Meta's Mark 'Zuck Bucks' Zuckerberg: A Visionary Who Saw 14% Less Profit Coming

PALO ALTO — In a move that financial analysts are calling 'a bold new strategy in the realm of advanced fiscal self-sabotage,' Meta Platforms, Inc. reported a 14% dip in quarterly profits, a direct consequence of its relentless, unfathomable investment in artificial intelligence. Experts, many of whom possess functioning prefrontal cortexes, had apparently failed to account for the phenomenon where one spends an unfathomable sum of money on something with no immediate return, and then... has less money. Zuckerberg, whose public appearances now oscillate between benevolent alien overlord and a man who just learned what 'money' feels like, assured investors that the metaverse, which currently boasts the population density of a deserted Blockbuster Video, will soon be powered by enough sentient algorithms to perfectly simulate the experience of having 14% less money. Meanwhile, Meta staff, reportedly sustained on a diet of Soylent and the rapidly diminishing hopes of mankind, continue to train these algorithms to identify ads for virtual NFTs that nobody will buy, thus ensuring maximum irrelevance for all eternity. Truly, a triumph of human endeavor.