Mastodawn

Zuckerberg has blown 77 billion – enough money to revitalize entire countries – on an idea so overwhelmingly, obviously stupid that I have never once heard anyone, from the Thanksgiving avuncular table to the most wretched depths of social media, say they liked it or even tried it. He was so sure that it would revolutionize the world that he renamed his extremely famous company after it. And now he's on to the next thing that he's so very, very sure about.

The world needs direction from sober people who aim to improve the human condition, not the whims of a handful of billionaire princelings who absolutely, positively cannot be dissuaded from failing at unprecedented scale while chasing their own vainglory off the edge of a cliff.

someone on discord was unaware that there even *was* a released version of the facebook metaverse that you *could* try, which about sums that up 😂

Consensus Tullyality Dec 7

@0xabad1dea oh shit that's right

what was it called, horizon or something?

@0xabad1dea Wait what? That was a thing?

@gudenau @0xabad1dea clearly, it was a trillion dollar opportunity: https://cyberplace.social/@GossiTheDog/115663189943069630

Kevin Beaumont (@[email protected])

Attached: 3 images A reminder that every major financial institution declared the Metaverse as real, in many cases a multi trillion dollar market. It was all total bullshit.

Cyberplace

@0xabad1dea as in Horizon Worlds? They're certainly still trying to drag Quest users into it, kicking and screaming

Jernej Simončič �Dec 7

@0xabad1dea Well, that makes two of us – I thought it never left technical demo stage.

Kawaoneechan Dec 7

@jernej__s @0xabad1dea That's the best part.

It didn't!

@kawa @jernej__s @0xabad1dea
Hyperbolic but it is trash, yes. And Quest users now load straight into it when they turn on their headsets, instead of the homeworld they chose before.

@0xabad1dea
I read a post recently that outlined a likely reason: Facebook needs to stay a growth company unless they want to lose most of their value. It's the same reason NFTs moved into AI and why AI is simultaneously a god that will change everything and a poor word guesser.

Once a company transitions from "growth" to "stable" they lose the ability to print stock that will be accepted like money and their valuation tanks fast. That's why they keep making up bullshit that will never do anything -- to keep from maturing.

@RnDanger wait, that last sentence sounds like people who never got enough emotional support to stop reacting like teenagers. @0xabad1dea

@RnDanger @0xabad1dea that's likely something @pluralistic wrote.

@llogiq @0xabad1dea @pluralistic
That's probably where i read it 🙃
Edit: it was! https://pluralistic.net/2025/12/05/pop-that-bubble/

@0xabad1dea +1, did not know

לָקס (לא לותור) لاكس🏴Dec 7

@0xabad1dea wait, they actually released something???

@0xabad1dea 👍

@0xabad1dea How could they not know of the huge metaverse content creator protest that happened, in the metaverse?

@0xabad1dea I'm a VR affectionado and I didn't know lmao

vriska, thief of light

@oli it's what that zuckerberg eiffel tower meme was a screenshot of

Louise Auerhahn 🏳️‍🌈Dec 7

@0xabad1dea I didn't know the "Metaverse" was ever a real product! I thought it was just a marketing concept to get ppl excited about augmented reality glasses & similar doodads.

Eric McCorkle Dec 7

I actually didn't know that myself. I assumed it was the world's biggest vaporware.

John Timaeus Dec 7

Until you mentioned it, I'd forgotten about it. I suppose somewhere in the back of my brain I knew Metaverse was still a product. But I figured it was largely abandonware.

Ludwig Vielfrass Dec 8

@johntimaeus @0xabad1dea Which is a shame because look at this compelling content they created for it!

@lerxst @johntimaeus @0xabad1dea

Oh man, the graphics are worse than games from 20 years ago.

Ready Player One called and wants its idea back.

Jonathan Hartley Dec 8

@13reak Mastodon pedant reporting for duty! Ready Player One hyper-commercialized the idea from Snow Crash (92?) which could never have existed without Neuromancer (84?). If you like one, you may like the others. The last, in particular is a rare instance of quality writing in science fiction, a literary style that stands up to re-reading decades later.

Nicolás Alvarez Dec 8

@0xabad1dea I love the fact that Neopets today has more active users than Horizon Worlds ever had.

Kaitlyn~Ethylia Dec 8

@0xabad1dea TIL there was a released version of the facebook metaverse that you could actually try

Sam Livingston-Gray Dec 8

@0xabad1dea I actually bought a Quest 3S last month, but as far as I'm concerned it's purely a Beat Saber device, so I immediately went to the "Library" tab and disabled everything I could. This included a lot of things called "worlds," I think?

The OS on this thing is so hilariously terrible. It's not clear what different things do, how to find the setting you want, what apps are installed... just a complete UX disaster.

I wasn't aware there was a released version I could try either, and I follow tech news almost obsessively.

But yeah, imagine 77 billion spent on researching how to cost effectively generate petrol from air and solar power with a self contained and deploy-able device. It would allow countries to massively balance their Co2 emissions. I think it could work because there's already been research in this field and proofs of concept do exist.

For 77 billion you could make the entire chain into an easy to use product, and it probably would sell very well.

@0xabad1dea I also was very unaware of it. Then again I also try to stay clear of anything Zuckerberg as good as possible. Would stay away from WhatsApp as well if it wouldn't mean losing connection to some people who just do not want to use other options.

cinnamon roll Dec 8

@0xabad1dea I forgot that exists-

Jonas Platte Dec 10

@0xabad1dea +1, unaware. And why would I care anyways?

@0xabad1dea 1,000,0000% this

Edvin Malinovskis Dec 7

@0xabad1dea I'm still convinced that the rename had more todo with distancing from Facebook's negative reputation and abusing exposure of an established word in tech/gaming context 😤

Tero Hänninen Dec 7

@0xabad1dea people like him are never going to use their wealth for good, so burning it on these madcap schemes is probably as good as it gets. Maybe next is metaverse AI, but… (wait for it) but the datacenters are in outer SPACE!!

Maddogeco Dec 7

@0xtero @0xabad1dea is this how trickle down economics works?

@0xtero @0xabad1dea huh. That would help with the heat exhaust, but needs good shielding for the memory and stuff.
Something something grey goo scenario, something something they should just get therapy.

Doesn’t help at all for the heat exhaust, it’s very difficult to cool things in space! Wildly counterintuitive for atmosphere based beings but true.

@MxVerda @0xtero @0xabad1dea

aburka 🫣Dec 8

@0xtero @0xabad1dea nah, as good as it gets would be a wealth tax so we can take the money and use it to improve society somewhat

Tero Hänninen Dec 8

@aburka I agree, but seeing who Americans vote into office, changing the system so taxing billionaire wealth becomes useful is about as realistic as datacenters in outer space.

Unfortunately

madison taylor Dec 7

@0xabad1dea i'd like to clarify the nature of the stupidity. the idea in principle isn't fundamentally stupid because 3D virtual worlds have no promise, after all: one can imagine much promise, fantastical sights and sounds and movement, grand architecture, adventures — flying! space! dragons! dungeons! and one can imagine all forma of self-expression, avatars human and inhuman! one can imagine anything, boulded only by the limits of human perception.

perhaps delivering this is hard. perhaps it is too broad and unconstrained and the realm would only thrive with limitations, a unifying vision. perhaps there would be intractable social moderation troubles and abuse. perhaps these barriers are insurmountable or the tech immature. but the concept has potential.

no, the really most stupidest thing is that facebmeta looked at all this potential and imagined ...

checks

generic corporate avatars
sitting at a conference table
attending a meeting

(and yes, "sitting" is being quite generous to the legless...)

madison taylor Dec 7

Stanislav Ochotnický Dec 8

@tomoyo @0xabad1dea saddest part about that meeting screenshot is that its a featureless office space instead of some cool rainforest or maybe a big tree house or whatever. how corrupt does your mind have to be to want to be in this environment if you could be anywhere?

Mikko Tuumanen Dec 8

@tomoyo @0xabad1dea

I didn't have a FB account, so I wouldn't probably have gotten a metaverse account either.

Too bad the non-techbro 3D universe didn't find funding: https://thirdroom.io/

Third Room

Open, decentralised, immersive worlds built on Matrix

Third Room

@0xabad1dea sensible leadership will never come though. Because nothing good seems to ever happen

@0xabad1dea IKR how completely out of touch is he! First thing I thought when I heard about it was "lol yeah nah cool story bro".

Any other CEO at any other company with that scale of fuckup means your ass. We can stop pretending that he is anything other than an idiot dorm room creep.

It's the most American thing ever to think that because someone has a lot of money that they must somehow be geniuses rather than say, frauds or criminals lol.

Chris [list of emoji]Dec 7

He kind of personifies "lottery winner who thinks he's smart".

@0xabad1dea the world needs means to "depose" these kind of madmen (legal means. We already have guns. That's a bad solution. It works, but that's not the world you want to live in).

Direction from sober people does nothing as long as the madmen can own over 50% of the companies they're running and just dismiss the folks they don't like.

John Tinker Dec 7

@TheRealPomax @0xabad1dea
https://johntinker.substack.com/p/noblesse-oblige-as-a-factor-of-social

Noblesse oblige as a factor of social stability

Me, to the DeepSeek chatbot:

John’s Substack

Kevin P. Fleming Dec 7

@TheRealPomax @0xabad1dea They IPOed with this ridiculous dual-class capital structure and everyone piled in anyway.

Bob 🇨🇦🇲🇽🇺🇦Dec 7

@0xabad1dea My guess is that he saw Ready Player One and became obsessed with becoming James Halliday.

@0xabad1dea
A Youtuber I like made a fun video about it. Probably the most entertaining thing to come out of the mess.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdqrFa6pWLA

I Played Facebook's VR Metaverse so you don't have to

YouTube

@phi1997 oh, I know RT, but I didn't know about this video.

Wow, that was an experience of horror and comedy rolled into one. lol did that stream really cause metaverse stock to tank?

@Aaidanbird
Maybe? It could have been a coincidence, but considering how few people use it, it likely brought many more eyes on how lacking it really is. Both feel plausible.
@0xabad1dea

M. Fioretti Dec 7

@0xabad1dea that's because (EXACTLY like #elonmusk, first wishing to relocate to Mars, now going all-in on humanoid #robots) he hates humans so much he can't stand to be around real ones, and only wants to see himself.

Ditto for Altman and all the #AI fanatics.

I elaborated on this concept here:

https://mfioretti.substack.com/p/the-only-thing-that-ai-tech-bros

The ONLY thing that AI Tech Bros actually created, and WHAT to stop about AI

because we'd really need some REAL AI, NOW.

Just an invitation...

@mfioretti_en @0xabad1dea See also: Transport. A lot of tech bro transit proposals are built around 'pods' of some sort because these ultra-rich 'entrepreneurs' feel afraid and disgusted at the idea of sharing an enclosed bus or train with strangers. The notion of being trapped in a box with the disease-carrying criminal vermin of the commoner class is just not something they can imagine anyone accepting. So they come up with idiocy like the Vegas loop, where every passenger gets their own car.

M. Fioretti Dec 9

@Qybat @0xabad1dea true, but that is only the car culture brought to its logical conclusion, isn't it?

Reminds me that the companies that Howard Hughes, Jr. owned always made money ... except when he stepped in to run them.

neel chauhan Dec 7

@0xabad1dea Now we're making the same mistake with AI, but on a larger scale.

We need a solarpunk future. We need degrowth. We need to be truly net-zero and circular. We need enough for everyone, whether in the US or Uganda. We need more Main Street businesses, not VC-backed "AI" startups. We need universal healthcare and child care and more third places.

Communism failed but so did capitalism. And both led to authoritarianism, just with different leaders.