Samsung’s Metaverse Event Went … Poorly

There Is A Certain Rather Uncouth Compound Word That Describes What Happened Perfectly

You could choose to skip down to learn about the upcoming arrival of Intel’s Software Defined Silicon on Linux, where you will be able to pay to unlock features on the upcoming Sapphire Rapid Xeons and decide how upset it makes you, but this is Friday so perhaps a wee chuckle is a better choice to focus on.  Samsung recently tried out hosting an event in the Metaverse and it went even worse than you might have thought.

Firstly, it does of course involve blockchains and cryptocurrency, because of course it did.  Samsung’s virtual replica of their flagship New York experience center, called Samsung 837X, is hosted in a blockchain-powered area of the Metaverse called Decentraland, which is a cryptocurrency-focused virtual world.  While that may not have caused the problems which plagued the event, it certainly didn’t make it easier for participants to navigate around the vortex in the centre of the atrium your avatar first arrives in.

It was after people managed to escape that landing page/world that the problems really started, for there was a line up at the entrance to the Samsung 837X virtual building.  As you might expect people reacted poorly to this, with some jumping on the heads of other avatars waiting in line in an attempt to get to the ‘door’ to get in.  That did not work well, only exacerbating the problem as the doors themselves would not open.

Slashdot also mentions that a CNET reporter tweeted they were able to gain access on the version hosted on the ATHENA server, with no information on exactly how one was to try to find that server, let alone log into it.   The Metaverse is apparently far from user friendly, and as it seems to be intended to be used by anyone that uses Facebook. Instagram and the other apps owned by Meta this is something of a problem.

If the main reaction from your average user trying to attend a virtual event is “I hate this game.”, you aren’t going to have a good time.