Business | Reality bites

How much trouble is Mark Zuckerberg in?

As Facebook fades, Meta hopes for success in another dimension

An avatar of Mark Zuckerberg, chief executive officer of Meta Platforms Inc., speaks during the virtual Meta Connect event in New York, US, on Tuesday, Oct. 11, 2022. Zuckerberg unveiled his company's newest virtual-reality headset, the Meta Quest Pro, the latest foray into the world of high-end VR devices that Meta Platforms hopes will entice creators and working professionals to adopt its vision for a virtual future. Photographer: Michael Nagle/Bloomberg via Getty Images
|THE METAVERSE

It is night-time at the Soapstone Comedy Club. In fact, it always is. The club is a space in Horizon Worlds, Meta’s flagship metaverse app, where users can watch and perform comedy in virtual reality (vr). “It’s hard to do stand-up when you have no legs,” quips one performer, gesturing to his hovering avatar, before accidentally dropping the virtual microphone and floating offstage. A night out in vr lacks some of the atmosphere of a real bar, though it does cause authentic dizziness and nausea.

This article appeared in the Business section of the print edition under the headline “Reality bites”

A house-price horror show

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