1. What is Mataverse?
The Metaverse is an iteration of the Internet part of
shared virtual reality, often as a form of social media.
The metaverse in a broader sense may not only refer to
virtual worlds operated by social media companies but
the entire spectrum of augmented reality
2. History of Metaverse
The term was coined in Neal Stephenson's 1992 science fiction novel
Snow Crash, where humans, as avatars, interact with each other and
software agents, in a three-dimensional virtual space that uses the
metaphor of the real world.
Stephenson used the term to describe a virtual reality-based successor to
the Internet.
Concepts similar to the Metaverse have appeared under a variety of
names in the cyberpunk genre of fiction as far back as 1981 in the Vernor
Vinge's novella True Names. Stephenson stated in the afterword to Snow
Crash that after finishing the novel he learned about Habitat, an early
MMORPG which resembled the Metaverse.
3. History of Metaverse Cont’
In 2021, the social media company Facebook changed its name
to Meta to reflect its new focus on building technologies that
"bring the metaverse to life.
Its version of the metaverse is described as "an embodied
internet where you’re in the experience, not just looking at it
4. Key Elements of Metaverse
The elements of the metaverse include "video-conferencing, games
like Minecraft or Roblox, email, virtual reality, social media and live-
streaming
The aforementioned cyberspace has kept evolving and included
various computer-mediated virtual environments.
Such expanding cyberspace indicates a digital 'big bang' driven by
various technologies and ecosystems.
5. Other KEY Elements of
Metaverse
The metaverse ecosystem allows human users to live and
play within a self-sustaining, persistent, and shared realm.
Therefore, the metaverse ecosystem considers user-centric
elements including Avatar Identity, Content Creation,
Virtual Economy, Social Acceptability, Presence, Security
and Privacy, and Trust and Accountability.
6. Why Metaverse?
Fans of the metaverse see it as the next stage in the development of
the internet.
The idea of the metaverse is that it will create new online spaces in
which people's interactions can be more multi-dimensional, where
users are able to immerse themselves in digital content rather than
simply viewing it.
The accelerated interest in the metaverse can be seen as a result of the
COVID-19 pandemic. As more people have started working and going
to school remotely, there has been increased demand for ways to make
online interaction more lifelike.
7. Who is Interested
The idea of the metaverse is attracting a lot of interest from investors
and companies who are keen to be part of the next big thing.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in July that the company will try
to transition from being a social media company to a metaverse
company in the next five years or so.
The term is popular in Silicon Valley, with Microsoft also having
mentioned converging the digital and physical worlds.
8. Why is it suddenly a big thing?
Hype about digital worlds and augmented reality pops up every few
years, but usually dies away.
However, there is a huge amount of excitement about the
metaverse among wealthy investors and big tech firms, and no-one
wants to be left behind if it turns out to be the future of the internet.
There's also a feeling that for the first time, the technology is nearly
there, with advancements in VR gaming and connectivity coming
close to what might be needed.
9. Why is Facebook involved?
Facebook has made building the metaverse one of its big priorities.
It's invested heavily in virtual reality through its Oculus headsets, making them
cheaper than rivals - perhaps even at a loss, according to some analysts.
It's also building VR apps for social hangouts and for the workplace, including ones
that interact with the real world.
Despite its history of buying up rivals, Facebook claims the metaverse "won't be built
overnight by a single company" and has promised to collaborate.
It has recently invested $50m (£36.3m) in funding non-profit groups to help "build
the metaverse responsibly".
But it thinks the true metaverse idea will take another 10 to 15 years
10. Potential Implications of Metaverse
The metaverse is often imagined as a means of manufacturing
immersive digital spaces for all human activity, with potential uses to
increase work productivity
Within the education sector, it has been proposed that metaverse
technologies would allow for more focused and interactive
environments for learning history and human geography
Virtual reality has long been used in the real estate sector for home
tours and metaverse development may expand that function.
There is a significant interest in developing the metaverse for online
retail.
11. Who else is interested in the
metaverse?
Mr Sweeney, the head of Epic Games (which makes Fortnite), has
long spoken about his metaverse aspirations.
Online multiplayer games have had shared interactive worlds
going back decades. They are not the metaverse, but have some
ideas in common.
In recent years Fortnite expanded its product, hosting concerts,
brand events, and more inside its own digital world.
That impressed many with what was possible - and thrust Mr
Sweeney's vision of the metaverse into the spotlight.
12. Who else is interested in the
metaverse?
Other games are getting closer to a metaverse idea, too.
Roblox, for example, is a platform for thousands of
individual games connected to the larger ecosystem.
Meanwhile, Unity, a 3D development platform, is investing
in "digital twins" - digital copies of the real world - and the
graphics company Nvidia is building its "Omniverse", which
it describes as a platform for connecting 3D virtual worlds.
13. So is it all about games?
No. Even though there are so many ideas about what the metaverse
might be, most visions see social human interaction as the core.
Facebook, for example, has been experimenting with a VR meetings
app called Workplace, and a social space called Horizons, both of
which use their virtual avatar systems.
Another VR app, VRChat, is entirely focused around hanging out
online and chatting - with no goal or purpose other than exploring
environments and meeting people.
Other applications may be waiting out there, ready to be
discovered.
14. Technology of Metaverse
The metaverse is a proposed expansion to existing internet technologies. Access points
for the metaverse include general-purpose computers and smartphones, in addition to
augmented reality (AR), mixed reality, virtual reality (VR), and virtual world
technologies
There are significant business and commercial interests in metaverse-related research
and technology.
Facebook bought VR company Oculus in 2014, looking to build a new 3-D social space
with "connective tissue" to bridge the gap between varying services.
A virtual environment is considered to be the most likely access point to the
metaverse.
The metaverse's dependency on VR technology places limitations on its development
and wide-scale adoption
15. Does the technology exist yet?
VR has come a long way in recent years, with high-end headsets which can trick the human eye
into seeing in 3D as the player moves around a virtual world.
It has become more mainstream, too - the Oculus Quest 2 VR gaming headset was a popular
Christmas gift in 2020.
The explosion of interest in NFTs, which may provide a way to reliably track ownership of digital
goods, could point to how a virtual economy would work.
And more advanced digital worlds will need better, more consistent, and more mobile
connectivity - something that might be solved with the rollout of 5G.
For now, though, everything is in the early stages.
The evolution of the metaverse - if it happens at all - will be fought among tech giants for the
next decade, or maybe even longer.
