Facebook/Meta's Horizons Planned to Shut Down VR Option, Then Changed

 

Some Second Life users may remember Horizons, the virtual world created by Meta, the company behind Facebook. Announced in 2021 as the effort of Mark Zuckerberg's company to "build the Metaverse." But there was skepticism from the start as it's avatars had nothing below the waist, which was fodder for a number of jokes, including a few from Linden Lab and others in Second Life. As time went on, it became clear it was not attracting many people, and Meta netted only a fraction of the money it put in. Among the signs things weren't right, unlike Second Life, the people who worked on it did not spend time in the virtual world when off the clock. 

 

Earlier this month on March 17, it was announced that the software to use Horizons on VR headsets would no longer be available at the end of the month, and in June it would be taken offline. “We are separating the two platforms so each can grow with greater focus, and the Horizon Worlds platform will become a mobile-only experience,” the company stated on a community blog. The move came just weeks after Meta laid of a thousand workers from Reality Labs in January, the part of the company that works on it's virtual world. Besides VR, the virtual world can be accessed through a mobile app, which was remaining up. 

But a few days later, Meta backtracked, it's CEO announcing, “We have decided, just today in fact, that we will keep Horizon Worlds working in VR for existing games to support the fans who’ve reached out.” But, VR won't be the main focus, "Most of our energy is going towards mobile and the Meta Horizon Engine there."

Commentary: In Second Life, and Discord channels with SL users, yours truly heard several residents bring up Meta's decision to close Horizon's VR option, and react with smugness. The feeling was a multi-billion dollar company had gone up against the much smaller Linden Lab and the people behind VR Chat, and it couldn't even begin to compete with them, the company Mark Zuckerberg created losing big. Second Life, for all of it's Linden blunders over time, remains the champion virtual world. And a startup like Resonite can do more with a few people, a few dollars, and a little elbow grease and imagination, than a billion dollar megacorp that is all dollars and no brains and bare-bones effort. 

 

Image from Techcrunch 

 

Sources: Wired, Meta, PC Gamer, CNBC 

 

Bixyl Shuftan 

 

Facebook Suspends Account of "Snow Crash" Author, Accusing Him of Impersonating Himself

 

 While not everyone knows the name Neal Stephenson, probably most who go about virtual worlds know about his novel "Snow Crash," a cyberpunk thriller describing them about a decade before the appearance of Second Life. 

 

Well, it seems Meta, the company behind Facebook which rebranded itself to match the name of his description of life online, the Metaverse, has been less than kind to him. He posted the news on his Twitter/X account. 

 

Today in “you can’t make this stuff up,” Meta has suspended my Facebook account because they suspect me of impersonating someone noteworthy

 

 New World Notes would report that his account was restored the following day, but that it happened to begin with was too ironic to ignore, "it's pretty fun to spend two-three years in research and interviews, writing about how Meta's leaders never really understood the Metaverse, couldn't even explain it to their staff, were never really passionate about virtual worlds and what made them meaningful, and how they sidelined people on their team who were. When all of that could be encapsulated by quoting this single tweet."

 

 Source: New World Notes

 

Bixyl Shuftan 

 

Facebook/Meta Quietly Leaving Virtual Worlds Behind

 

Last year, Facebook/Meta was really harping itself as the future of virtual worlds. It was touting it's Horizons as the up and coming brand new virtual landscape that the masses would want to join and experience. This year, they've been quiet about it. CEO and owner Mark Zuckerburg has gone from repeatedly promoting Horizons as the must be-in place online, to having stopped.

 

So what happened? Well, Horizons turned out to be a big money loser. Zuckerburg invested billions in his company's virtual world, only to get very little return for it in comparison. 

 

The number of people signing up was far short than the half million expected, and most didn't stay after their first month. It seems the "lack of realism" on the avatars, notably having no legs, was one of the big reasons. Of it's virtual worlds, only a handful were visited by more than 50, most not visited by anyone but it's creator. And unlike Second Life, which continued to do very well, Facebook/Meta workers didn't enjoy using the place on their free time "because it's riddled with bugs and other quality issues."

For all the money invested, Horizon's returns are small in comparison. It brought in 727 million USD in 2022, 17% less than in 2021. The result has been huge loses, losing nearly 24 BILLION dollars in 2021 and 2022, 13.7 billion in 2022 alone. Considering their overall income was 32.1 billion, the company had been continuing to spend and invest heavily after initial small returns, and was getting even less. So no wonder Facebook/Meta is cutting its losses.

Fortunately for Zuckerberg, technology tends have allowed him to quietly leave virtual reality behind: AI, which in recent months has gotten more attention thanks to programs like Chat GPT. An article on "The Street" stated in an announcement, he announced, "We're creating a new top-level product group at Meta focused on generative AI to turbocharge our work in this area. We're starting by pulling together a lot of the teams working on generative AI across the company into one group focused on building delightful experiences around this technology. ... In the short term, we'll focus on building creative and expressive tools. Over the longer term, we'll focus on developing AI personas that can help people in a variety of ways."

So it seems Horizon is being left behind, joining the ranks of the virtual worlds such as There and Blue Mars that had gotten plenty of talk but ended up falling short, while Second Life and to a smaller extent VRChat, continue to flourish.

 

Sources: The Street, Kotaku, PC Gamer

Bixyl Shuftan

News And Commentary: Questions Raised About Horizon Following Zuckerburg's Comments, Announcement of Creator Fees

 

It's no secret that many Second Life users roll their eyes at Linden Lab a lot. But can anyone else do a better job at developing a virtual world. The biggest company gicing it a try is Facebook/Meta, with it's Horizons. This virtual world has already been ridiculed for having avatars with nothing below the waist. But certain comments by the company founder plus how much of a cut it plans to take from content creators is making it look worse.

Read more in Other Grinds, MMOs, and Games.

SL Videos: Linden Lab's April Fool

 

(Click here if the video does not play)

The Newser's April Fool yesterday wasn't the only one around. Linden Lab had one of it's own that was a poke at Facebook/Meta's Horizon. Or rather, three, in the form of a few Youtube videos. One also parodied the "Lifelock" videos (forum post).

"Brand new from the creators of Second Life comes our latest premium feature: LEGLOCK!

"Second Life is the ONLY metaverse that will actually guarantee your legs will be right here where you left them upon your return!  We consider it our sacred duty to give all our customers the whole metaverse experience. We care about our residents and what they care about, and we know one thing they care about are legs. In Second Life you can have all the legs you want, One leg, two legs, four legs, eight… a hundred… be a human centipede if you desire. Actually, I don’t think anyone really wants that last one, but you can!

"And the best part is, it is so easy! Here’s a helpful video explaining just how this handy tool works and how you can keep your avatar protected." 

(Click here if the video does not play)

"Finding one's other half" is an expression meaning to find one's soulmate. Though with avatars looking like Horizon ones, it takes on a new meaning (forum post).

"At Linden Lab, we’re all about bringing people together. We’ve heard countless stories from individuals that discovered their other halves in Second Life. Today we’re floating you a spotlight featuring a union that was love at first sight.

"If you feel like something is missing in your life, we hope we can help you find it in Second Life."

 (Click here if the video does not play)

Abnor Mole stared in this one as a used leg salesman. Guess his joke had a few legs to stand on, unlike Facebook/Horizon's virtual world (forum post).

Happy April Fools.

Addition: There were three threads in the forums about the videos, so they're now included.
 

WSJ Video: "Remember Second Life? It’s Now Taking On Big Tech’s Metaverse"

 

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From the Wall Street Journal on Feb 3, "Second Life – yes, the virtual world from the ‘00s – is staging a comeback to challenge tech giants like Meta that are throwing billions into the metaverse. Its creator explains to WSJ how he plans to refresh the platform – no VR headsets required."
 

More on Facebook And Meta And Virtual World Plans, Grumpity Linden's Interview

 

It's been a few weeks since Mark Zuckerburg announced the company behind Facebook would be changing it's name to Meta. Since then, there have been more developments, and more people commenting. Among those with something to say was Grumpity Linden, or Anya Kanevsky in real life. She was interviewed by a magazine, and had a few things to say about Facebook's plans and how they related to Second Life, the existing virtual world.
 
Read the story in Other Grids, MMOs, and Games.
 

Of Facebook The Corporation Changing It's Name

 
On October 28, Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook the corporation, announced it was changing it's name to "Meta."

"We're now looking at and reporting on our business as two different segments, one for our family of apps, and one for our work on future platforms. And as part of this, it is time for us to adopt a new company brand to encompass everything that we do, to reflect who we are and what we hope to build."

Besides having several social medias under it, including What'sApp, Instagram, and Facebook, Zuckerberg has plans to build the "Metaverse." This would be a huge virtual world, “We believe the metaverse will be the successor of the mobile internet. We’ll be able to feel present – like we’re right there with people no matter how far apart we actually are.”

The move comes after the company has faced a string of bad publicity from it's platforms going down for hours twice in one week to accusations it ignored findings that it's products were not good for the mental health of teenagers and that it wasn't doing enough to stop the spread of disinformation. So naturally there are criticisms that the move is to distract people from the incidents. There were also charges that the company planed to expand to the point of hiring tens of thousands of workers while ignoring it's problems "just goes to show how out of touch Facebook is with real people.” And of course came concerns that Facebook had it's sights on new territory to monopolize and become even more powerful.

Besides criticism, the move was also mocked on social media. "I meta girl in high school," joked one man. In Israel there were snickers as the term "meta" means "dead" in Hebrew.  One Reuters writer reminded that a few years ago Google's corporation changed it's name to Alphabet, but people still call both the search engine and it's company Google.

Finally there was one detail pointed out by Daniel Voyager. The term "Second Life" was trending on Twitter searches "Probably for the first time." He reasoned that Zuckerberg's move was drawing comparisons to the virtual world that was already around, and expressed hope that the extra attention would result in a few more people becoming residents.

It's hard to say how successful Facebook's effort into virtual reality will be. Two years ago, they announced their upcoming virtual world "Horizons," and the platform has yet to fully open. It was also joked about as the avatars were legless, people going about as floating in the air with nothing showing below the waist.

Sources, BBC, CNN, Reuters, ZDnet, The Guardian, Daniel Voyager

Bixyl Shuftan
 

Virtual World Meta7 Closing Due to Court Order

One of the smaller alternatives to Second Life, Meta7, had some sad news for it’s residents on April 21st. “Another company, that has trademark rights to the use of a similar logo used by us and the name 'Meta7' is forcing the company behind Meta7 to stop using the trademark ...”A judge had ordered them to stop using their name, and so they would be closing down May 1st.

The following was posted on their forums:


OFFICIAL NOTICE MAGNE METAVERSE RESEARCH LLC, THE LEGAL OWNER OF META7 IS UNDER A COURT ORDER TO STOP USING THE META7 TRADEMARK BY APRIL 30TH 2011. MAGNE METAVERSE RESEARCH LLC, ITS DIRECTORS AND OFFICERS, ARE TAKING ALL STEPS TO COMPLY WITH THE INJUNCTION. FURTHER USE OF THE META7 GRID OR ASSOCIATED WEBSITES WILL THEREFOR NO LONGER BE AVAILABLE COMMENCING MAY 1ST 2011.

Meta7 closing May 1st It is with sadness in our hearts that we have to inform you of the imminent closure of the Meta 7 grid at such short notice. Legal proceedings have led us to a point where we now must comply with this court order, or endure heavy fines and possible personal complications for the Meta7 team members. After almost 3 years of pioneering history, creating this unique place in the internet landscape, we have had to make a very hard and unpleasant decision and shall be closing Meta7 permanently by May 1st 2011.

We would like to thank all our loyal metazens for using Meta7 as a homebase over the last few years. We hope you use these last few days to make sure you can keep in touch with your friends as you move off into different grids. Obviously a number of you will have question concerning Land, credits and inventories. Please read about this in the special goodbye-FAQ.

As for us, we are going to take a break for a while.

Thank you all, it has been an amazing ride.

The Meta7 Team

On the question of if they’ll be coming back, the answer seemed to be probably not, saying, “It would involve a full rebranding and round of investments of the viewer, inworld content, all related websites and legal paperwork. It would take an enormous amount of time from a small group of people who are stretched to their limits as it is.”

Of where its residents should go, they gave a link to a list of Opensim-based worlds, “Besides that list, you might want to go to Second Life, the granddaddy of the sim based virtual worlds.”

The list gave Meta7 as having a total of almost 5,000 users with over 1300 having logged in at least once in the past 30 days. Hypergrid Business gave a total of over 7100 residents, but gave a number of "active residents" as only about a thousand. It stated numbers had been dropping in the past few months, possibly because it was "one of the most expensive grids in OpenSim."

The Pais Kidd’s Weblog, which reported on Meta7 time to time, stated it started out as an Opensim experiment that came to be called K-Grid before becoming Meta7, “I know this is a devastating situation for the Meta7 team and their loyal supporters. There has been a lot of work, money, creativity, hope, and dreams put into Meta7. This is a sad day.”

Hopefully the residents will be able to find new pastures somewhere, whether in Second Life, or another alternative.

Sources: Pais Kidd's Weblog, Hypergrid Business, Meta7 Community Forums, Daniel Voyager's Blog

Bixyl Shuftan