Employees working on Meta’s Metaverse not only hate working on the virtual world, but also hate virtual reality in general.
Since late 2021, the company formally known as Facebook has gone all-steam ahead in creating the virtual world known as the Metaverse.
According to Bloomberg, the employees still working on the project are fed up of using VR headsets for working and testing the technology.
Talking to almost a dozen different Metaverse workers, the Bloomberg report details an environment of tired employees that can’t stand being stuck inside virtual reality.
According the the report, Meta President of Global Affairs, and former UK coalition Prime Minister, Nick Clegg attempted to start Metaverse meetings for employees. A largely pushed feature of the virtual world, meetings inside VR worlds have been pitched as the future of office work.
However, as expected, employees have fought against the new meeting standard, calling them “uncomfortable and glitchy”. Furthermore, employees felt embarrassed wearing the headset at work and claimed the meetings’ avatars are “weird and unprofessional”.
As it turns out, Meta has pitched these virtual meetings to other major companies including Walmart and more. In a surprising turn, the team behind pitching the technology to other companies are also not partaking in virtual meetings at Meta.
The Metaverse project has been a huge point of contention at the tech giant. With the company losing billions every quarter on the technology’s development, investors have begged CEO Mark Zuckerberg to cut the project off.
Meta’s Metaverse isn’t the only virtual world that’s suffering from a number of issues. In fact, the United States military’s virtual world has already been canned due to “challenging macro-economics conditions”.
While Meta is cutting down the costs of its Metaverse, the virtual world isn’t dead yet. Meta’s Metaverse is still a major part of the company’s plans for the future, as well as its soon-approaching AR glasses technology.
Meta is reportedly now more focused on its AI technology, another major part of its conglomerate make-up. While the company has been criticised for its racist AI programs and large departure of AI researchers, the company is planning on doubling down in the face of the ongoing AI explosion.
With companies such as OpenAI creating massively popular artificial intelligence tools, Meta is hoping to keep up while still working on its virtual world.