John Carmack, one of the VR pioneers who joined Meta* following buying Oculus for $2 billion, has left the company. He confirmed his departure on social media, along the way posting an explanation of his decision.
John wrote that this is the end of his decade in VR. He praised the Quest 2, calling it the VR device he wanted to see from the start, noting internal motion tracking, PC streaming, cost, and display resolution. But he added that it might have happened sooner if other decisions had been made.
Carmack’s main problem with Meta was efficiency, or rather its very low level.
We have an absurd amount of people and resources, but we are constantly engaged in self-sabotage and waste of effort. It makes no sense to embellish – I think that the company is working at half its possible efficiency.
As one of the leaders, Carmack says he thinks he might influence the pace, but he was not convincing enough.
I didn’t get to deal with stupid things before they hurt, or set a direction for the team to follow.
Carmack explained that he is tired of this battle but still believes in the value of VR to people around the world and believes that Meta is in a great position to realize its potential.
In August, Carmack told Lex Friedman’s podcast that he felt sick following learning regarding the $10 billion spent on VR and AR, how absurdly such a huge amount of money was being used.
* On March 21, the Tverskoy District Court of Moscow recognized the company Meta (owns Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp) as extremist and banned its activities in Russia
