THE METAVERSE

It reminds me of my favourite childhood movie Matrix…. It depicts a dystopian future in which humanity is unknowingly trapped inside a simulated reality. I can bet that at that time, most of us wanted technology to travel places with skills that can be computerized using a binary algorithm. Well here in 2022, not through the Telephone exactly but something roughly similar coming to our era.

Technology frequently produces surprises that nobody predicts. However, the biggest developments are often anticipated decades in advance. In 1945 Vannevar Bush described what he called the “Memex”, a single device that would store all books, records and communications, and mechanically link them together by association. This concept was then used to formulate the idea of “hypertext” (a term coined two decades later), which in turn guided the development of the World Wide Web (developed another two decades later). 

 WHAT IS METAVERSE? 

 Metaverse has become the newest macro-goal for many of the world’s tech giants. It is the express goal of Epic Games, maker of the Unreal Engine and Fortnite. It is also the driver behind Facebook’s purchase of Oculus VR and its newly announced Horizon virtual world/meeting space, among many, many other projects, such as AR glasses and brain-to-machine interfaces and communication. The tens of billions that will be spent on cloud gaming over the next decade, too, is based on the belief that such technologies will underpin our online-offline virtual future.

Ultimately, you’ll find many of the same items in the offices of Big Tech CEOs. However, the most well-worn is likely to be a copy of Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash, which first described and essentially coined the terms “Metaverse” and “Avatar”. And there are many reasons why. The Implementations are mostly to two components currently, Video games and Virtual Reality. For Video games, many big names are coming out. Technology journalist Clive Thompson has argued that the emergent, social-based gameplay of Minecraft represents an advanced analogue of a metaverse. Some statements have been made by a few companies on rolling out AR/VR games. For Virtual reality, I am sure Facebook is the name we all are familiar with (Meta). Facebook renamed Meta Platforms recently and many other tech companies Microsoft has also introduced virtual meetings to Teams applications which is cool. Just as the physical universe is a collection of worlds that are connected in space, the metaverse can be thought of as a bunch of worlds, too. According to IBM, The metaverse will become a platform that’s not tied to any one app or any single place — digital or real. And just as virtual places will be persistent, so will the objects and identities of those moving through them, allowing digital goods and identities to move from one virtual world to another, and even into our world, with augmented reality. 

 CAN METAVERSE WILL CONNECT THE WORLD? 

Yes. If we look to connect with world experience, several components of metaverse technologies have already been developed within modern internet-enabled technologies. Companies like Microsoft, Google, IBM have been working on AR/VR for ages now.

A perfect example will be Microsoft HoloLens. HoloLens are a pair of mixed reality smart glasses. Using multiple sensors, advanced optics, and holographic processing that melds seamlessly with its environment, these holograms can be used to display information, blend with the real world, or even simulate a virtual world. Many claims that Metaverse can be effective in order to the public sector like health workers, colleges, defence etc. How the metaverse evolves is still somewhat unknown, but we do know that some very large companies will spend billions rolling out their own ideas of what it will look like. Apple — the world’s largest company in terms of market value — is said to be working on augmented reality glasses that will put it squarely in the metaverse. The company already has augmented reality tools for its iPhone and other products I’ve already mentioned Microsoft, the second most valuable tech company, with its early development of the HoloLens AR glasses, its X-Box gaming platform and, now, its acquisition of Activision Blizzard. 

 HOW CAN WE USE IT? 

 It is actually very simple. 

1. Access to Website: https://studio.gometa.io/landing 

2. A smartphone. It's entirely possible to venture into the metaverse with just your iOS or Android
    device. 

3. A computer. 

4. A gaming console. 

5. A Virtual Reality (VR) headset. 

6. Augmented Reality (AR) glasses. 

 HOW SAFE METAVERSE IS? 

Imagine you have 100$ in your bank account. Now the bank provides you with many methods to view/transact the amount like Net banking, Debit/Credit Card, Contactless payment etc. If anyone will have accidentally access to any of any service, you can have the consequences. Just like that, Metaverse can be a so-called ‘virtual world’ but we all are accountable to maintain our digital identity. To prevent sexual harassment and make the Metaverse a safe place for all, Meta has announced a new feature called “personal boundary” in its Horizon virtual reality platform which will prevent people from virtually assaulting other people. 

WILL METAVERSE GOING TO ELIMINATE THE PHYSICAL WORLD? 

The simple answer is NO. AR/VR can be a revolutionary change to the world, but the feeling of human touch can’t be eliminated in a million billion years. It is a HOAX if anyone company/individual claims in future. 

 The optimist and activist in me say that maybe we can get it right time by building a metaverse that doesn’t have the problems associated with the internet as we now know it, but that will only happen if everyone — industry, governments, advocacy organizations and end-users — all do our part.

Finally, This is obviously a very hard topic to nail down. All thoughts, comments, disagreements, additions, ideas are welcome. If I have to summarise METAVERSE in one sentence then I would say that "it is just another technology, it is not LIFE". 

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Contact:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sourav-poddar-a305426b/
or mail me at Sourav1up@gmail.com....

Credits:

1. Wikipedia

2. Individual authors. 

3. IBM, Microsoft, Meta.