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ColdFusion
The Metaverse Only Has 900 Users
The Metaverse Only Has 900 Users
ColdFusion
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13:54 · Dec 3, 2025
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0:00
This goofy doofy image,
0:04
it's seared into everyone's collective consciousness
0:06
when they think about the metaverse even 4 years after its launch.
0:11
The metaverse, as envisioned by Mark Zuckerberg,
0:13
was just one of those vague Silicon Valley ideas that nobody concretely understood.
0:18
At the center of the metaverse was Horizon Worlds,
0:21
the flagship VR universe
0:23
that was to usher in a new era of social connection.
0:26
On the surface, Facebook had the social network effects
0:29
and the money to execute the tried andrue
0:32
if you build it,
0:33
they'll come method, but it wasn't to be.
0:36
The average person wasn't ready to meet
0:38
and interact with their friends in a virtual reality enabled world.
0:41
So, the big question here is what happened to Zuckerberg's metaverse?
0:46
Well, today Horizon World sits abandoned
0:49
as a halfbaked glitchy mess
0:51
and it's struggling to grow
0:52
as promised.
0:53
Meta's Metaverse venture, the Reality Labs division,
0:56
has lost $70 billion since 2020 and is losing billions more each quarter.
1:02
By some estimates, the number of daily users in Horizon Worlds could be
1:06
as low as 900.
1:08
This story shows just what happens
1:10
when a CEO ignores the criticism surrounding him
1:12
and insists that he knows best.
1:14
We examine the strange failure of the metaverse.
1:18
How did this happen and where did it go so wrong?
1:22
You are watching Toll Fusion TV.
1:26
>> Just a handful of years ago,
1:28
the metaverse was supposed to be the next version of the internet.
1:31
According to Zuckerberg, it was supposed to be quote,
1:34
"An immersive embodied internet where you're in the experience
1:37
and not just looking at it."
1:39
The next platform and medium will be even more immersive.
1:43
An embodied internet where you're in the experience, not just looking at it.
1:47
And we call this the metaverse.
1:49
So, of course, we have to settle the question, what is the metaverse?
1:53
Basically, a digital world where you reside with others using VR.
1:58
If you're into science fiction, think Ready Player 1 or Snow Crash.
2:05
In 2021, Facebook was having a rough time escaping controversy.
2:09
It started in earnest in 2018 with the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
2:13
Then in 2021, leaked internal documents revealed just how much Facebook knew it was
2:18
hurting its users,
2:19
social cohesion, and children, but chose to do very little.
2:23
The files dropped in September 2021, and the very next month in October,
2:28
Zuckerberg decided to unveil his grand vision of the metaverse to the world.
2:31
It just so happened to come with a complete branding change and name change.
2:36
The optics were poor
2:37
and it looked like a thinly veiled way to ditch the troublesome Facebook brand
2:41
identity and switch it to a new one.
2:43
All within a virtual presentation that lasted an hour.
2:47
The stock dropped for months afterwards.
2:50
It was because investors had no idea what the heck was going on.
2:53
And it didn't help
2:54
that the metaverse brand image
2:56
that everyone got was this low poly,
2:58
goofy goomba avatar of Mark.
3:00
It stuck in everyone's minds as a dorky but memeable image.
3:04
Since then, Zuckerberg has done a fair bit to reinvent his public image with
3:07
mixed results.
3:08
I've done a whole episode on it if you're interested.
3:12
Regardless, investors and the public wanted to know one thing and one thing only.
3:17
How was such a concept of the metaverse going to even work?
3:22
Meta would plan to launch several metaverse products.
3:25
Number one, Horizon Worlds,
3:27
a VR world with Meta Horizon OS
3:29
as an operating system
3:30
that would power their headsets.
3:32
Number two, Meta Horizon mobile app.
3:35
This is the companion app for Meta Horizon.
3:37
People could manage their Horizon profile and connect with others.
3:40
Number three, the Meta Horizon Store,
3:43
a platform for buying and downloading apps and games for Horizon OS devices.
3:48
And four, Horizon Home.
3:50
This is a personalized virtual space where users can socialize with friends
3:53
and family in a virtual environment.
3:56
But for the average consumer, the friction was immense.
4:00
First, you have to buy a headset which cost you hundreds of dollars.
4:03
Then you have to sign up to the metaverse and explore.
4:06
The lynch pin of the whole idea is
4:08
that the experience would have to be good enough to keep you coming back.
4:11
Then there's the network effects.
4:13
If no one is there,
4:15
no one else is going to be drawn to use it.
4:18
And this isn't to mention
4:19
that trust in Facebook was at an all-time low
4:21
and trust in Meta still is.
4:25
Lastly, there's the cultural element.
4:27
Most people don't understand the appeal of having a platform
4:30
that literally disconnects you from the real world.
4:32
It would take a lot to get the average person not interested in technology
4:36
to actually want to strap a pair of screens onto their face centimeters away
4:39
from their eyeballs time
4:41
and time again.
4:42
The bottom line is
4:43
that VR headsets are a hard form factor to gain mainstream adoption.
4:47
Even Apple couldn't do it.
4:48
Of course, for Apple, the price was the big issue, but still,
4:52
it's an indication that consumers aren't ready for it just yet.
4:57
All of that consumer friction aside,
4:59
the idea of Zuckerberg's metaverse didn't come from nowhere,
5:03
it was slowly being worked towards for years.
5:06
In 2014, Facebook would go on to buy VR leader Oculus.
5:10
And in 2020, they founded Reality Labs, but development was far from smooth sailing.
5:16
John Carmarmac, one of the greatest minds in technology,
5:19
was tasked with helping build Zuckerberg's metaverse in 2014.
5:22
But in 2022, he ended up leaving the company and verbally frying Meta's efforts.
5:27
According to Carmarmac, the bet on virtual reality was actually a good one,
5:31
and he's still very bullish on the technology.
5:34
He just thinks that the way Meta is going about it is wrong.
5:37
Even in 2023, John Carmarmac called Meta's VR efforts too glitchy and slow.
5:43
During the time of the 2021 Meta name change,
5:46
the company didn't have a concrete definition of what the metaverse meant.
5:49
The idea of what it was
5:51
or wasn't ended up being a mystery even to those who were building it.
5:55
According to some staff working on the project at the time,
5:57
they couldn't define what the metaverse was, even when asked.
6:01
Different employees had different ideas of what it was.
6:04
According to staff member Bernie Yei,
6:06
staff internally were confused on what they were building.
6:09
Quote, "One group of people think they're building YouTube
6:12
and another group think they're making a casual World of Warcraft for everyone. are
6:16
you making a tool
6:17
or are you making an experience?
6:19
End quote.
6:20
But it got even worse.
6:22
In February of 2022,
6:23
Zuckerberg sent out a memo on the vision of the metaverse to employees.
6:27
He told them that they should quote live in the future,
6:30
and that was it.
6:31
Employees were encouraged to use their own products, be critical, and improve it.
6:36
But in a foreshadowing of the future,
6:39
being in the metaverse was too much for even the employees to bear.
6:43
Frankly, they didn't end up liking their own product.
6:45
Part of the push to use VR internally took the form of meetings in
6:49
the metaverse,
6:50
and it went about as well as you'd expect.
6:52
An internal source spoke to the Wall Street Journal,
6:54
and they shed some light on how things went.
6:56
It was glitchy and full of friction.
6:59
So much so that it wasn't unusual for a participant to spend 30 minutes
7:03
simply just trying to join a meeting.
7:05
They'd get so frustrated
7:06
that they'd give up
7:07
and just call in the normal way with a normal video.
7:10
And that's the fundamental problem.
7:12
People are more likely to enjoy things
7:14
that are easier and more convenient for a given application.
7:17
Consider strapping on a headset
7:19
and signing into a Meta platform versus just clicking an item for a Zoom
7:22
meeting.
7:23
Which one do you think most people would choose?
7:26
Now, the Metaverse may not be getting a lot of traction recently,
7:29
but if you want your business to have a website that does,
7:32
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7:35
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7:40
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7:48
First, define your goals and your industry.
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Then, choose a color palette or upload your logo.
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Next, add your pages and features.
7:58
And finally, pick a theme from dozens of professional templates.
8:02
In minutes, you'll have a complete structure ready to customize.
8:06
And customization is where ODU really shines.
8:09
Their drag and drop editor is intuitive and powerful.
8:12
No coding required.
8:13
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8:24
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8:29
or translate text on the spot.
8:31
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8:35
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8:40
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8:43
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8:44
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8:46
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8:51
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8:52
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8:56
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9:01
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9:02
Thanks to ODU for sponsoring this video.
9:05
Now, back to the story.
9:08
We probably all remember what happened to Meta during this rocky period.
9:11
By October 2022, Meta stock had fallen 70% since the start of the year.
9:17
Not long after jobs were cut for the first time in the company's almost
9:20
20-year history.
9:22
From November 2022 to May 2023,
9:25
the company laid off 20,000 employees or about 25% of their workforce.
9:30
Things seemed dire, but that period was the exact bottom of the stock.
9:35
Against all odds, Mark Zuckerberg managed to turn the ship around via massive growth
9:40
in advertising revenue.
9:47
While the stock began to rebound, the metaverse didn't.
9:51
The company doesn't release public data on users, but by February of 23,
9:56
there are about 20,000 monthly users in Horizon Worlds with an estimated 8K daily
10:01
users.
10:02
YouTuber Jarvis Johnson went into the metaverse to see for himself.
10:06
And what he saw was a count as low as 900 daily users,
10:10
but that was in 2023.
10:12
And seeing that Horizon Worlds is only getting less popular,
10:14
the true number is probably even less than that today.
10:17
The only ones using the platform are basically kids that enjoy Roblox.
10:22
Frankly, it all wasn't working, and nobody cared about it.
10:25
Investors were even telling Meta to cut back on their metaverse ambitions.
10:29
They saw it as a drag in an otherwise rebounding company,
10:32
but Zuck didn't listen.
10:34
In April of 2024,
10:36
Reality Labs opened up the Horizon OS platform for use on other non-meta hardware.
10:40
It was an indication that things maybe aren't going that well.
10:43
Meta's Quest headsets are selling decently, and they're pretty good for the price,
10:47
but it's still not profitable for the company.
10:50
Meta's Reality Labs division in Q3 2025 made $470 million in sales,
10:56
but lost $4.4 4 billion.
10:59
Over the years, Meta would continue to spend money on improving the software
11:03
and hardware experiences,
11:04
including infamously spending 2 years to add legs to avatars.
11:09
But is the cost worth it?
11:10
Only time will tell.
11:12
But that brings me to another question.
11:14
How does Meta plan to make money off the metaverse?
11:17
You'd have to bet
11:18
that advertising would be at the top of their mind for the metaverse,
11:21
but it hasn't worked yet.
11:22
The additional theorized upside is
11:24
that instead of placing regular ads in a 3D environment,
11:27
advertisers build worlds and sell items in that world.
11:31
Apart from a few examples like a virtual world built by Absolute Vodka.
11:35
So far, this hasn't panned out either.
11:38
The grand vision for Metaverse revenue could be the Apple App Store model.
11:42
It's where they build the hardware, MetaQuest and Meta Raybands, and software,
11:46
but Meta gets a cut of every app developed for the Horizon Worlds
11:49
and Meta Horizon Store.
11:50
This will take a while to build, if at all.
11:53
But so far, it still looks like it's a way to light money on
11:56
fire,
11:56
but with extra steps.
12:00
As it stands, Horizon Worlds will remain a disaster for the foreseeable future.
12:05
Meta Reality Labs may have sold 20 million MetaQuest headsets,
12:09
but it still can't make a profit.
12:11
Frankly, VR just isn't working out monetarily,
12:14
but it doesn't seem to be Zuckerberg's focus anymore.
12:17
AI seems to be the new shiny thing that's distracted Mark from the metaverse
12:21
vision.
12:21
He's now spending big to poach AI experts for meta.
12:25
It's paying off for their voice assistant technology in the meta ray bands,
12:28
but the rest of the benefits largely remain to be seen.
12:32
Who really knows how the AI pivot will pan out?
12:34
It all might be a massive waste of money.
12:36
Or conversely, an AI system
12:38
that integrates into all of Meta's products could result in better targeted ads for
12:42
them.
12:43
But if that doesn't pan out in the long run,
12:45
could we see Zuckerberg strike out two for two?
12:48
Whatever the case, Mark Zuckerberg's metaverse as a whole isn't going well.
12:52
And their flagship product, Horizon Worlds, is fairing even worse.
12:58
And just to be clear,
12:59
I think virtual reality as a technology does have a future.
13:02
Just look at VR Chat,
13:03
which can have over 100,000 users at a time.
13:06
As John Carmarmac said, Meta is just going about VR the wrong way.
13:13
Anyway, that's about it from me.
13:14
Thanks for watching.
13:15
Hope you enjoyed that.
13:16
If you did, feel free to subscribe.
13:18
My name is Dogo and you've been watching Cold Fusion.
13:21
And I'll catch you again soon for the next episode.
13:24
Cheers, guys.
13:25
Have a good one.
13:50
>> >> Cold Fusion.
13:52
It's new thinking.
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