Meta Aims To Start Selling Virtual Goods In The Metaverse

The metaverse is catching on and “enablers” such as Meta want to make it possible for people to make money selling virtual goods on its virtual reality platform called Horizon Worlds.

In a blogpost, the company published late Monday, Mark Zuckerberg said that “As part of our ongoing commitment to support creators, we’re beginning to test several new tools that will enable creators to experiment with different ways to monetize what they’re building in Horizon Worlds. While we’re launching this today as a test with a handful of creators to get their feedback, these types of tools are steps toward our long-term vision for the metaverse where creators can earn a living and people can purchase digital goods, services, and experiences.”

The metaverse is seeing increased adoption with huge potential for individuals creators and entrepreneurs as well as companies looking to make some extra (or huge) bucks. As explained by Mark Zuckerberg, by nature of its not being limited by physical space, “the metaverse will bring a new level of creativity and open up new opportunities for the next generation of creators and businesses to pursue their passions and create livelihoods” and what better way to make it easy for people to spend and make money on the metaverse than providing support for its Horizon Worlds?

“The ability to sell virtual items and access to things inside the worlds is a new part of the e-commerce equation overall,” he added.

“We’re starting rolling this out with just a handful of creators and we’ll see how it goes but I imagine that over time we’ll get to roll it out more and more,” he said emphasizing that “Creators who are participating in any monetization programs, including in-world purchases and creator bonuses, are required to follow all of our policies for Horizon Worlds including the Conduct in VR Policy and Horizon Worlds Prohibited Content Policy in order to be eligible for earnings.”

Horizon Worlds, known formerly as Facebook Horizon is a free virtual reality, online video game that allows people to build and explore virtual worlds. “Purchasing items in Horizon Worlds is available to people 18+ in the US and Canada where Horizon Worlds is currently available. Creators selling items will see a Commerce tab and gizmo when they’re in Create mode that lets them create purchasable items,” the blogpost added.