

Zuckerberg's metaverse cuts shouldn’t be interpreted as a retreat from his passion project
A sense of smug satisfaction wafts across the internet whenever a report indicates Mark Zuckerberg’s metaverse vision is in trouble. So it was last week when my colleague Kurt Wagner broke the news the Meta was planning cuts of up to 30% in the Reality Labs division that handles the experimental technology.“Finally,” offered Henry Blodget, a man who made his name hyping doomed dot-com stocks. “Points for trying.
Now on to other things.” The Wall Street Journal called it a ‘pivot’ away from a “yearslong vision.” Investors cheered. “The potential cost cuts could somewhat offset the historic spend to build out Meta’s AI infrastructure,” TD Securities analysts wrote, estimating cost savings of $5 billion to $6 billion. Meta shares closed the week up almost 4%.But this isn’t a pivot from the metaverse.
It’s a rebrand. Not for the first time, Meta’s CEO has reframed his ambitions to make his corporate spending more palatable to Wall Street—and it’s worked. The metaverse has always been seen as Zuckerberg’s nerdiest folly.
It has lost a staggering $71 billion since 2021 with little to show for it. Fewer than a million Quest headsets, the gateway to the metaverse, were shipped globally in the second quarter of this year. Meta’s Horizon Worlds platform, a place for your virtual self to live and hang out, is a lonely place.
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