is Zuckerberg still up for architecting the next internet?

But how long can such investments continue given current circumstances? For all its spending and workforce, initial versions of products like Worlds have been met with ridicule; for example when Zuckerberg showed off a remarkably unimpressive screenshot of his own avatar, or when Meta was forced to admit it doesn’t know how to track people’s legs.

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Early impressions of the Meta Quest Pro, a very expensive device that attempts to reinvent the Quest 2 for work, have also not been glowing.

Meta is making progress towards its goals, but slowly and while bleeding a lot of money. It could be 10 years before we find out whether there’s an audience for the kind of systems it’s developing, meanwhile Reality Labs is losing around $14 billion each year and dragging down Meta’s stock, which fell by around 70 per cent in 2022.

Pouring cash into extreme long-term bets when your stock is already falling isn’t exactly great for investor relations. In one very public complaint Brad Gerstner, chief executive of long-time Meta investor Altimeter, called on the company to limit metaverse spending to no more than $US5 billion per yer.

“An estimated $US100B+ investment in an unknown future is super-sized and terrifying, even by Silicon Valley standards,” he wrote in an open letter in October.

There have also been various reports of unrest within Meta’s product development teams, indicating that Zuckerberg’s vision for the metaverse is not necessarily reflected across the organisation.

Insiders told The New York Times that some employees referred to metaverse projects as “MMH” jobs, meaning “Make Mark Happy”, and that when Zuckerberg ordered all meetings to take place within Horizon many workers had to scramble to acquire and set up headsets of their own. A source also sent The Verge internal memos in which Meta executives wonder why more of the workforce isn’t actively embracing the metaverse.

“If we don’t love it, how can we expect our users to love it,” asked vice president Vishal Shah in one memo.

More recently programming legend John Carmack — who co-created the hit video game Doom in the 90s and joined Oculus as chief technology officer in 2013 — quit the company with an internal note complaining that Meta is “grossly inefficient”.

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It’s worth noting that, despite the name change and investment, Reality Labs and the metaverse don’t make up the entirety of Meta’s focus. It’s still a very profitable company that has acquired or developed advanced capabilities in AI, 3D development, augmented and virtual reality. It could afford to move metaverse development out of public view for years and look elsewhere for nearer-term moneymakers, although that would surely push its timelines back even further.

Meanwhile, other companies are likely to step in and start laying down the groundwork for what may some day be the metaverse, even if it’s not the one Meta had planned. Apple, for example, is tipped to launch some kind of headset in 2023 that could make use of its years of augmented reality development.

Microsoft is beginning to use Meta tech in its enterprise suite to power more immersive work-from-home experiences. And the likes of Roblox and Epic continue to build out entire worlds within video games that combine all manner of other media with a persistent online virtual space, an approach which could easily be adapted for non-game purposes in the metaverse.

Get news and reviews on technology, gadgets and gaming in our Technology newsletter every Friday. Sign up here.

But how long can such investments continue given current circumstances? For all its spending and workforce, initial versions of products like Worlds have been met with ridicule; for example when Zuckerberg showed off a remarkably unimpressive screenshot of his own avatar, or when Meta was forced to admit it doesn’t know how to track people’s legs.

Loading

Early impressions of the Meta Quest Pro, a very expensive device that attempts to reinvent the Quest 2 for work, have also not been glowing.

Meta is making progress towards its goals, but slowly and while bleeding a lot of money. It could be 10 years before we find out whether there’s an audience for the kind of systems it’s developing, meanwhile Reality Labs is losing around $14 billion each year and dragging down Meta’s stock, which fell by around 70 per cent in 2022.

Pouring cash into extreme long-term bets when your stock is already falling isn’t exactly great for investor relations. In one very public complaint Brad Gerstner, chief executive of long-time Meta investor Altimeter, called on the company to limit metaverse spending to no more than $US5 billion per yer.

“An estimated $US100B+ investment in an unknown future is super-sized and terrifying, even by Silicon Valley standards,” he wrote in an open letter in October.

There have also been various reports of unrest within Meta’s product development teams, indicating that Zuckerberg’s vision for the metaverse is not necessarily reflected across the organisation.

Insiders told The New York Times that some employees referred to metaverse projects as “MMH” jobs, meaning “Make Mark Happy”, and that when Zuckerberg ordered all meetings to take place within Horizon many workers had to scramble to acquire and set up headsets of their own. A source also sent The Verge internal memos in which Meta executives wonder why more of the workforce isn’t actively embracing the metaverse.

“If we don’t love it, how can we expect our users to love it,” asked vice president Vishal Shah in one memo.

More recently programming legend John Carmack — who co-created the hit video game Doom in the 90s and joined Oculus as chief technology officer in 2013 — quit the company with an internal note complaining that Meta is “grossly inefficient”.

Loading

It’s worth noting that, despite the name change and investment, Reality Labs and the metaverse don’t make up the entirety of Meta’s focus. It’s still a very profitable company that has acquired or developed advanced capabilities in AI, 3D development, augmented and virtual reality. It could afford to move metaverse development out of public view for years and look elsewhere for nearer-term moneymakers, although that would surely push its timelines back even further.

Meanwhile, other companies are likely to step in and start laying down the groundwork for what may some day be the metaverse, even if it’s not the one Meta had planned. Apple, for example, is tipped to launch some kind of headset in 2023 that could make use of its years of augmented reality development.

Microsoft is beginning to use Meta tech in its enterprise suite to power more immersive work-from-home experiences. And the likes of Roblox and Epic continue to build out entire worlds within video games that combine all manner of other media with a persistent online virtual space, an approach which could easily be adapted for non-game purposes in the metaverse.

Get news and reviews on technology, gadgets and gaming in our Technology newsletter every Friday. Sign up here.