into a single-day, virtual-only F8 Refresh without a Zuckerberg keynote in 2021, then dissolving entirely by 2022 into separate business-messaging and AR/VR events.

The trend: Big-platform developer conferences are being permanently unbundled from physical venues, replaced by always-on digital channels targeted at narrower audiences.

Discussion

@briansumers Brian Sumers on x
You can see where all of this is going, and it's not good, for airlines or any other travel-related industry. https://twitter.com/...
@leahmcelrath @leahmcelrath on x
Zuck likely has much better info than we all do, so I'd pay attention to this cancellation: #COVID19 https://twitter.com/...
@futureshift @futureshift on x
Facebook's playing it safe https://mashable.com/...
@harrymccracken Harry McCracken on x
It's possible 2020 will be the year without a developer-conference season. https://www.cnet.com/...
@khanoisseur @khanoisseur on x
Apple could cancel its annual conference too. Could save airlines and hotels from emitting lots of planet-warming, travel-related emissions, but also “bad for the economy”—which relies on spending to increase GDP metric that many politicians love to tout as sign of progress. http…
@markgurman Mark Gurman on x
WWDC is only a month later https://twitter.com/...
@chillmage @chillmage on x
Facebook should send everyone an Oculus headset free of charge so we can meet remotely https://twitter.com/...
@caro_milanesi Carolina Milanesi on x
Let's see who follows Facebook in cancelling developers events. May is a heavy event month https://twitter.com/...
@waltmossberg Walt Mossberg on x
This is a rare example of @Facebook being voluntarily responsible. It's a big deal for them. And it's a sign of just how seriously U.S.-based companies are beginning to take the Coronavirus. https://twitter.com/...
@cat_zakrzewski Cat Zakrzewski on x
Facebook canceled its annual developers' conference due to coronavirus. Many big tech companies have spring conferences, so this could be just the beginning of cancellations https://developers.facebook.com/ ...
@lamonicabuzz Paul R. La Monica on x
Wow. Facebook cancelling F8 developer conference due to coronavirus fears. $FB says “this was a tough call to make...but we need to prioritize the health and safety of our developer partners, employees and everyone who helps put F8 on.” https://developers.facebook.com/ ...
@neilcybart Neil Cybart on x
Facebook just canceled the in-person component of its developer conference scheduled for early May. If the current environment doesn't improve in the coming weeks, it's logical to assume every major company will follow suit. https://developers.facebook.com/ ... https://twitter.co…
@campuscodi Catalin Cimpanu on x
After Facebook postponed BountyCon yesterday, the writing was on the wall for F8. You can postpone a small conference. You can't postpone something as big as F8. https://twitter.com/...
@caseynewton Casey Newton on x
This is a bummer for a lot of reasons, but any time you can take one fewer trip to San Jose in a year I consider it a win https://www.theverge.com/...
@wongmjane Jane Manchun Wong on x
I wonder if Facebook will be able to leverage the VR tech to give presentations in avatars instead (if they plan not to give ones in person) https://twitter.com/...
@cwarzel Charlie Warzel on x
think conferences will be the biggest thing that are preemptively cancelled. it's basically non-essential travel and human contact. nobody wants to get sick to network. and no conference wants to be known as the epicenter of an outbreak https://twitter.com/...
@kantrowitz Alex Kantrowitz on x
Instead of hosting a big F8 in San Jose, Facebook will program “locally hosted events, videos and live-streamed content.” This is what many conferences, tech and otherwise, will look like in the coming year. https://developers.facebook.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
@sarahfrier Sarah Frier on x
Wow, Facebook cancels the in-person part of F8 due to Coronavirus... and the conference is all the way in May. https://developers.facebook.com/ ...
@qwongsj Queenie Wong on x
Facebook cancels its F8 developer conference, the social network's biggest event of the year, over coronavirus concerns. Instead, the company plans to gather developers through locally hosted events, videos and live streamed content. https://www.cnet.com/...

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