New World Notes: EXCLUSIVE: Meta Staff’s Confidence in Metaverse Drops Sharply from 2021; Majority Say Zuckerberg Not Clearly Explaining What It Even Is

I noted how Meta’s Reality Labs conspicuously didn’t mention “the metaverse” even once in its “Why We Still Believe in the Future” update post last month, and now there’s some new data which might explain its absence.

According to a survey conducted last month by Blind, the popular anonymous messaging app for company staff, confidence in the Metaverse and Meta’s efforts dropped sharply last year. That’s compared to a November 2021 Blind survey where the very same questions were asked. (Methodology below.)

To the statement, “I believe Meta will successfully build the metaverse” (above), only 50% of employees answered yes. In November 2021, 77% of staff answered in the affirmative.

To put that in concrete terms, Blind asked Meta staff if its platform would reach 1 billion users within the next decade. (A goal that Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has often mention.) Now, most of his employees aren’t confident on that score:

40% say No. In November 2021, 67% answered Yes.

In both cases, that represents a one year drop of 27%.

There were also some interesting results when Blind asked new questions about future sales of its Quest line, and whether Meta employees and Zuckerberg himself can even clearly explain what the Metaverse even is:

58% of Meta staff believe its Quest line will have an install base over 100 million by next decade. Seeing as the Quest 2 install base is only at about 20 million after 4 years, that’s quite a lot of confidence!

A couple more results, around who can still clearly explain what the Metaverse even is — 64% of Meta staff say their coworkers can:

However, 56% say their own CEO has not explained that clearly:

That’s pretty notable! I guess the 3 hour talk about the Metaverse with Joe Rogan somehow didn’t do the trick. (May I humbly recommend this blog post instead?) The curious thing if this and Meta’s recent ixnay on the metaverse-ay post signals a major strategic departure for 2023.

Thanks to Blind’s Rick Chen for sharing the data, taken from 648 verified Meta professionals in the U.S. from Dec. 12 to 20, 2022. “The total represents a 99% confidence level with a 5% margin of error of Meta’s 76,000 employees,” Rick tells me.