Does Mark Zuckerberg Not Understand How Bad His Metaverse Looks?

https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2022/08/17/does-mark-zuckerberg-not-understand-how-bad-his-metaverse-looks/

by CoolGuySteve • 4 years ago

55 19 4 years ago

PaulHoule2• 4 years ago

No. Zuck's had this problem forever.

It's just astonishing that you can visit Horizon Worlds, have no legs, and get sexually harassed by another person with no legs.

nh23423fefe• 4 years ago

why is that astonishing?

PaulHoule2• 4 years ago

I dunno... Baudrillard's Simulacra and Simulation which is about the cultural implications of technology leading to "Virtual Reality" was the first publication in a book series on "The Body" although it has nothing to do with the body.

superchroma2• 4 years ago

I would guess that the art direction is still informed by the desire to use this technology for phone calls and work meetings, where a sanitary and boring avatar is fitting.

johnwheeler• 4 years ago

They purchased whatsapp due to its reach and that reach was due to low-res requirements (third-world countries with flip phones).

I wonder if they envision the same for metaverse and he's focusing on reach so they got the graphics running on the least common denominator of hardware.

superchroma2• 4 years ago

I'd say so, but I think that should be a user-tailoring thing, one thing that Snow Crash helpfully defined; where weak, underpowered terminals see a worse looking version of the world.

dimensionc132• 4 years ago

Meanwhile in Decentraland.......

mrguyorama• 4 years ago

For reference to those who don't understand just how pathetic Zuck's metaverse is, right now, on any number of VR devices, you can freely download VRChat, choose nearly any avatar you want, including definitely copyrighted works that you shouldn't be allowed to, the avatars can have significantly higher detail and fidelity than Zuck's, all of them have legs, you can setup full body tracking through various cheap or expensive ways, you can play silly games with strangers, stay up too late and hang out with random asian kids you can't understand, go literally virtual clubbing (this was awesome during the pandemic), watch movies together, chat about nothing, draw with people much more talented than you, watch impromptu live musical performances, and just otherwise hangout with anyone, VR or not.

And after you are done, you can go "next door" onto Rec Room, play much better designed and built games with more strangers and kids, get absolutely shitmixed by 12 year olds in paintball and lasertag, make some 12 year olds day by helping them beat a big pirate themed campaign, build your own entire worlds using a robust in engine creation kit, and once again do this with both VR and non-VR people.

The only possible innovation Meta could bring in is to make it Adults Only

djcannabiz• 4 years ago

I played a virtual live set on vrchat during the Pandemic, It was totally a blast! I wasnt wearing a headset but one of my buddies brought over some equipment and got bodytracking setup, so the people could see me moving. I was really skeptical about vr but this experience definitely changed my mind about it.

no_time• 4 years ago

including definitely copyrighted works that you shouldn't be allowed to

You know what a VR world with infinite potential needs more than anything? That's right, artificial scarcity.

poulsbohemian• 4 years ago

Maybe the real question is, does Mark Zuckerberg not understand how bad all of Meta looks?

I pay Facebook a reasonable amount of money each year as a small business owner with advertising needs, but their product has become increasingly hard to use with poor returns. We all know from the consumer side how unusable FB is, and frankly even as an advertiser let alone as a consumer, I question the value of Instagram. Then there is Meta for Business (I use in one of my jobs), which I guess is fine for its purpose as a generic messaging board but not good for anything serious.

I'm particularly sensitive after being brushed off yesterday as an advertiser begging them to fix a problem so I can give them more money. Glad I'm not a shareholder.

So yeah, good luck to them with this metaverse "stuff".

tchock23• 4 years ago

The cartoony art style can work well in VR (see Rec Room), but for some reason it just doesn’t work in Horizon.

I was on the beta and the disconnect between various parts of the world left something to be desired so I never went back.

The tools to create content were fairly well done though.

Hamcha2• 4 years ago

If anything, it shows that Rec Room has always had really good art direction and whoever did the UX is a genius.

Back when I was active in it (many years ago) I remember seeing them eager to drop the typical UI approaches for stuff that just makes more sense:

- Buttons in menus are actual buttons that you physically press down, instead of touch-sensitive rounded boxes

- You literally pick stuff out from your flat inventory

- You can interact with people with gestures (handshake to add friend, fist bump to join party)

I feel other games (Meta, but also VRChat and Neos and Chillout etc!) are too "stuck" on what the computer world feels like to understand what VR allows them to do… or maybe they're just lazy.

CRConrad3• 4 years ago

I feel other games (Meta, but also VRChat and Neos and Chillout etc!) are too "stuck" on what the computer world feels like to understand what VR allows them to do…

Too drunk on the "Boo, skeumorphism! Bad! BAD!!!11!" Kool-Aid?

mint2• 4 years ago

Why does the Facebook vr world look almost like they copied the Nintendo wii stuff from 15 years ago that was itself using non-cutting and edge graphics at the time?

jamiek88• 4 years ago

Mii's even had legs!

Seriously this is like a shittier second life where you need to buy a $300 device to even test it, and like when second life first came out the hardware can barely run it so it's janky as hell.

The dangers of ivory towers and absolute power.

CRConrad3• 4 years ago

To paraphrase Updike (IIRC), it's remarkable how bad a robber-baron billionaire can be at understanding something if his idea of robbing even more billions depends on him not understanding it.

Does Mark Zuckerberg Not Understand How Bad His Metaverse Looks?

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