Last updated on July 21st, 2023 at 09:03 pm
What is the Metaverse?
The metaverse is a complex broad term that can mean many things. The term was first coined in author Neal Stephenson’s 1992 sci-fi novel Snow Crash. In his book, Stephenson referred to the metaverse as “an all-encompassing digital world that exists parallel to the real world”.
To put it differently, it is cyberspace. Some people think of it as creating and experiencing a virtual world that is trying to replicate or create an alternate reality, where players can take the roles of an avatar. Much like the Steven Spielberg film Ready Player One.
In terms of cryptocurrency, a crypto metaverse is one that incorporates blockchain into it, such as smart contracts or NFTs in the virtual world.
The metaverse is predicted to become an $800 billion market by 2024.
What are the use cases?
The metaverse is already being seen as the future of education, healthcare, sports, real estate, fashion, socialising, and many more industries.
Education
In the metaverse, instead of hosting classes over zoom calls, students will likely be more engaged in a virtual 3D world. For example in early 2022 Microsoft launched Microsoft Mesh where businesses can host virtual workspaces, and meetings and collaborate together as digital avatars. Teams can do spatial rendering, synchronisation across multiple users, and ‘holoportation’, which is a 3D capture technology that lets users reconstruct and transmit high-quality 3D models of people in real-time. Microsoft Mesh is compatible with HoloLens 2, VR headsets, mobile phones, tablets, and PCs.
Healthcare
Telemedicine is one area of healthcare that is poised to benefit from the technologies of the metaverse. Telemedicine is the remote diagnosis and treatment of patients by means of telecommunications technology. By utilising the metaverse, virtual consultations can be possible, saving the trip to the doctor for minor checkups. Wearable devices such as disease monitors, heart rate monitors, brain wave technology, etc., all connected to the cloud will make it possible for patients to be monitored remotely. This will save hospital beds, resources, and time. The blockchain will allow the secure sending of patient data, and create fast, simple bridges between different facilities.
Dr. Timothy F. Witham, a Professor of Neurosurgery and Orthopedic Surgery at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, performed the world’s first spinal surgery using augmented reality in 2020.1
Sports
Sports games will be transformed with the metaverse in the way fans will be able to watch and enjoy the game from home. By wearing a VR headset you are able to watch the game from different viewpoints around the ground. Or watch it live in a virtual bar with a friend on the other side of the world. Receive virtual signatures from players after the game through NFTs. The possibilities are quite endless. Of course, nothing will ever beat being there in real life to experience a sporting event, though if another pandemic ever occurs, this would be the next best thing. 2
In fact, in 2022, the Premier League football club Manchester City announced they are creating a virtual copy of Etihad Stadium to be used in a metaverse. This is being done in collaboration with Sony. Players can run around the virtual stadium and participate in social activities using their avatars. Using only seven sensors, Sony captured footage of Manchester City players to recreate them digitally in the metaverse. You can watch the video here.
Real Estate
Buying virtual land in metaverse games such as The Sandbox and Decentraland is already possible. These metaverses have created a limited number of NFT virtual properties. Eventually, players will be able to monetise their land and rent it to others to build and host their events. Even some virtual real estate agencies have started to pop up.
Also taking virtual tours of the real-life property could be done in the metaverse if a building or land is modelled true-to-scale, it would allow users to walk around it using VR. Some platforms are already doing this such as Matterport and SpaceWalk.
Fashion
Browsing and trying on different clothes will be possible in the metaverse with the use of Augmented Reality (AR) technology or VR. AR makes it possible to overlay digital objects over real objects through cameras, for example, Pokemon Go. It will be possible to digitally try on the product before you physically purchase it.
Decentraland hosted ‘Metaverse Fashion Week’ in early 2022 which more than 108,000 attended. 3 Players were able to walk around a showcase of clothes from brands such as Tommy Hilfiger, Etro, Dundas, and more. 3D renders of signature styles were available to purchase and wear in the game as an NFT, but also redeemable for physical products delivered straight to the customers’ door. So sort of like a two-in-one deal.
Decentraland is primed to host their second annual event in 2023 from March 28 to March 31. This year, Miami Fashion Week which is recognised by the Council of Fashion Designers will be present.
Socialising
Snoop Dogg has hosted numerous parties on The Sandbox where he has played his music to a live digital audience of avatars dancing to his lyrics. Lil Nas X has done the same on the popular gaming platform Roblox during the pandemic.
Some social activities that could be further immersive with the metaverse include:
- Movie watching
- Music listening/concerts/parties
- Sports events
- Meetups and networking
Interoperability
It is likely that there will become a time when like cryptocurrencies, there will be many metaverses with the ability to communicate with each other. Exchanging NFTs and online shopping or trading will be possible with other players’ virtual characters or representations of themselves. Though this is not an easy task, and bringing items from one video game or virtual world to another is a very complex task.
To achieve this, some standards or similarities must exist between different metaverses. The Metaverse Standards Forum was launched in 2022 by over 35 tech companies, industry consortia, and standards-developing organisations (SDOs) in order to help achieve this.
What does the Metaverse consist of?
A crypto metaverse should have some of the following key features:
Decentralisation
A decentralised blockchain ledger will allow both transparent or anonymous transfers of records in the metaverse without any middleman or long delays. For example, games will transact fungible and non-fungible assets, the medical industry transacts will be able to store patient records and sporting events the ability to sell virtual tickets.
Bring value to the real world
By allowing the opportunity to collaborate, create, teach, showcase, market or sell in the virtual space, it adds another platform. Object mapping of real-world items to scaled 3D digital renders will make items redeemable in real life. It doesn’t mean it will be a necessity to use the metaverse, it will likely just complement real-world interactions. Time will probably be synchronous and live with the real world, much like the popular game Animal Crossing.
Interoperability
There likely will be many metaverses, just like there cryptocurrencies. Interoperability will play a big part as one experience should be able to communicate and transfer to another.
Buy an expensive digital item in one experience? You should have the ability to see and use it in completely different one. The only thing that should change is the value as you move around, just like how a countries currency is valued differently outside that country.
What is driving the Metaverse?
There are many technological advances that are helping to shape the metaverse and will continue to do so in the future. These include:
Virtual Reality
Virtual reality (VR) is a simulated 3D environment that creates an immersion though pose tracking and 3D near-eye displays such as VR headsets. VR headsets allow the user to have a 360-degree view of the virtual environment.
Augmented Reality
Augmented reality (AR) has been around for many years, but we are still only scratching the surface of its potential. Rather than wearing VR goggles that completely detach the user from reality, AR allows the use of glasses or camera systems to overly digital objects over the real world.
An example of a recent AR app is IKEA Place which lets you virtually place true-to-scale 3D models of store products in your own space to see how they fit before you make a purchase. Imagine combining this technology with crypto payments, or walking through a virtual IKEA store in the metaverse!
Wearables
Sony recently unveiled their latest wearable metaverse technology, a motion-capture system similar to tech similar to motion-capture suits used in movies. 5
A crypto project MatrixAI Network is creating a system that tracks your brain wave data where you can upload it to use in multiple metaverses.
Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence (AI) is blowing up in 2023 with the release of OpenAI’s ChatGBT. AI has so many use cases that we know but also that we have not even thought of yet. From live speech translation to generating text, images, or videos, and even automating monotonous tasks. All of these things will be possible in the virtual space one day.
Our article ‘Best Three AI Projects to Skyrocket in 2023?‘ looks into some great AI crypto projects that are working to help develop the metaverse.
Edge Computing
Edge computing is an IT deployment that puts data as close to the end user as possible. This helps to solve the problems of limited bandwidth and latency.
If you have a metaverse with people from all over the globe, each with different latencies, it becomes a mess. With edge computing, content is no longer centralized in one or two data centers. Instead, it’s replicated to edge regions across the globe so that there’s a copy of the content close to everyone, which provides low latency.
How do I access the Metaverse?
It depends on what metaverse you would like to join. There are many projects that are trying to innovate and create their own metaverse. Some of the top metaverse cryptocurrency projects include:
What is the Facebook Metaverse?
In late 2021, Mark Zuckerberg announced that he had a new vision for Facebook and he was rebranding the company to ‘Meta’. Since then Meta has been allocating a lot of its resources to Reality Labs, its metaverse unit, in order to capitalise on the hype. They stated that in 2023 they are devoting around 20% of their overall yearly expenses to the metaverse. 6 There has been quite a strong public push back on the centralised giant entering the metaverse, as the company finished 2022 with weak revenues and many regulatory issues. However, Meta is not backing down and is continuing to pump more and more capital into Reality Labs.
By July 2022, Meta had already sold just under 15 million units of its Meta Quest 2 VR headset.7
How do I join the Facebook metaverse?
If you are interested in joining the Facebook – now Meta metaverse. You can sign up for Horizon Worlds. Horizon Worlds is a free app that will require a Meta Quest VR headset in order to play. You can access Horizon Worlds here. However, the game is still only available in some select countries.
https://www.trustedreviews.com/explainer/what-is-meta-horizon-4275486
What are the risks involved?
One could argue that the metaverse could open a wide range of possibilities for online predators to anonymously attack their victims. This could include both social predators and financial scammers.
Charlie Bell, Microsoft’s executive vice president of security, compliance, identity, and management, stated in a 2022 blog “The problems of yesterday’s and today’s internet—impersonation, attempts to steal credentials, social engineering, nation-state espionage, inevitable vulnerabilities—will be with us in the metaverse.” 8
In order to keep users safe, the metaverse will have to put sophisticated authentication measures in place, such as biometrics, verification, content filtering, etc.
What is holding the metaverse back?
Most people do not have VR headsets or motion capture devices as the entry price is still simply too high. Perhaps when the technology becomes cheaper to manufacture and becomes more comfortable and less of a gimmick.
However, it is easy to see that giants are already diving into the virtual world head first. The potential and future are bright.
References
- Daltro, A. L. (2023). “Arab Health 2023: Talking About the Metaverse (in Healthcare)”. [ONLINE]. Retrieved 13 February, 2023, from: https://emag.medicalexpo.com/arab-health-2023-talking-about-the-metaverse-in-healthcare/#:~:text=In%20the%20present%20and%20very,efficiency%2C%20while%20also%20lowering%20costs.
- Duge, C. (2022). “Why the Metaverse Will Change Sports and Your Life Forever”. [ONLINE]. Retrieved 13 February, 2023, from: https://www.ispo.com/en/trends/metaverse-revolution-sports-world#:~:text=In%20a%20virtual%20sports%20arena,geographical%20and%20physical%20barriers%20anymore.
- ‘AUGUSTMANMALAYSIA’. (2022). “The second Metaverse Fashion is happening in March”. [ONLINE]. Retrieved 13 February, 2023, from: https://www.lifestyleasia.com/bk/style/fashion/metaverse-fashion-week-2023/.
- Midjourney. (2023). “Metaverse Fashion Week”. [ONLINE]. Retrieved 14 February, 2023, from: https://www.midjourney.com/
- Perper, R. (2022). “Sony Launches Motion-Tracking Metaverse Wearables“. [ONLINE]. Retrieved 16 February, 2023, from: https://www.coindesk.com/web3/2022/11/29/sony-launches-motion-tracking-metaverse-wearables//
- The Straits Times. (2022). “Facebook’s Meta will devote 20% of costs to metaverse in 2023”. [ONLINE]. Retrieved 13 February, 2023, from: https://www.straitstimes.com/business/facebook-s-meta-will-devote-20-of-costs-to-metaverse-next-year.
- De’Angelo, W. (2022). “Meta Quest 2 Has Sold 14.8 Million Units, Most Successful VR Headset – Sales”. [ONLINE]. Retrieved 16 February, 2023, from: https://www.vgchartz.com/article/454210/meta-quest-2-has-sold-148-million-units-most-successful-vr-headset/
- Bell, C. (2022). “The metaverse is coming. Here are the cornerstones for securing it”. [ONLINE]. Retrieved 13 February, 2023, from: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/h/howey-test.asp
