The Metaverse Finally Has Some Legs to Stand on
The dreamers have long talked the talk. Will they now walk the walk?
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Today, I woke up to some bad news.
My favorite dunk on Mark Zuckerberg’s Metaverse — the idea that we’ll adopt floating Wii avatars that forgot to bring their legs into the digital world — will soon end.
Pass the tissues. Is my writing career going to hit the skids?
The company announced the update among a host of features during its Connect 2022 conference, which many attendees joined using the Oculus 2 headset. First, there was a new ‘pro’ headset (priced at a whopping $1500) that will be aimed towards creators and businesses. There were grand plans to build out the VR ecosystem and improve integration with “real world” apps like Instagram, meaning users could share videos from the Metaverse across social media.
The conference also provided a loose roadmap for what’s to come, which is essential if Metaverse creators are going to convince the world to stay excited about something years away from fruition. Meta is inventing new tech. It’s experimenting with the entry-point devices, aiming to build Google Glasses, but better. It’s making expensive deals with giants like Microsoft to integrate Teams, Office, Windows, and Xbox into Horizon’s VR world. A new project called Magic Room — proclaimed as the future of meetings — will one day allow interaction regardless of devices or headsets, allowing people and avatars to mix.
In sum, there was some good stuff here.
But then came the real announcement.
“I think everyone has been waiting for this,” Zuckerberg joked during the keynote.
Yup, legs are now on the roadmap. I repeat. Your Metaverse overlord is going to grant you your legs back.
In the strangest statement you’ll read today, Meta notes, “Legs will roll out to [Horizon] Worlds first, so we can see how it goes. Then we’ll begin bringing legs…
