“Metaverse is gonna be the future”. I have seen tons of tweets with phrases like this. Big tech companies like Meta (formerly known as Facebook), Microsoft, NVIDIA, Epic Games, etc. are spending a lot of money to create one. I have watched the film “Ready Player One” and I thought Metaverse is a VR game. But there is more to it.
In this article, I am gonna talk about what it actually is, how it might change the way we live and do things, etc.
What is a Metaverse?
Meta comes from the Greek language, which means “after” or “beyond.” And verse is “Universe“. So, the meaning of the word Metaverse is “Beyond the Universe that we live in”. Neal Stephenson coined the term “Metaverse” in his 1992 science fiction novel “Snow Crash”.
Metaverse is basically a virtual world where we can interact with each other, play together, organize concerts, hang out in coffee shops, etc. And we can explore this virtual world and events by wearing a VR rig and all of this by sitting in our homes. Roblox, Fornite, and Minecraft are some good examples that you can look for to get an idea of what it’s gonna look like in the future.
Metaverse is a combination of VR, AR, & Blockchain(if decentralized).
Is this an escape from the real world? Maybe, maybe not.
How The Metaverse Might Look Like
First of all, we need to understand that there won’t be just a single metaverse. In one metaverse we will have immersive learning where we can learn new concepts and in one metaverse people can play together. And in another Metaverse, people can come and buy products at discount.
Google doesn’t own the internet. They just have a bigger pie. All the millions of blogs, apps, tools, etc. fully make up the internet. Similarly, multiple companies and groups of people combined will end up making multiple virtual worlds.
And the important part is people will control this place, not the big corporations, Ideally.
So, the metaverse is the next phase of the internet where people come together to build it & own a part of it.
– NFTs, Blockchain, & Finance
You can choose your own digital avatar, and probably can even buy a place and invite your friends to hang out. So, the key thing here is to understand the concept of “digital ownership” aka “NFTs“.
NFTs are foundational blocks of Metaverse.
Your digital avatar aka your alter ego in the virtual world will be an NFT owned by you. This will be a world where Rolex and Lamborghinis don’t matter. Status lies in Ape and Punks. An entry ticket for a movie premiere will be an NFT which you need to own to attend the event.
And when it comes to financing, transactions or exchange of value will happen with multiple cryptocurrencies based on the virtual world we live in and buy things.
So, every transaction will be (should be) recorded on the blockchain and that’ll serve as the proof of ownership, entry to events, digital ownership, etc.
– VR Rig Adaption
One common question people have is will people use VR gear and adapt that to their lifestyle. But the same happened with the internet & mobile phones, right? Now we just keep using it all day long, so much so that it has become so hard to not use it. You are most probably reading this on a mobile phone.
So, if there is value in the metaverse (which will be for sure) people will make the VR rigs part of their daily life. And then there might be Network Effects on it.
If your colleagues are doing virtual meetings you should do it too. So, there shouldn’t be an adaption problem assuming that the rig will be developed fully in such a way that people can wear it for longer durations.
Conclusion
A lot of creativity and innovation will happen in the metaverse because of the people that want to be part of it, without any central authority thereby providing the opportunity for everyone to be independent & be whatever they want to be.
The future is gonna be fucking bright, I hope.