Carmack, who previously created groundbreaking games at id Software, has left Meta (including Oculus, where he previously worked).

The New York Times reported that Carmack, who was the CTO of Oculus, had left Meta and confirmed it in a Facebook post after the leak: “This is the end of my decade in VR. I have mixed feelings. Quest 2 is almost exactly what I wanted to see: mobile hardware, inside-out tracking, optional PC streaming, 4K-ish screen, and cost-effective. Despite all my complaints about our software, millions of people still get value from it. We have a good product. It is booming, and successful products make the world a better place. It all could have happened a bit faster and been going better if different decisions had been made, but we built something close to The Right Thing. The issue is our efficiency.

Some will ask why I care how the progress is happening, as long as it is happening. If I am trying to sway others, I would say that an organization with only known inefficiency is ill-prepared for the inevitable competition and/or belt-tightening. Still, it is the more personal pain of seeing a 5% GPU utilization in production. I am offended by it. (I was overly poetic here, as several people have missed the intention. As a systems optimization person, I care deeply about efficiency. When you work hard at optimization for most of your life, seeing something grossly inefficient hurts your soul. I likened observing our organization’s performance to seeing a tragically low number on a profiling tool.)

We have a ridiculous amount of people and resources, but we constantly self-sabotage and squander effort. There is no way to sugarcoat this; our organization is operating at half the effectiveness, which would make me happy. Some may scoff and contend we are doing just fine, but others will laugh and say, “Half? Ha! I’m at quarter efficiency!” It has been a struggle for me. I have a voice at the highest levels here, so it feels like I should be able to move things, but I’m not persuasive enough. A good fraction of the things I complain about eventually turn my way after a year or two passes, and evidence piles up. Still, I have never been able to kill stupid things before they cause damage, set a direction, and have a team stick to it. I think my influence at the margins has been positive, but it has never been a prime mover.

This was admittedly self-inflicted – I could have moved to Menlo Park after the Oculus acquisition and tried to wage battles with generations of leadership. Still, I was busy programming and assumed I would hate it, be bad at it, and probably lose anyway—enough complaining. I wearied of the fight and have my startup to run, but the fight is still winnable! VR can bring value to most people worldwide, and no company is better positioned to do it than Meta. Maybe it is possible to get there by just plowing ahead with current practices, but there is plenty of room for improvement. Make better decisions and fill your products with “Give a Damn”!” Carmack wrote.

John Carmack is now focused on Keen Technologies, and yes, the name makes sense as a reference to Commander Keen. The company’s focus is AGI (Artificial General Intelligence), which tries to mimic human intelligence, so it is broader than just artificial intelligence in the arts or science.

Still, it is undeniable that Meta can consider Carmack’s departure a defeat, while the company laid off more than 11,000 employees in November and its Reality Lab sector (including Oculus) was already reporting a monthly loss of $1 billion in July…

Source: PCGamer