- Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg appeared on the Lex Fridman podcast hosted on his company’s metaverse platform
- Zuckerberg and the show’s host appeared on set as avatars that closely resembled their actual physical appearance
- The podcast centered around topics like AI in the metaverse and large language models
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has appeared in the Lex Fridman podcast as an avatar in Meta’s metaverse platform Horizon Worlds with an avatar closely matching his physical appearance. Zuckerberg and Fridman interacted in the virtual world using Meta’s Quest 3 headsets with Fridman describing the experience as almost as if he was physically engaging the executive. Although the web3 community was excited by the avatars’ life-like appearance, some noted the appearance was meant to promote Horizon Worlds, which has been lately receiving criticism from the community.
The Metaverse is Officially Real
Fridman engaged Zuckerberg on topics like AI in the metaverse, terming the experience “awesome” and noted that at some point it was hard to differentiate between Zuckerberg’s avatar and his appearance in real life. Fridman added that the interaction provided a sneak peek into the future of “reality and human connection.”
Here’s my conversation with Mark Zuckerberg, his 3rd time on the podcast, but this time we talked in the Metaverse as photorealistic avatars. This was one of the most incredible experiences of my life. It really felt like we were talking in-person, but we were miles apart 🤯 It’s… pic.twitter.com/Nu8a3iYWm0
— Lex Fridman (@lexfridman) September 28, 2023
The engagement employed Meta’s Codec Avatars technology which has been in development for roughly four years and intends to generate photorealistic avatars for Horizon World users.
Some of those who viewed the interaction between Zuckerberg and Fridman noted that “the metaverse is officially real.” However, not everyone was impressed by the realistic avatars with some observing that they were of low quality while others said that they preferred the cartoon-like versions.
Meta has been recently facing backlash over its cartoonish Horizon Worlds avatars that initially had no legs. The company has in the past defended its continued funding of its metaverse ambitions despite sinking billions of dollars into losses.
Metaverse a Danger to Teenagers?
It has also faced criticism from lawmakers who consider its metaverse platform a danger to the well-being of teenagers. Some U.S. senators, for example, wrote to Zuckerberg requesting him to block persons under 17 years from accessing Horizon World citing a possible negative effect on their mental health.
Although Zuckerberg may have impressed the community with the realistic avatars, Horizon Worlds users will likely continue using the cartoonish versions since the tech to produce the avatars is yet to be available to day-to-day users.
