John Carmack Facebook Connect 2021 Keynote

I recommend watching last year's speech by Carmack. It gives a little perspective as to why this was targeted to be a virtual session. He is not a fan of how Meta pushes the Metaverse, "Money is flowing and enormous wheels in the company apparatus are turning" and he wants to salvage that financial energy to push technology in some meaningful way. (Pushing down audio latency on the Quest 2 was such a talking point). This shows what Meta's tech is capable of, mask off, no per-rendered CG advert and I think that's a good thing. Besides that, afaik he is largely detached from that project now and only does once a week consulting, with the main focus being his pursuit of AGI. Doesn't change of course how embarrassingly bad Meta's money invested vs results achieved are. edit: Fount the spot I referenced. [this video] at 15:10 onward

hwers's comment lacks some context, but there is some truth to it. Consider Carmack's comment: [this video] @33:50 onward "A closed platform doesn't deserve to be called a metaverse, or does it?" Making money in the Metaverse is a pillar of what makes a virtual world an actual world. (Ignoring of who does the money making for now) Scarcity is an integral part of it. Skins, models, rare items. In the virtual world it all scarcity is artificial by definition. Just like with second life and the linden dollar making it to real exchanges. Second life sold worlds as some kind of virtual realtor in the past, VRChat's users sell custom created skins and rigged models today and Meta wants to be the platform facilitating that tomorrow, but on a grand scale. I also highly applaud Meta's contribution to FOSS btw.