Facebook has opened its social virtual reality experience Facebook Horizon Worlds to users in the US and Canada. Meta Horizon Worlds was one of the first steps towards the metaverse. Take your place in this world.
Facebook’s vision for Metaverse became a manifesto when its parent company changed its name to Meta. In addition to his Oculus investment, he announced his interest in the augmented reality world by announcing Horizon in 2019. At a press conference this year, the company clearly demonstrated how it will bring digital meetings to virtual environments with Horizon Workrooms.
After all these developments, Facebook opened its social VR experience Facebook Horizon to users in the USA and Canada yesterday. Horizon Worlds, which met users with a closed beta version in the first months of 2020, will now meet users over the age of 18 in the USA and Canada.
You can start your new metaverse adventure by installing Horizon Worlds’ free app on Oculus Quest 2. When you sign in to Horizon Worlds’ free app, you’re given the option to play, join events, or hang around. In the Horizon Worlds universe, you can visit the environments prepared by both Meta and various communities.
At this point, let’s also mention that you can build your own fields in Meta. If you remember, the company announced last October that it will spend at least 10 billion dollars this year for its metaverse unit. It is possible to say that Horion Worlds is expanding step by step with professionals and communities. There are even tools for manufacturers to create their own games and environments.
If you are not interested in producing something, but just want to wander around a bit, Plaza can be one of the ideal areas for this. Created by Meta, Plaza has community moderation. Thus, the moderator supports and guides the first steps of newcomers.
Areas developed by creators are Pixel Plummet, Wand & Broom, and Mark’s Riverboat. There is no moderation support in areas produced by users and creators. Considering that after a while, almost all areas will be developed by users, developers and brands, the issue of how to provide a safe environment in Horizon Worlds without moderation support comes to the fore.
The days when social networks were full of hate speech, fake news and harassment seem to be a little behind with the measures taken. Yet we continue to see cases of hate speech, fraud and harassment on social networks. The transfer of these elements to the virtual reality environment can also increase the feeling of the experience.
Let’s get to the details of the experience, each Avatar you interact with in Horizon Worlds belongs to a real person. Therefore, in this sense, we can define Horizon Worlds as the VR version of social networks. If you are in an environment that disturbs you, you can press the security button from the main menu on your right wrist. This takes you directly to the “safe zone”. Here you can take a break from virtual reality interactions or apply the options to mute, block and report people who bother you. By the way, if you want to meet the community before logging into the platform, you can become a member of the Horizon Worlds group.
We can say that a new era has begun for social networks and the web. However, we will only be able to see the widespread use of VR glasses like Oculus in the next 2-3 years. Meanwhile, we can say that new job roles for virtual reality environments will increase. Novi integration to Horizon Worlds will be the first step to launch business operations. Afterwards, it is possible that the virtual reality marketing segment will emerge, just like social media marketing, with virtual stores and virtual events.
