Metaverse – Rise of the new technology
What is the metaverse?
It’s a combination of multiple elements of technology, including virtual reality, augmented reality and video where users “live” within a digital universe. Supporters of the metaverse envision its users working, playing and staying connected with friends through everything from concerts and conferences to virtual trips around to the world.
The origin of Metaverse
The word “metaverse” is a combination of two words “meta-” and “verse”. The word “meta” is a prefix of Greek-origin meaning “beyond” while “verse” comes from the word “universe”.
It was first used in literature by Neal Stephenson in his 1992 dystopian novel Snow Crash. In the book, the metaverse is presented as the ultimate evolution of the internet — a kind of virtual reality where any virtual interaction can have a direct impact on the real world too.
The book pretty much sums up what the metaverse is. It’s a physically persistent virtual space where there are virtual avatars, digital social interactions, and gaming among many unique things that we associate with metaverse today. Snow Crash also underlines how the metaverse in the story affects developments in the real world of the protagonist, including a conspiracy that turns people, whose brains are connected to the virtual world, insane.
Metaverse Terms To Know
Virtual World
A virtual world is a simulated environment that can be accessed by many users who can explore the world simultaneously and independently through the use of an avatar. The virtual world presents perceptual data to the user while also including the real time actions and communications of other users along with their movements and gravity.
Massive multiplayer online games use virtual worlds to allow players to do things like build and change the world and travel between spaces within the world. Those behind the metaverse believe virtual worlds can have applications outside gaming including in things like collaboration software and medical care. Virtual worlds are also sometimes called synthetic worlds.
Virtual Reality
VR is a simulated experience that’s usually provided by a virtual reality headset that projects realistic images, sounds and other sensations to a user within a virtual environment. It is currently used for video games but could be used for virtual meetings, medical training, or military training. A person who is using virtual reality equipment is able to do things like look around a virtual world, move, and interact with objects and other users.
Mixed Reality
Mixed reality is integration of real and virtual worlds to create new ways to interact with physical and digital spaces and other users. In mixed reality, you are not solely in the virtual world or entirely in the real world but somewhere along the ‘virtuality continuum’ between the real and virtual environments.
Examples of mixed reality are place-specific simulations such as 3D representations of charts or concepts projected to virtual reality headsets or glasses in a university lecture or the use of augmented reality in Pokemon Go where users could see the Pokemon they found in the real world via their mobile device’s camera. Mixed reality has applications for video games, education, military training, healthcare, and the integration of humans and robotics.
Augmented Reality
Augmented reality is similar to mixed reality in that it creates an interactive way to experience real world environments. It often enhances the real world through digital sensory additions such as visuals, sounds, sensory data, or olfactory data. Augmented reality features an integration of real and virtual worlds, real-time interaction, and 3D visualizations of both virtual and real objects. An example of how it might be used is to allow shoppers to visualize a product they are considering in an environment that resembles their home.
Virtual Economies
The term ‘virtual economy’ was first used to refer to the exchange or sale of virtual goods within online games, particularly massive multiplayer online games. In some of these games, players can buy things from each other and exchange real money for game-based money. However, virtual economies can also now incorporate crypto currencies and non-fungible tokens. Many believe that social media companies and other corporations might create their own virtual currencies in the future. Although regulators might put limitations on their capacity to do so.
Gaming goes hand in hand with Metaverse
In the Gaming industry, the metaverse is not a newly coined term. Few gamers are regularly using this term more or less in their gaming experience. The online free-to-play battle royal can be seen as the metaverse prototype. The gaming industry has shifted from the traditional version to the new world digital avatars and transactions powered by NFT or cryptocurrency. NFT gaming solutions are breaking the boundaries of the digital world, where gamers can own the virtual stuff and can rent out or lease them for specific cryptocurrencies. Powered by blockchain, in metaverse users need cryptocurrency for transactions and whenever they receive rewards.
Metaverse Examples
There are a number of companies who currently have metaverse products or services available to consumers or who have announced they are creating them. Here are some examples:
Second Life
Founded in 2003, Second Life, the once popular online massive multiplayer game, allowed players to live another life within a virtual world. The concept was an early metaverse experience created by the San Francisco firm Linden Lab, and was one of the first popular examples of the virtual economy as users bought tokens to buy things in the game.
Snap
Snapchat (SNAP) has been creating augmented reality filters since the app first launched. Their photo filters allow users to manipulate the world via their phone camera. In 2021, they launched augmented reality glasses which can be used to augment users’ experience of reality outside their app.
What’s the future of the metaverse?
The fact is that the metaverse will become as real and common as the internet. As we can see, it is but a matter of time.
When Epic Games founder Tim Sweeney was asked by CNN what he thought about the future of the metaverse, he said, “I think it will take a decade or more to really get to the end point, but I think that is happening.”
At the same time, Sweeney said, “The metaverse isn’t going to be created by one company. It will be created by millions of developers each building out their part of it.”
So, in other words, the metaverse is still being constructed brick by brick and everyone will have a hand in its creation.
Epic Games
Epic Games is the creator of the popular digital game Fortnight. While the company started with video games, they have now moved to creating virtual social experiences like music concerts or dance parties. These allow users to have an immersive virtual experience.
Medical Learning
Medical learning companies are deploying virtual reality and augmented reality to disrupt medical learning, allowing for the simulation of patient and surgical interactions and allowing students to practice new techniques.
Bottom Line
While there is a lot of excitement behind the metaverse, much of that excitement seems to be from the hype put out by tech and social media companies themselves. Whether any company’s vision for the metaverse will be technologically possible or gain market share remains to be seen. Investors interested in the metaverse as an investment opportunity will need to be cautious and patient.
