Facebook’s parent company, Meta, is collecting a 47.5 percent cut on digital assets sold through Horizon Worlds, its virtual reality platform.
Horizon Environments is a free virtual reality game that allows players to create and explore their own virtual worlds. While all of this is part of Mark’s ambition to build a virtual “metaverse,” it comes at a cost to authors.
Horizon Worlds was released last year and is now accessible for Oculus VR headsets in the United States and Canada.
Within the worlds they construct, creators may sell virtual things and effects. Wendy’s “Wendyverse,” for example, is simply an advertisement where frosty aficionados can communicate with one another.
A Meta spokesperson told CNBC:
“Meta will take an overall cut of up to 47.5% on each transaction. That includes a ‘hardware platform fee’ of 30% for sales made through the Meta Quest Store, where it sells apps and games for its virtual reality headsets. On top of that, Horizon Worlds will charge a 17.5% fee.”
Meta’s decision will disappoint the creators
After openly criticizing Apple for collecting a 30% developer charge for in-app purchases in the App Store, this news appears dishonest.
“As we build for the metaverse, we’re focused on unlocking opportunities for creators to make money from their work,” he said. “The 30% fees that Apple takes on transactions make it harder to do that, so we’re updating our subscriptions product so now creators can earn more.”
Mark Zuckerberg
In virtual worlds like Decentraland and The SandBox, organizations and people have been buying everything from art to real estate in the last few months. Snoop Dogg, the hip-hop artist, has bought virtual land, and a fan spent $450,000 for a piece next to him on The Sandbox in December.
“We think it’s a really competitive fee in the industry,” Meta’s VP of Horizon, Vivek Sharma, allegedly told The Verge. We feel that other platforms should be allowed to participate.”
Horizon Worlds (previously Facebook Horizon) is a free online virtual reality game that allows users to create and explore virtual worlds. The game was released on Meta’s Oculus VR headsets in the United States and Canada on December 9, although it has yet to be released globally.