Verifying the Metaverse

There has been a lot of publicity about the Metaverse. Facebook rebranded itself as Meta! Zuckerberg said he sees the Metaverse as the future, though he was also careful to say that Facebook would not own it, that others would also build it.

What is the Metaverse? You make an avatar of yourself. A software construct that is a skin. The Metaverse is a set of rooms or even worlds, where your avatar interacts with other avatars. It does not have to look like you. It is a fictional construct. You move your avatar from room to room.

Virtual Reality (VR) is the expected way interactions will happen. Via some type of wearable heads up display (HUD). A dissenting view is from Niantic, maker of Pokemon Go and Ingress. Niantic (owned by Nintendo and Google) suggests that Augmented Reality (AR) is the way to go. Its 2 games are the most popular AR games in the world. Niantic says its games were successful because they used cellphones, unlike the wraparound VR displays like Microsoft’s Holo Lens or Magic Leap or Meta’s Oculus.

One factor is the cost. Hundreds of millions already have cellphones and do not have to pay out to buy a VR device. This was why Pokemon Go was able to reach over 100 million users at its peak. Whereas a VR display can go for well over $1k. A second factor is the hard work needed to improve current VR displays. Magic Leap spent about $1 billion because it had to do expensive research on better headsets. Microsoft has not said how much it is putting into Holo Lens, but it surely cannot be cheap.