Meta, formerly known as Facebook, will get a 47.5% commission of digital asset sales on the Horizon Worlds platform.
Meta Charging Creators
The Meta Quest Store will be a place where creators can sell their apps and games for VR headsets. Meta will charge creators a 30% platform fee for sales made through the Store. Then, it will take a 17.5% cut as its platform fee.
The tech giant announced that it is testing tools for creators to sell their digital assets and make money on Horizon Worlds. This is a vital part of the company’s plan to create ‘Metaverse Worlds‘.
“For now, in this limited test, creators will be rewarded for building worlds that attract the most time spent, but over time we may evolve these goals, for example, to encourage creators to adopt new tools or features we roll out.”
Meta
Months before, it was one of the tech companies that complained about the commission that Apple takes every time a subscriber purchases through the App Store.
The commission has proven to be prolific for Apple. In fact, it has become the main driver of the company’s growth in recent years with yearly sales of nearly $275 billion. But the commission has also created headaches for the company as it drew antitrust scrutiny, outrage from app makers, and lawsuits from partners.
Apple has been sued by the most popular video game maker, Epic Games. It accused Apple of breaking antitrust laws as it forced app makers to pay 30% fees.
Last year, Meta’s founder, Mark Zuckerberg, said that his company is keeping “paid online events, fan subscriptions, badges, and our upcoming independent news products free for creators until 2023. And when we do introduce a revenue share, it will be less than the 30% that Apple and others take.”
He also criticized the policy of Apple, which is making it difficult for creators to make money from their work on the App Store because of the huge cut. Facebook described the huge commission of the App Store to be monopolistic and harmful to customers. Mark added that the cut blocks innovation and competition.
Now, it seems Meta will be the one taking a huge cut from creators through their digital asset sales. Meta’s VP of Horizons said that the nearly 50% commission is a competitive rate in the market.
Meta will also introduce a bonus program that will help encourage creators to use the tools and build out their virtual worlds. The bonuses won’t have fees and they will be paid in full.
Creators must abide by Meta’s VR conduct policy. They are also not allowed to go against the content policy for Horizon Worlds. If the creators don’t follow the rules, they are removed from the bonus program.
In February, Meta’s Horizon amassed 300K users. The VR platform was featured in Super Bowl and Mark called it the core of the company’s metaverse vision. However, it’s too early to tell if Horizon’s rapid growth will go on. Will it retain users over time, though? That is a question that only time can tell.
