Mark Zuckerberg’s metaverse has become a thing of memes and parodies but the billionaire remains unfazed by the criticism.
To say the metaverse has had some bad press lately would be an understatement.
‘Mark Zuckerberg’s metaverse vision is over’, ‘How Mark Zuckerberg’s metaverse gamble backfired’, ‘Skepticism, confusion, frustration: Inside Mark Zuckerberg’s metaverse struggles’ are some of the headlines on the subject.
Either the ego of a billionaire doesn’t bruise easy or maybe he’s in too deep to go back now.
Whatever the case, the company hasn’t stopped building products for the metaverse.
In a chat with Metro.co.uk, Vishal Shah, Meta’s VP of Metaverse, described it as ‘the next version of the internet’. If that’s true, we’re all going to be hanging out there someday.
After the recent bloodbath of layoffs where the company cut down its workforce from 87,000 to about 66,000 employees, the remaining staff continue grinding away on metaverse products.
This week, Meta even released some updates on their ‘Meta avatars’. Yes, those underbaked renderings of Mr Zuckerberg that became an internet meme.
Meta avatars are 3D images of yourself that can be used across Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger. They are designed to represent users in virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) experiences.
More than a billion Meta avatars have been created to-date, according to the company, even if we don’t know anyone who’s actively using them.
The latest update will allow people using Messenger and Instagram to get on real-time calls with their avatars.
They are ‘the path to getting people to experience parts of the metaverse before they can necessarily be in a fully immersive experience in VR’, explained Mr Shah.
‘A lot of people assume that when we talk about the metaverse we assume it’s virtual reality and it only works in inside of a VR headset,’ he said.
‘That might be the most immersive way to experience the internet, but it is not the only way. In fact, we think most people will probably experience the metaverse on their phones or on a computer.’
Meta seems to have figured out that their problem with the metaverse is no one actually wants to be ‘in’ there.
With updates like this, the company is hoping to get people familiar with the idea of using an avatar of themselves on apps they use everyday before they’d want to spend all their time in a non-existent metaverse.
Now, people will be able to use animated avatar stickers in their chats on WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram.
After all, more than 100 million were created on WhatsApp in the first month that it was announced, Mr Shah says.
In 2022, Meta spent $13.7 billion on its Reality Labs division, which is responsible for developing metaverse products. This includes the Oculus Quest 2 VR headset, the Horizon Worlds social VR platform, and the Spark AR augmented reality platform.
Meta has said that it plans to invest $19.2 billion in Reality Labs in 2023. The company has also said that it expects to lose money on the metaverse for the next several years, as it invests in developing the technology and building a user base.
Some analysts have questioned Mr Zuckerberg’s metaverse bet for spending too much money on a technology that is still in its early stages.
However, the CEO has said that he believes it is the future of the internet, and that Meta is well-positioned to lead the way.
Indeed, Mr Shah echoes this belief so clearly that Mr Zuckerberg and his employees can apparently see something the rest of us can’t.
If the metaverse does become a reality, our burning question is will our avatars get better than the cartoonish suspended heads and torsos we have today?
‘The first version of something is never the best. We have to keep iterating on these things to make them great,’ said Mr Shah.
In the future, he tells us avatars could get more ‘realistic’, suited for serious conversations, while you’ll still have the option to show up to virtual meetings with blue skin if you chose to.
It’s barely been two years since Mr Zuckerberg made a billion-dollar pivot by rebranding his social media giant to one that builds products for a non-existent virtual world.
Only time will tell whether the investment will pay off. While a future of living out our lives in between virtual and real spaces sounds exhausting, we can’t be quick to bet against technology or a stubborn billionaire.
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