---
title: "Zuckerberg’s AI Glasses Guy Is Named Rocco Basilico"
description: "The guy who's spearheading Meta's AI-powered smart glasses is named Rocco Basilico — which matches a internet theory called Roko's basilisk."
date: "2025-09-27"
modified: "2025-09-27"
authors:
  - name: "Sharon Adarlo"
    job_title: "Correspondent"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/sadarlo"
url: "https://futurism.com/future-society/mark-zuckerberg-ai-glasses-rocco-basilico"
categories:
  - "Artificial Intelligence"
  - "Computing"
  - "Devices"
  - "Future Society"
  - "Meta"
  - "Metaverse"
  - "Robots and Machines"
  - "The Industrialists"
  - "Virtual Reality"
---

# Zuckerberg’s AI Glasses Guy Is Named Rocco Basilico

![The guy who's spearheading Meta's AI-powered smart glasses is named Rocco Basilico — which matches a internet theory called Roko's basilisk.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/mark-zuckerberg-ai-glasses-rocco-basilico.jpg>)
*Photo Illustration by Tag Hartman-Simkins / Futurism. Image ources: Craig Barritt / Andrej Sokolow / picture alliance via Getty Images*

In the darker corners of the tech industry, an untold number of professionals have come to [believe](<https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/04/technology/rationalists-ai-lighthaven.html>) in a controversial theory known as [Roko's basilisk](<https://www.lesswrong.com/w/rokos-basilisk>), which holds that a future AI super intelligence [would torture](<https://www.vice.com/en/article/what-is-rokos-basilisk-elon-musk-grimes/>) any human who didn't help it come into existence.

Now, in a twist that should please any writer, the guy who's spearheading Meta's AI-powered smart glasses is named [Rocco Basilico](<https://www.forbes.com/profile/rocco-basilico-1/>) — which has delighted and freaked out some online observers.

"I grabbed my head in horror hearing that a man named ROCCO BASILICO is designing ANYTHING to do with artificial intelligence," [one person posted on X](<https://x.com/kyukitsuragi/status/1968831262535176607>). "That's genuinely the worst possible name he could have."

"Nominative determinism at its worst," [one Redditor quipped](<https://www.reddit.com/r/behindthebastards/comments/1nn5ev8/comment/nfietaq/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button>).

Kidding aside, Basilico is the scion of the family that owns EssilorLuxottica, the biggest eyeglass company in the world and parent company of sunglass brand Ray-Ban, and is the firm's chief wearables officer, [according to *Forbes*](<https://www.forbes.com/profile/rocco-basilico-1/>).

Basilico came into Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg's orbit when he [cold emailed Zuck](<https://x.com/tbpn/status/1968512859044000240>) with a pitch about a partnership, which has resulted in the now increasingly popular and AI-enhanced Meta Ray-Bans smart glasses, with plans to manufacture [10 million of these specs next year](<https://www.theverge.com/news/613292/meta-ray-ban-2-million-10-million-capacity-subscription-essilor-luxottica-earnings>).

Meta introduced its first smart spectacles with Ray-Ban [back in 2021](<https://about.fb.com/news/2021/09/introducing-ray-ban-stories-smart-glasses>), and has come out with successive iterations since, with the latest one demonstrated in an embarrassingly [glitchy showcase](<https://futurism.com/meta-disastrous-smart-glasses-demo-worse>) earlier this month in which the AI hallucinated and gave wrong instructions during a cooking demo, among other fails.

For any conspiracy theorists wondering why the name of Zuckerberg's AI glasses guy aligns with a nightmarish internet theory that inspired not just [tech billionaire Elon Musk and music star Grimes to hook up](<https://pagesix.com/2018/05/07/elon-musk-quietly-dating-musician-grimes/>) but also a [murderous cult](<https://longreads.com/2025/02/26/the-delirious-violent-impossible-true-story-of-the-zizians/>), sleep easy: the demo clearly showed that the glasses [weren't quite ready](<https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/20/technology/personaltech/meta-smart-glasses-mark-zuckerberg.html>) for prime time.

Or maybe that's what a malevolent super intelligence would want us to think. But we'll be keeping an eye on this guy.

**More on Meta:** *[Meta’s Disastrous Smart Glasses Demo Even Worse Than We Thought](<https://futurism.com/meta-disastrous-smart-glasses-demo-worse>)*