Pour one out from your digital bottle, because Meta disables Horizon Worlds virtual reality.
Meta sent an email to Horizon Worlds users today stating that the world of social VR will officially end on it Search for VR headphones; as of March 31st, Horizon Worlds will no longer be in the Quest store. Some Horizon-specific benefits, including Meta Credits, avatars, and some digital clothing and international purchases, will also be removed. VR World will be shut down for good on June 15, after which the service will only be available as a mobile platform.
The move comes after Meta did reduced spread to its Reality Labs division in February, laying off 10 percent of the workforce in its VR division.
Horizon World was A big win for Meta in building out metaversethe prospect of a completely online environment inspired by Neal Stephenson’s Snow Accident. The company believed in the effort so much that it changed its name from Facebook to Meta to support its VR efforts.
Horizon Worlds is one of the least popular VR services out there, if the horizon light can be found in the comments of r/eye subreddit The thread about the end of the service is anything to go by. It was widely derided since it was first announced, mainly due to its poor start. Player avatars he had no legs and it looks like that animals with dead eyes that of Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg unusual avatar became a memes.
Almost immediately, the World of Horizon was crowded and children. But kids throwing digital donuts aren’t the strongest or most profitable base. Meta pumped billions of dollars into the service, planning high-profile partnerships with other brands and artists to have online concerts and Imagine Dragons and Coldplay. Even with all that pride, the Meta ownership line has been less popular than VRChatsocial service that people really looks like enough to attend virtual raves and presidential election.
Like Meta changes its direction with artificial intelligence and his Ray-Ban smart glasseshas significantly reduced its investment in its metaverse division, including abandoning updates to very popular services such as Divine Equality.
“The Meta Axis at Horizon Worlds is the predictable and inevitable result of a big, risky bet that didn’t find an audience,” wrote Mike Proulx, vice president and director of research at market research firm Forrester, in an email to WIRED. “Meta was trying to solve a consumer problem that doesn’t exist. You can’t build a big social platform based on hardware that most people don’t own or want to wear for more than short bursts.”
