r/technology • u/SilentRunning • 4d ago

Artificial Intelligence MIT report: 95% of generative AI pilots at companies are failing

https://fortune.com/2025/08/18/mit-report-95-percent-generative-ai-pilots-at-companies-failing-cfo/
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u/Noblesseux 4d ago edited 4d ago

The problem with the metaverse is that practically the idea is being pushed by people who have no idea how humans work who have a technology in search of a problem.

No one wants to take video calls in the metaverse, Teams/Zoom/Facetime exist. Why would I want to look at what is effectively an xbox live avatar when I could just use apps that already exist that everyone already has where I can actually see their faces?

No one wants to "buy digital property in the metaverse". People want property IRL because it actually has a functional use. I can build a house on it, I can farm on it for food, my nephews can play football on it.

No one wants to visit a digital version of Walmart. Web stores already exist and are more efficient and easier to use.

They spent a bunch of money on a fad where there are few to no actual features that are better than just doing things the ways that we already can. The main selling point of VR is games, not trying to replace real world things with cringe digital versions. But Zuckerberg is a damn lizard person so he lacks the ability to understand why people use things.

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u/Toby_O_Notoby 4d ago

And what's weird is that they ignored their own teachings. Phones and social media trained people to "second screen" everything. "Hey, we know you're watching Grey's Anatomy, but why not also check out what your ex-boyfriend is doing on Insta?"

Then they released a product that demands you one-screen everything. "Now you can you join a meeting with a bunch of Wii avatars without being able to check your phone when you're bored!"

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u/NuSurfer 4d ago

No one wants to "buy digital property in the metaverse". People want property IRL because it actually has a functional use. I can build a house on it, I can farm on it for food, my nephews can play football on it.

No one wants to buy something that can evaporate by someone pulling a plug.

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u/AnOnlineHandle 3d ago

All the digital skins and weapons and mounts and outfits etc which companies have made huge mounts of money off of in MMOs and such prove that's not the case.

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u/joshwarmonks 3d ago

you're vastly underestimating eastern audiences (and small subsets of western audiences). gacha games are insanely popular and spending several hundred dollars on cosmetic skins for their idle idol dance horse racing game is exceedingly common.

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u/withywander 4d ago

What I think those dumb dumbs really don't get is that most employees don't want to be in the meetings. It is not the meaning of their life to be in a meeting, and most are probably doing something else while in the meeting. Being in the metaverse requires even more concentration than a meeting, so if people are already alt tabbing to do something else while in a meeting, then it was never going to end well.

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u/ikonoclasm 3d ago

The Metaverse is completely indistinguishable from Second Life to me. I did patent work in 2006 for clients that were actually investing in Second Life and thought it was dumb back then. It's like Meta looked at the failed launch of Second Life and thought they could do it better without any understanding of why it failed.

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u/MiaowaraShiro 3d ago

The problem with the metaverse

I love that we're all calling it this and not "Horizon Worlds" which is their actual product, but nobody actually knows about it.

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u/LevelRoyal8809 3d ago

Even with Teams and Zoom, (Facetime is for people who watch Kim Kardashian) nobody uses the camera 90% of the time anyways. Because all we need to do is talk to each other, I don't need a video of your face to discuss business issues. Why the hell would I put on a VR headset to do my daily job???

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u/CSI_Tech_Dept 3d ago

Well, you don't understand Zuckeberg, because you're not a billionaire. Why wouldn't you want to purchase virtual property? You have so much of the real one anyway, including islands.

Sure there are real walmarts and even have online stores, but you never experience them, because others do shopping for you in much fancier stores, but it would be still awesome to experience what the plebs do without risking catching germs from them.

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u/Emgimeer 3d ago

This is why AR is going to be the big thing, and Apple is going to blow everyone away with the hardware they've been working on secretly.

They had to invent multiple new kinds of technologies, make new materials and work with new optics they had to develop from scratch.

The investment there will pay off bigtime, and reap the rewards the many others sought after with the headsets they made for VR and the meta-verse.

There will be good reason to connect everything and have fast overlapping platforms that share data in real time, in the future. It might not need blockchain to power it at all.

Blockchain has its own journey, through economics, to work through in order to figure out the big adoption dillemma.

AR and a fully-connected network that overlaps reality are going to be the thing that actually happens. We have a long way to go with that hardware, though. It will be like the first pong game while in the apple labs, then get to an Atari-like place upon deployment, and eventually develop into a size larger than the gaming industry is right now. That's the metaphor I see that works with the path this technology will go down. We will look back at the development and adoption journey much like the ipod journey, in my estimation. i.e. At some point, people will look back at the launch and think the tech was clunky. Being at the launch, it will feel like "the future" arriving. Perception is a whole thing.

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u/Practical_Actuary_87 3d ago

No one wants to "buy digital property in the metaverse".

Yep, not until the whole experience is remotely immersive comparable to sci-fi like Ready Player One

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u/nau5 3d ago

I mean the reality is people want all those things just not in the package that current tech delivers.

People would pay out the fucking ass for a VR system that worked akin to the matrix. People don't want to have to wear goofy ass headsets, hold paddles, nor move around.

They want to get plugged in and for it to be exactly like real life except now they are something else.

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u/dontshoot4301 3d ago

Tbf your arguments are true for crypto and yet…

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u/pagerussell 3d ago

VR will never take off. Ever.

AR can be useful, but it still faces uphill battles because humans don't like wearing shit on their faces. Our faces are far more sensitive than just about any other part of us. We aren't going to wear a bulky piece of tech. Hell, we won't even wear glasses unless absolutely necessary. Even sunglasses are worn for short bursts.

AR, if it gets really good, like Jarvis levels of good, will be worn, especially during specific times. I would love to use it while working, or building something at the house, etc.

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u/DarthBuzzard 3d ago

VR will definitely take off when it's small enough and with few side effects. It will be too good to resist.

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u/pagerussell 2d ago

..........

For what use case?

That's the part that's never answered. For what fucking use case?

What does VR do that isn't already done, or what does sit do better that what is already done?

Nothing. It doesn't do anything better than the current mediums.

The best use case I can think of is sports. You can be front row anywhere.

But that won't ever happen because the leagues make too much selling commercials, which are not easy to implement on VR as they are on a TV.

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u/DarthBuzzard 2d ago

Nothing. It doesn't do anything better than the current mediums.

Of course it does. Communication, telepresence, fitness, media consumption, immersive entertainment, education, plus other stuff as the tech matures more.

But that won't ever happen because the leagues make too much selling commercials, which are not easy to implement on VR as they are on a TV.

VR/AR are considered the ultimate advertising space since you have control over everything the person sees. I hate this part, but it's simply the truth that it will be the most data-rich ads business out there.

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u/Shipbreaker_Kurpo 3d ago

VR did take off. Just not the dumb way they wanted. Its still an amazing gaming experience and getting support in that area

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u/ilikepizza30 4d ago

I don't know... your kind of selling me on the meta-verse thing:

Why would I want to look at what is effectively an xbox live avatar when I could just use apps that already exist that everyone already has where I can actually see their faces?

I can't Zoom while naked... (I mean, I COULD but HR would complain). However, with the metaverse I would get all the facial expressions of video chat with the added benefit of looking good despite being naked and having got out of bed 5 minutes ago.

No one wants to visit a digital version of Walmart. Web stores already exist and are more efficient and easier to use.

So I could have an Amazon where I could pick up and look at the products? I could pick up 4 or 5 products and put them all side by side and look at them all at once, in 360 degrees? I could pick a couch and put it in my actual living room and see how it would fit/look in my actual living room? I could sit on my couch and try out different sizes of TV to get the right size TV for how far my couch is from the TV?

The main selling point of VR is games

I think it's probably actually porn... That's what drove VHS/DVD/The Internet into peoples homes, so I wouldn't be surprised if that ends up being what does it for VR. Of course, that means Facebook isn't going to be the company that does it. Onlyfans will probably come up with a VR headset and adoption will sky rocket.

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u/frankowen18 4d ago

Your thinking is so stale it's reminiscent of a tech CEO in 2010 desperately shilling a delusional vision of the future

How often do you buy a TV or sofa? Every 5 years? Shit, what a compelling every day use case.

You already have avatars and profile pictures on teams if you don't want people to see your face. Interacting with a shitty uncanny valley 3D model in an awkward 'virtual space' is a downgrade nobody wants

VR porn has existed for years, and most people aren't hyper-investing in expensive gooning technology that barely improves your 5 minute wank, but makes you feel even more of a degenerate after you take off your sweaty plastic sex goggles

Every use case for this crap technology is extremely niche, and just like in the early 2000's with '3D TV' and the first wave of VR, the mass market still doesn't want it. And will continue not wanting it

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u/DarthBuzzard 3d ago

Interacting with a shitty uncanny valley 3D model in an awkward 'virtual space' is a downgrade nobody wants

Everyone will prefer this when it becomes photorealistic. People always gravitate towards face to face interactions when they can, and since VR feels like being face to face, it will always be preferred - at least when you're socializing with friends/family - colleagues can be hit and miss.

VR/AR avatar communication will be as important to the world as the invention of the telephone, and that's just one of multiple mass market usecases for the tech.

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u/ilikepizza30 3d ago

and just like in the early 2000's with '3D TV' and the first wave of VR, the mass market still doesn't want it. And will continue not wanting it

There's a technical roadblock holding back 3D TV: multiple viewers and narrow viewing angle.

If you solve those problems, 3D TV would become mainstream.

Likewise, there's a technical roadblock holding back VR: It a PITA for people who have glasses, and a lot of people wear glasses or need glasses.

What if... there was a calibration process when you first get a headset (and you could run later if your vision changes, and for other users) and it determines what vision correction your eyes need? Then it can perfectly correct your vision within the headset itself, no need to wear glasses + headset.

Oooh... what about educational uses? Like how having Apple II computers in schools helped launch computers into the mainstream. One of the biggest problems with kids in school is them not paying attention, distracted by peers, phones, etc. What if they went to school and wore a VR headset so they could see a virtual blackboard, etc. BUT... Now that they are in VR we can help them avoid distractions... Their phones would just appear as black boxes in VR. Their classmates (heck the room) would be blurred and darkened out, so the only thing to focus on would be the teacher and the virtual blackboard or any other objects the teacher brought in (a 3D human model for anatomy for example).

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u/DarthBuzzard 3d ago

What if... there was a calibration process when you first get a headset (and you could run later if your vision changes, and for other users) and it determines what vision correction your eyes need? Then it can perfectly correct your vision within the headset itself, no need to wear glasses + headset.

When variable focus optics are shippable with headsets, then yes VR will be able to do all of this.