Since the late 1970s and early 1980s, many of those in the technology community have imagined a future state of, if not quasi-successor to, the Internet – called the “Metaverse”. Metverse is a vision of the future networking that sounds fantastical. The Metaverse is a collective virtual shared space[1] including the sum of all virtual worlds and the Internet. The idea is to create a space similar to the internet, but one that users (via digital avatars) can walk around inside of and where they can interact with one another in real time. Keeping it simple, the metaverse is a potentially vast three-dimensional online world where people can meet up and interact virtually.
The metaverse was originally conceived as the setting for dystopian science fiction novels, where virtual universes provide an escape from crumbling societies. Now, the idea has transformed into a moonshot goal for Silicon Valley, and become a favorite talking point among startups, venture capitalists and tech giants. Imagine a world where you could sit on the same couch as a friend who lives thousands of miles away, or conjure up a virtual version of your workplace while at the beach.
Tech titans like Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg are betting on as the next great leap in the evolution of the internet. Although the full vision for the Metaverse remains hard to define, seemingly fantastical, and decades away, the pieces have started to feel very real. Metaverse has become the newest macro-goal for many of the world’s tech giants. Big companies joining the discussion now may simply want to reassure investors that they won’t miss out on what could be the next big thing, or that their investments in VR, which has yet to gain broad commercial appeal, will eventually pay off.
‘Metaverse’: the next internet revolution? article tells that metaverse is the stuff of science-fiction: the term was coined by Neal Stephenson in his 1992 novel “Snow Crash”, in which people don virtual reality headsets to interact inside a game-like digital world.
Facebook Wants Us to Live in the Metaverse. According to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg “What is the metaverse? It’s a virtual environment where you can be present with people in digital spaces. You can kind of think of this as an embodied internet that you’re inside of rather than just looking at.” Metaverse vision was 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 communications. In a high-tech plan to Facebookify the world advertisements will likely be a key source of revenue in the metaverse, just as they are for the company today.
Term Metaverse was created by sci-fi author Neal Stephenson in his 1992 dystopian novel “Snow Crash” to describe a virtual space where people interact with one another through user-controlled avatars. That “Snow Crash” novel coined the terms “Metaverse” and “Avatar”.
Venture capitalist Matthew Ball has also written extensively on what he believes are the main attributes of a metaverse: a full-functioning economy, real-time persistence (no pausing), and interoperability of digital “belongings” such as clothing across multiple platforms. Experts working in the space tend to agree on a few key aspects of the metaverse, including the idea that users will experience a sense of “embodiment” or “presence.”. Read more at The Metaverse: What It Is, Where to Find it, Who Will Build It, and Fortnite and Big Tech has its eyes set on the metaverse. Here’s what that means
Proponents of the metaverse say there could eventually be huge business potential — a whole new platform on which to sell digital goods and services. If metaverse could be properly realized and catches on some future year, it is believed that metaverse would revolutionize not just the infrastructure layer of the digital world, but also much of the physical one, as well as all the services and platforms atop them, how they work, and what they sell. It is believed that verifiable, immutable ownership of digital goods and currency will be an essential component of the metaverse.
Did you hear? Facebook Inc. is going to become a metaverse company. At least that’s the story its management wants everyone to believe after a flurry of interviews and announcements over the past couple of weeks. Zuckerberg is turning trillion-dollar Facebook into a ‘metaverse’ company, he tells investors article tells that after release of Facebook’s earnings CEO Mark Zuckerberg took a moment to zoom out and wax on the company’s future goals, specifically calling out his ambitions to turn Facebook into “a metaverse company.”
Some pieces of the metaverse already exist. Services like Fortnite, an online game in which users can compete, socialize and build virtual worlds with millions of other players, can give users an early sense of how it will work. And some people have already spent thousands of dollars on virtual homes, staking out their piece of metaverse real estate.
Who will be big if metaverse catches on. Bloomberg article Who Will Win the Metaverse? Not Mark Zuckerberg or Facebook article claims the social networking giant and its CEO have vast ambitions to dominate the next big thing in computing, but other tech giants are in a better position to turn the hype into reality. Facebook’s actual track record on VR tells a story that has not been very promising. The two critical components needed for companies to take advantage of the opportunities that may arise from any potential metaverse are advanced semiconductors and software tools. Facebook is not strong on either front.
There are many other companies with Metaverse visions. For example Oculus’s technology has been surpassed by smaller competitors such as Valve Index, which offers better fidelity. Microsoft (MSFT) CEO Satya Nadella said last week that his company is working on building the “enterprise metaverse.” Epic Games announced a $1 billion funding round in April to support its metaverse ambitions. Companies like graphics chipmaker Nvidia (NVDA) and gaming platform Roblox (RBLX) are also playing Metaverse game.
Despite the current hype cycle, the idea is still amorphous, and a fully functioning metaverse is probably years and billions of dollars away — if it happens at all. Another question is are we emotionally evolved enough for it? There is a host of concerns about how the metaverse could be used or exploited. “Are we safe to start interacting at a more person-to-person level, or are the a**holes still going to ruin it for everybody?” “If you can now replace somebody’s entire reality with an alternate reality, you can make them believe almost anything,”
Keep in mind that the metaverse is a relatively old idea that seems to gain momentum every few years, only to fade from the conversation in lieu of more immediate opportunities. Though “Fortnite” and “Roblox” are often described as precursors to the Metaverse, the most significant precursor to the Metaverse is the internet itself.
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Tomi Engdahl says:
Richard MacManus / The New Stack:
The Khronos Group forms the Metaverse Standards Forum with Nvidia, Meta, Epic Games, Unity, Microsoft, W3C, and others, seeking to improve interoperability
Metaverse Standards Forum Launches to Solve Interoperability
https://thenewstack.io/metaverse-standards-forum/
Interoperability — or lack thereof — is a key issue in the nascent metaverse industry. The Khronos Group aims to solve this with a new open standards discussion forum called The Metaverse Standards Forum, which launches today. The group includes representation from most of the big players in the 3D internet, including Nvidia, Meta, Epic Games, Unity, Microsoft, and the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).
In the lead-up to today’s announcement, I spoke to Neil Trevett, President of Khronos and also VP Developer Ecosystems at Nvidia. Trevett has been President of Khronos since 2001, and previously led the Web3D Consortium from 1997 till 2005.
The Metaverse Standards Forum
https://metaverse-standards.org/
Where Leading Standards Organizations and Companies Cooperate to Foster Interoperability Standards for an Open Metaverse
Multiple industry leaders have stated that the potential of the metaverse will be best realized if it is built on a foundation of open standards.
Open to any organization at no cost, the Metaverse Standards Forum provides a venue for cooperation between standards organizations and companies to foster the development of interoperability standards for an open and inclusive metaverse, and accelerate their development and deployment through pragmatic, action-based projects.
Building a pervasive, open and inclusive metaverse at a global scale will require cooperation and coordination between a constellation of international standards organizations, including the Khronos Group, World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), Open Geospatial Consortium, OpenAR Cloud, Spatial Web Foundation, and many others.
The Forum will not create standards itself but will coordinate requirements and resources to foster the creation and evolution of standards within standards organizations working in relevant domains.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://thenewstack.io/metaverse-standards-forum/
Solving Short-Term Interoperability Problems
Khronos became interested in the metaverse, Trevett told me, because “a lot of the standards that we do — and in many cases [that] we’ve been developing for many years, before ‘metaverse’ became a buzz term — are directly relevant to the metaverse. The 3D APIs for native apps and the web, OpenXR for AR and VR, and the file formats that we do are [all] directly being used by the metaverse community.”
The metaverse is “going to be a mixture of the connectivity of the web, some kind of evolution of the web, mixed in with spatial computing.”
Neil Trevett, President of Khronos
According to Trevett, the new forum will not concern itself with philosophical debates about what the metaverse will be in 10-20 years time. However, he thinks the metaverse is “going to be a mixture of the connectivity of the web, some kind of evolution of the web, mixed in with spatial computing.” He added that spatial computing is a broad term, but here refers to “3D modeling of the real world, especially in interaction through augmented and virtual reality.”
“No one really knows how it’s all going to come together,” said Trevett. “But that’s okay. For the purposes of the forum, we don’t really need to know. What we are concerned with is that there are clear, short-term interoperability problems to be solved.”
Trevett noted that there are already multiple standards organizations for the internet, including of course the W3C for web standards. What MSF is trying to do is help coordinate them, when it comes to the evolving metaverse. “We are bringing together the standards organizations in one place, where we can coordinate between each other but also have good close relationships with the industry that [is] trying to use our standards,” he said.
Metaverse as an Evolution of the Web
This brought us to a question that has been top-of-mind for me, as I explore and report on the metaverse technology stack in 2022: what role will the web play in achieving the “interoperability” that so many of the forum’s member companies claim they want? Companies like Meta and Microsoft became successful platforms because of the web, yet the likes of Epic Games and Unity have largely built their businesses on non-web technologies. So does the MSF view the web as a foundational platform for the metaverse?
“Reinventing something completely disconnected from the web doesn’t make sense to me,” Trevett replied. “The web has so much pervasiveness already and so much functionality. I’m not in charge [of the web], but it just seems rational that you’re going to evolve what we already have, rather than trying to create something completely new.”
So the mindset of MSF will be to treat the metaverse as an evolution of the web. With that said, Trevett pointed out that “the spatial web” will require “new protocols and new asset formats.” Just as we have HTML to describe a 2D web page, he continued, “we’re gonna need the equivalent for 3D graphics and all the ways that you can interact with 3D graphics in a connected sense.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Babylon.js Hints that Microsoft Metaverse Will Be Web-Based
https://thenewstack.io/babylon-js-hints-that-microsoft-metaverse-will-be-web-based/
Croquet Woos JavaScript Devs with a Web-Based Metaverse
https://thenewstack.io/croquet-woos-javascript-devs-with-a-web-based-metaverse/
Croquet is an intriguing new browser-based system for creating 3D “microverses,” described as “independent, interconnected web-based spaces and worlds created on the Metaverse.” The technology was developed by David A. Smith, a computer scientist with 30 years of experience in the VR and AR industry — including creating the set visualization software behind James Cameron’s 1989 movie, “The Abyss”.
Tomi Engdahl says:
New York Times:
Sources: the metaverse, not securing elections, is now Mark Zuckerberg’s top priority; Meta has ~60 people focused on elections, down from 300 in 2020 — Mark Zuckerberg, who once said securing elections was “the most important thing,” has shifted Meta’s focus to the metaverse.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/23/technology/mark-zuckerberg-meta-midterm-elections.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
Meta finally showed us why it’s been spending $10 billion on VR
By Nicholas Sutrich published 5 days ago
It’s an incredibly exciting time to be a VR nerd.
https://www.androidcentral.com/gaming/virtual-reality/meta-quest-prototypes-2022
VR has come a long, long way in the six short years since the first real mainstream headsets launched, but as Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg told me and a virtual room of journalists at a special roundtable this past week, we still have a long way to go.
During the hour-long session, Zuckerberg and a panel of Meta researchers explained what it’s going to take to pass the “visual Turing Test” in the best VR headsets(opens in new tab).
The photo above showcases a wall of prototypes Meta’s Reality Labs has been working on since the company bought Oculus back in 2014. While some of these prototypes have gone on to become consumer-grade headsets we all know — like the Oculus Quest 2(opens in new tab) — most of them serve a sole purpose and are specifically designed to solve a single problem in VR.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Metaverse progress update: Some VR headset prototypes nowhere near shipping
But when it does work, bet you’ll fall over yourselves to blow ten large on designer clobber for your avy
https://www.theregister.com/2022/06/20/meta_prototype_vr/
Tomi Engdahl says:
VR Prototypes Reveal Facebook’s Surprisingly Critical Research Directions
https://hackaday.com/2022/06/26/vr-prototypes-reveal-facebooks-surprisingly-critical-research-directions/
A short while ago, Tested posted a video all about hands-on time with virtual reality (VR) headset prototypes from Meta (which is to say, Facebook) and there are some genuinely interesting bits in there. The video itself is over an hour long, but if you’re primarily interested in the technical angles and why they matter for VR, read on because we’ll highlight each of the main points of research.
As absurd as it may seem to many of us to have a social network spearheading meaningful VR development, one can’t say they aren’t taking it seriously. It’s also refreshing to see each of the prototypes get showcased by a researcher who is clearly thrilled to talk about their work. The big dream is to figure out what it takes to pass the “visual Turing test”, which means delivering visuals that are on par with that of a physical reality. Some of these critical elements may come as a bit of a surprise, because they go in directions beyond resolution and field-of-view.
Hands-On with Meta’s New VR Headset Prototypes!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6AOwDttBsc
Tomi Engdahl says:
Apple mixed reality headset is a “game changer” coming next year, says Kuo
It could be only six months away
https://www.techspot.com/news/95079-apple-mixed-reality-headset-game-changer-coming-next.html
In a nutshell: Apple’s long-awaited mixed reality headset could be announced as soon as January, claims veteran supply chain analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. He says that it will be a revolutionary new device for Apple and a catalyst for the expansion of the mixed reality market.
In a new analysis of the market shared with 9to5mac, Kuo calls the Apple headset “the most complicated product Apple has ever designed” and “a game changer for the headset industry.”
https://9to5mac.com/2022/06/23/apple-ar-vr-headset-will-likely-release-in-january-says-ming-chi-kuo/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mark Zuckerberg Expects Billions of People to Use the Metaverse Generating Massive Revenue for Meta
https://news.bitcoin.com/mark-zuckerberg-expects-billions-of-people-to-use-the-metaverse-generating-massive-revenue-for-meta/
Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, formerly Facebook, has shared how the metaverse will be a key part of his business and bring hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue. “Our playbook over time has been build services, try to serve as many people as possible,” said Zuckerberg.
Mark Zuckerberg on the Metaverse
Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta Platforms, formerly Facebook, talked about the metaverse in an interview on Wednesday with Jim Cramer, the host of CNBC’s Mad Money.
The Facebook co-founder explained that he expects the metaverse to be massive and become a major part of his company’s business over the next decade. Commenting on Meta’s metaverse efforts, Zuckerberg said:
Our playbook over time has been build services, try to serve as many people as possible — you know, get our services to a billion, two billion, three billion people, and then we basically scale the monetization after that.
“We hope to, basically, get to around a billion people in the metaverse doing hundreds of dollars of commerce each,” he continued, adding that people could be “buying digital goods, digital content, [or] different things to express themselves” in the metaverse.
Some examples of what people can purchase are “clothing for their avatar or different digital goods for their virtual home or things to decorate their virtual conference room,” Zuckerberg listed. He added that people can also buy “utilities to be able to be more productive in virtual and augmented reality and across the metaverse overall.”
However, he admitted that there is a long way to go
Zuckerberg envisioned experiences in the metaverse to be more immersive than text, photos, or videos, noting that people can even make eye contact when meeting in the metaverse. The technology “basically adds up to making it deliver this realistic sense of presence,” the Facebook co-founder added.
“We are at this point, you know, a company that can afford to make some big long-term research investments, and this is a big focus,” the Meta CEO opined.
Last week, Meta, Microsoft, and 31 other companies formed a metaverse standards group. In March, Meta filed eight trademark applications for its logo and Meta Pay covering the metaverse and crypto services.
https://news.bitcoin.com/meta-microsoft-and-others-launch-metaverse-standards-group/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Cambridge medical students train by treating holographic patients in world first
Students in other countries can take part by tuning into mixed-reality system
https://www.thenationalnews.com/world/uk-news/2022/06/27/cambridge-medical-students-treat-holographic-patients-in-world-first-training-practice/?outputType=amp
Tomi Engdahl says:
Securing the Metaverse and Web3
https://www.securityweek.com/securing-metaverse-and-web3
Security must be built into the metaverse as it moves from science fiction to science reality
The terms ‘web3’ (Web 3.0) and ‘metaverse’ have been so heavily promoted by the cryptocurrency and gaming industries that it is easy to think it’s a niche terminology with little overall business value. That would be wrong. Each technology offers valuable business opportunities — but their synergy could change the nature of the future internet.
Web3 fundamentally comprises the blockchain technology that underpins cryptocurrency. Cryptocurrencies are still searching for legitimacy beyond an a risky and highly speculative investment opportunity. They haven’t found it. They are loved by speculators and widely used by criminals but largely shunned by a business world that prefers the greater stability of fiat currencies (Bitcoin dropped in value from around $60,000 in November 2021 to less than $18,000 in June 2022).
Nevertheless, cryptocurrency paints itself as the future of global finance (not impossible, but a long and hard road). By promoting the underlying technology as web3, and describing it as the future of the internet, it gains some credibility for its own futuristic claims.
The metaverse is any technology that provides an immersive experience, so that users feel as if they are part of the experience rather than just spectators of a flat or moving web page. The gaming industry has been moving in this direction for years – but the reality of fully immersive virtual reality is still largely in the future.
Nevertheless, the metaverse potential goes way beyond gaming, driven by the human preference to talk ‘in person’. Immersive virtual reality on social platforms will allow people to meet and talk face-to-face, will bring remote workers together more effectively than Zoom, will allow genuine distributed learning from junior school to metaversities, will facilitate effective remote medical consultations – and much more.
The synergy between web3 and the metaverse will come from the greater need for fine-grained and secure access control into, and identity within, the metaverse – something that can be effectively delivered in a secure decentralized manner by web3’s blockchain technology. It is the focus on identity within the metaverse, and the ability for web3 to deliver that identity securely and across multiple metaverses, that leads some commentators to describe web3 as the enabler of the metaverse.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Siemens ja Nvidia pohjustavat teollista metaversumia
https://www.uusiteknologia.fi/2022/06/30/siemens-ja-nvidia-pohjustavat-teollista-metaversumia/
Nvidia ja Siemens yhdistävät omat Omniverse- ja Xcelerator -alustat toisiinsa, jotta yritykset voivat luoda helpommin todellisuutta vastaavat reaaliaikaiset digitaaliset kaksoset ja tekoälyjärjestelmät edge-ympäristöihin ja pilvipalveluihin teollisuuden metaversumiksi.
Yhteistyön ensimmäisenä askeleena yhtiöt suunnittelevat yhdistävänsä Siemensin avoimen digitaalisen liiketoiminta-alustan Xceleratorin ja Nvidian 3D-suunnitteluun ja yhteistyöhön tarkoitetun Omniverse-alustan. “Yhteistyön kautta teemme teollisesta metaversumista todellisuutta kaikenkokoisille yrityksille”, sanoo Siemens AG:n pääjohtaja Roland Busch.
”Kun Siemens Xcelerator yhdistetään Omniverseen, syntyy reaaliaikainen, mukaansatempaava metaversumi, joka tuo yhteen laitteistot ja ohjelmistot edge-ympäristöstä pilveen ja hyödyntää Siemensin ohjelmistojen ja ratkaisujen tuottamaa rikasta dataa”, taustoittaa hyötyjä Busch.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.securityweek.com/securing-metaverse-and-web3
Tomi Engdahl says:
Tim Bradshaw / Financial Times:
As avatars for metaverse applications grow in popularity, a look at Understanding Comics, a 30-year-old illustrated lecture considered an avatar design bible
https://www.ft.com/content/2b178ba0-92c5-4648-8905-876fcb77466f
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.electronicdesign.com/industrial-automation/media-gallery/21244348/electronic-design-121-myths-vol-1?utm_source=EG+ED+Auto+Electronics&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=CPS220620081&o_eid=7211D2691390C9R&rdx.ident%5Bpull%5D=omeda%7C7211D2691390C9R&oly_enc_id=7211D2691390C9R
Slide 1 Augmented Reality
11 Myths About Augmented Reality
1. Augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) are the same thing.
2. AR is limited to kitschy marketing/games like Pokémon Go.
3. AR is like Iron Man or the Terminator.
4. It’s not useful.
5. AR is hard to make/expensive.
6. It’s a gimmick; it’s not real.
8. Only big companies can do it.
9. It’s not ready for a mainstream audience.
10. It’s not ready for prime time.
11. You need AR glasses.
Tomi Engdahl says:
This 32-year-old artist made over $1 million in 9 months selling NFTs—now he’s reinvesting for the metaverse
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/11/this-32-year-old-artist-made-1-million-in-9-months-selling-nfts.html#Echobox=1656018479
Tomi Engdahl says:
Pew Research Center:
Survey: experts split on the likely evolution of an immersive metaverse by 2040, worry about the dominant platforms building it, and expect more useful AR/MR
The Metaverse in 2040
https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2022/06/30/the-metaverse-in-2040/
Hype? Hope? Hell? Maybe all three. Experts are split about the likely evolution of a truly immersive ‘metaverse.’ They expect that augmented- and mixed-reality enhancements will become more useful in people’s daily lives. Many worry that current online problems may be magnified if Web3 development is led by those who built today’s dominant web platforms
Interest in the idea of the metaverse leaped in 2021-2022, prompted in part by Facebook’s decision to rebrand itself as “Meta.” The word was coined by sci-fi author Neal Stephenson in 1992 in his novel “Snow Crash.” In today’s terms, the metaverse is the realm of computer-generated, networked extended reality, or XR, an acronym that embraces all aspects of augmented reality, mixed reality and virtual reality (AR, MR and VR). At this point in time, the metaverse is generally made up of somewhat- immersive XR spaces in which interactions take place among humans and automated entities. Some are daily interactions with augmented-reality apps that people have on their computers and phones. Some are interactions taking place in more-immersive domains in gaming or fantasy worlds. Some occur in “mirror worlds” that duplicate real-life environments.
While extended-reality gaming and social spaces have been in existence for decades, early 2020s technological advances and societal transformations brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic have pushed the development of the metaverse to the forefront, inspiring tens of billions of dollars in new investments and prompting predictions that the metaverse is “the future of the internet” or “the next internet battleground.”
Proponents of XR and the development of more-advanced and immersive, 3D, online worlds say its rapid evolution is likely to benefit all aspects of society – education, health care, gaming and entertainment, the arts, social and civic life and other activities. They believe the infusion of more data into people’s experiences, progress in artificial intelligence (AI) assistive systems and the creation of entirely new spaces and experiences for tech users could enrich and expand their lives.
This heightened interest and investment in extended reality prompted Pew Research Center and Elon University’s Imagining the Internet Center to ask hundreds of technology experts to share their insights on the topic. In all, 624 technology innovators, developers, business and policy leaders, researchers and activists provided open-ended responses to a question seeking their predictions about the trajectory and impact of the metaverse by 2040. The results of this nonscientific canvassing:
54% of these experts said that they expect by 2040 the metaverse WILL be a much-more-refined and truly fully-immersive, well-functioning aspect of daily life for a half billion or more people globally.
46% said that they expect by 2040 the metaverse WILL NOT be a much-more-refined and truly fully-immersive, well-functioning aspect of daily life for a half billion or more people globally.
Laurence Lannom, vice president at the Corporation for National Research Initiatives, offered an compact prediction, writing, “The metaverse will, at its core, be a collection of new and extended technologies. It is easy to imagine that both the best and the worst aspects of our online lives will be extended by being able to tap into a more-complete immersive experience, by being inside a digital space instead of looking at one from the outside. At the good end of the continuum are things like the ability of people to interact with others as though they were all in the same physical space without having spent hours burning dinosaur bones to get there; practicing difficult physical tasks (e.g., surgery) on virtual entities; and elevated educational and research opportunities of all kinds as we learn to leverage the built-in advantages of the new environments. The other end is also not hard to imagine – easier addiction to all-absorbing games and fantasy experiences resulting in increased isolation for many; further breakdown of social cohesion as the virtual offers an easy alternative to the hard task of learning to live with each other; and increased political turmoil as the prophets of fear and grievance acquire the ability to command rallies with millions of attendees.”
Edward Baig, freelance columnist and longtime technology reporter for USA Today, wrote, “Even the smartest folks today have difficulty articulating the metaverse so that regular people understand it beyond it being this vague thing emerging out of augmented reality, virtual reality, 3D and mixed reality. Of course, measured in tech years, 2040 is a lifetime away and, when you factor in the sheer magnitude of the financial and intellectual investments already being plowed into the metaverse, how could this thing possibly not morph into something likely to have a profound impact on our everyday lives? Whatever it is that draws all of us into the metaverse, it must provide – or at least promise to provide – experiences and benefits that are otherwise impractical if not impossible to achieve in (for lack of a better way of putting it) the real world.”
Elizabeth Hyman, CEO for the XR Association, which was founded by Meta, Google, HTC Vive, Microsoft and Sony Interactive Entertainment to convene stakeholders for the development and adoption of XR, shared a number of vital use cases already proven as useful in the XR realm: “Virtual, augmented and mixed reality are the gateway to phenomenal applications in medicine, education, manufacturing, retail, workforce training and more, and it is the gateway to deeply social and immersive interactions – the metaverse. Each day we’re taking strides to make the technology better and ensure that the opportunities are limitless – because they are. The XR industry is focused on responsible innovation and it has built a strong repository of resources that lay the foundation for the industry’s continued growth. While widespread adoption does take time and challenges will no doubt arise, we believe XR technology will become the next major computing platform. Already, colleges and universities are teaching students in the metaverse. Human Resources professionals at companies like Walmart, SAP, Delta and many others are using the tool to train workers – some of the fastest-growing job categories in the U.S. are in industries that are rapidly adopting XR technologies. Uses of XR include warehousing and inventory management, product engineering and design, immersive job training and upskilling and virtual health care patient monitoring. Particularly in the health care setting, we’re seeing XR use with children. For example, the Children’s Hospital Colorado is using XR to help to change the pediatric hospital experience for the better – for instance, for distraction and pain management reducing the need for anesthesia and physical therapy.”
About half of the respondents to this canvassing do not expect the VR aspect of the XR realm to be significantly more popular by 2040. Kevin Werbach, professor of legal studies and business ethics at the University of Pennsylvania and author of “The Blockchain and the New Architecture of Trust,” commented, “There is not a straight evolutionary path forward in maturity and importance for this collection of technologies. Virtual worlds and immersive online spaces will continue to develop in significance, but 500 million people won’t be living in ‘the metaverse’ in any more meaningful way in 2040 than 2022. Perhaps immersive games, social spaces and work tools will merge into a coherent industry sector at that point, which perhaps we’ll still call ‘metaverse.’”
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Economic Times:
IDC: global VR headset shipments jumped 241.6% in Q1 2022; Meta captured 90% market share thanks in part to its subsidized Quest 2 and exclusive content
Apple headset to challenge Meta’s dominance in AR-VR market
Read more at:
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/technology/apple-headset-to-challenge-metas-dominance-in-ar-vr-market/articleshow/92589296.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst
Tomi Engdahl says:
Meta Reveals VR Headset Prototypes Designed to Make VR ‘Indistinguishable From Reality’
https://www.roadtovr.com/meta-vr-headset-prototypes-visual-fidelity-indistinguishable-from-reality/
Meta says its ultimate goal with its VR hardware is to make a comfortable, compact headset with visual finality that’s ‘indistinguishable from reality’. Today the company revealed its latest VR headset prototypes which it says represent steps toward that goal.
Meta has made it no secret that it’s dumping tens of billions of dollars in its XR efforts, much of which is going to long-term R&D through its Reality Labs Research division. Apparently in an effort to shine a bit of light onto what that money is actually accomplishing, the company invited a group of press to sit down for a look at its latest accomplishments in VR hardware R&D.
VR headsets today are impressively immersive, but there’s still no question that what you’re looking at is, well… virtual.
Inside of Meta’s Reality Labs Research division, the company uses the term ‘visual Turing Test’ to represent the bar that needs to be met to convince your visual system that what’s inside the headset is actually real.
For a headset to completely convince your visual system that what’s inside the headset is actually real, Meta says you need a headset that can pass that “visual Turing Test.”
Four Challenges
Zuckerberg and Abrash outlined what they see as four key visual challenges that VR headsets need to solve before the visual Turing Test can be passed: varifocal, distortion, retina resolution, and HDR.
Briefly, here’s what those mean:
Varifocal: the ability to focus on arbitrary depths of the virtual scene, with both essential focus functions of the eyes (vergence and accommodation)
Distortion: lenses inherently distort the light that passes through them, often creating artifacts like color separation and pupil swim that make the existence of the lens obvious.
Retina resolution: having enough resolution in the display to meet or exceed the resolving power of the human eye, such that there’s no evidence of underlying pixels
HDR: also known as high dynamic range, which describes the range of darkness and brightness that we experience in the real world (which almost no display today can properly emulate).
The Display Systems Research team at Reality Labs has built prototypes that function as proof-of-concepts for potential solutions to these challenges.
Varifocal
On the retina resolution front, Meta revealed a previously unseen headset prototype called Butterscotch, which the company says achieves a retina resolution of 60 pixels per degree, allowing for 20/20 vision. To do so, they used extremely pixel-dense displays and reduced the field-of-view—in order to concentrate the pixels over a smaller area—to about half the size of Quest 2
Tomi Engdahl says:
FAMOUS MARKETING PROFESSOR CALLS FACEBOOK’S METAVERSE A “FLAMING BAG OF S**T”
https://futurism.com/the-byte/marketing-professor-metaverse
Meta Roasted
Turns out at least one major marketing expert agrees with what the plebeian public already knows — Mark Zuckerberg may not be able to pull off this Metaverse thing.
On a new new episode of Vox’s Pivot podcast with Kara Swisher, renowned NYU marketing professor Scott Galloway laid the cards on the table. While he gave Zuckerberg credit for being a “visionary” who’s doing the right things to try and pivot a sinking ship — aka Meta-formerly-known-as-Facebook, which is now losing active users for the first time ever — but he’s not convinced that its Metaverse is headed in the right direction.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Facebook Jacks Up Price Of The One Affordable VR Headset
Meta, everyone’s favorite social media company, needs an extra handout
https://kotaku.com/facebook-meta-quest-2-price-tiktok-mark-zuckerberg-1849333729
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/27/the-outlook-is-getting-more-complicated-for-metas-virtual-reality-dreams/?tpcc=tcplusfacebook
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/26/meta-raising-price-quest-2-vr-headsets-by-100/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Global trends are disrupting industries faster than companies can keep pace. It’s time to adopt newer and better ways to scale internationally.
Discover the 5 ways the Metaverse can scale your company internationally
https://synergyxr.com/5-ways-the-metaverse-can-scale-your-company-internationally/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Conv.+%7C+Articles+%7C+CBO&utm_content=Lookalike+%28BE%2C+DE+and+11+others%2C+1%25%29+-+Newsletter+sign-ups&hsa_acc=178019984211842&hsa_cam=23851078020060117&hsa_grp=23851302495590117&hsa_ad=23851302924100117&hsa_src=fb&hsa_net=facebook&hsa_ver=3&fbclid=IwAR3ZWACasHVQAxcHuG1KL5qwszlzK-eVVQ4XMxfOTMqvD8g1xec7aN-wJxk
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/martyswant/2022/04/29/meet-the-vermont-startup-that-amazon-gucci-and-google-are-betting-could-be-the-disney-of-the-metaverse/?utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=socialflowForbesMainFB&utm_source=ForbesMainFacebook&sh=41c050ae6df8
Tomi Engdahl says:
Superplastic, founded by Paul Budnitz in 2017, has taken on new funding from Kering, Sony Japan and Animoca to build a global entertainment brand for the Web3 era.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Metaverse is one of the most (mis)used buzzwords in the IT industry at the moment, and almost all major cloud companies are investing a lot of money in it.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Microsoft open sources its 3D emoji to let creators remix and customize them
Get ready for lots of custom 3D emoji
https://www.theverge.com/2022/8/10/23299527/microsoft-emoji-open-source-creators?scrolla=5eb6d68b7fedc32c19ef33b4
While Microsoft released its emoji in Windows 11 last year and 3D versions in Microsoft Teams in February, the company hadn’t originally planned to open source its work. “Initially we were focused on building the body of work,” says Jon Friedman, Microsoft’s CVP of design and research, in an interview with The Verge. “The idea kinda just started popping around, and it aligned with our belief and perspective that the more open source we are internally and externally, the more product excellence we can build, and the more relevant we can be for all of humanity.”
Microsoft now wants creators to explore new ways to build upon its emoji. “Internally at Microsoft we’re one design community that can only do so much or see so much,” explains Friedman. “We have a desire to engage the community and help us see and do more that’s globally relevant, that reaches people in unique ways.”
Designing in the Open(Source)
Why we’re excited to freely share our emoji for you to remix
https://medium.com/microsoft-design/designing-in-the-open-source-5c62be73a599
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2022/08/12/svelte-vr-headsets-coming/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Pelimoottori opettaa uusia parvekelasien asentajia
https://etn.fi/index.php/13-news/13882-pelimoottori-opettaa-uusia-parvekelasien-asentajia
Virtuaalitodellisuus on tehnyt itseään alun perin tunnetuksi pelimaailman kautta. Tekniikka ja sen tukemat ratkaisut on otettu käyttöön myös koulutuksessa ja uusien työntekijöiden perehdyttämisessä. Näin tekee esimerkiksi parvekelasituksia tekevä Lumon vantaalaisen Softabilityn ohjelmistoilla.
Softabilityn Lumonille toteuttamassa parvekelasien asennukseen liittyvässä VR-sovelluksessa tarkoitus oli nimenomaan tehostaa uusien työntekijöiden perehdyttämistä, päivittää kokeneiden työntekijöiden tietoja ja yhtenäistää asennustapoja. Sovellus toteutettiin Meta Quest 2 VR-laseille.
Lumonin VR-sovelluksessa lähdettiin liikkeelle parvekelasien asennuksesta, mutta teknologiaa on mahdollista hyödyntää myös muiden työtehtävien perehdyttämiseen liittyen vaikkapa asiakaspalveluun tai työturvallisuuteen. Uudet työntekijät joutuvat seuraamaan kokeneempien asentajien työskentelyä pitkään ennen kuin heidän voi antaa asentaa laseja itsenäisesti.
Tomi Engdahl says:
It-jätti uskoo Metaversiumin tuloon – turvallisuus selvitettävä
https://www.uusiteknologia.fi/2022/08/16/it-jatti-uskoo-metaversiumin-tuloon-turvallisuus-selvitettava/
Metaversumi ei ole enää isojen it-toimijoiden mukaan pelkkä muotisana. Siitä on muodostumassa rakenne, joka mahdollistaa reaaliaikaiset, aidontuntuiset ja virtuaaliset kokemukset. Esimerkiksi intilaisen Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) johtaja Krishnan Ramanujam uskoo, että metaversiumista muodostuu kolmen vuoden sisään jo vakiintunut tekniikka, jos turvallisuudesta huolehditaan.
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) on kehittänyt kuluneina kuukausina jo kauppakeskusmetaversumin muotialan asiakkaalle, karkkimaailman kuluttajatuotealan asiakkaalle sekä virtuaalisia konttoreita johtavalle brittipankille. Tatan mukaan juuri kulutustavara-, koulutus-, media- ja kiinteistönvälitysalat ovat siirtymässä kokemuksellisten teknologioiden pariin ensimmäisten joukossa. Uusi metauniversium tarjoaa uusia mahdollisuuksia liiketoiminnan kasvattamiseksi myös monella muulla toimialalla.
”Pandemian leviäminen vauhditti digitalisaatiota ja muutti ihmisten näkemyksiä erittäin nopeasti. Jos pandemiarajoituksia joudutaan ottamaan vielä käyttöön jossakin päin maailmaa, myös metaversumi voi vakiintua nopeasti”, Tatan Krishnan Ramanujam sanoo.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Tutkimussäätiöltä rahoitusta metaversumi-tutkimukseen
https://www.uusiteknologia.fi/2022/08/17/tutkimussaatiolta-rahoitusta-metaversumi-tutkimukseen/
Sijainti
Etusivu > Yleinen > Tutkimussäätiöltä rahoitusta metaversumi-tutkimukseen
Tutkimussäätiöltä rahoitusta metaversumi-tutkimukseen
Yleinen
- 17.8.2022
Tietotekniikan tutkimussäätiö on jakanut 40 000 euroa apurahoja metaversumi-teeman uusiin korkean riskin tutkimushankkeisiin. Määräaikaan mennessä säätiö sai yhdeksän hakemusta, joista valittiin kolme apurahan saajaa.
Tietotekniikan tutkimussäätiöltä sai suurimman 20 000 euron apurahan Lappeenrannan-Lahden teknillisen yliopiston Dominik Siemon, jonka hankkeessa luodaan järjestelmällinen lähestymistapa digitaalisten ja älykkäiden persoonien suunnitteluun ja kehittämiseen, jotka edustavat yrityksiä digitaalisessa tilassa.
Siemonin hankkeen taustalla on, että organisaatiot ovat siirtymässä syvemmälle digitaaliseen maailmaan. Tätä taustaa vasten digitaaliset persoonat, olivatpa ne sitten robotteja, avatareja tai pelkkiä tekstipohjaisia chat-robotteja, yleistyvät yhä enemmän, ja niiden ja ihmisten välinen vuorovaikutus on yhä yleisempää ja vivahteikkaampaa.
https://tietotekniikantutkimussaatio.fi/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Emmy Award Winner’s Algorithms Bring High-Quality Video to Your TV He is working on making high-res images for the metaverse
https://spectrum.ieee.org/alan-bovik-profile#toggle-gdpr
Tomi Engdahl says:
Gaming
Meta’s metaverse turned into laughing stock, gets savagely lampooned
After spending $18 billion on the metaverse and VR, Meta has shared an image that has been lampooned and ruthlessly mocked by gamers and consumers.
Read more: https://www.tweaktown.com/news/88000/metas-metaverse-turned-into-laughing-stock-gets-savagely-lampooned/index.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.tweaktown.com/news/87049/mark-zuckerberg-reveals-how-many-people-he-expects-in-the-metaverse/index.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
Gaming
Meta’s metaverse investment is about control, defining a new platform
Meta is sinking billions into the metaverse so it can fully control a new ad-centric social media/gaming ecosystem/platform.
Read more: https://www.tweaktown.com/news/87662/metas-metaverse-investment-is-about-control-defining-new-platform/index.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mark Zuckerberg updates his metaverse avatar to look slightly more human
Is this the metaverse we were promised?
https://www.polygon.com/23313564/mark-zuckerberg-metaverse-horizon-worlds-graphics-update
It’s been a busy week for Meta. On Monday, Mark Zuckerberg announced via Facebook that Meta would be launching Horizon Worlds, the company’s social metaverse platform, in France and Spain. The Facebook post was accompanied by an image of Zuckerberg’s avatar, with the pale, vacuous look of a Victorian ghost, taking a selfie in front of basic renderings of the Eiffel Tower and the Basílica de la Sagrada Família. Commenters and internet denizens subsequently dunked on the image throughout the week, calling out the cartoonish graphics. Probably not the desired reaction to a project that’s meant to usher in the digital future.
On Friday, Mark Zuckerberg shared an update about Horizon Worlds, complete with a new version of his avatar and a rendering of an ancient Rome-style environment.
In these images, it does look better.
Horizon Worlds is available on Quest VR headsets. It grew to 300,000 users in the first two months after its December 2021 launch, and in February, the Horizon Worlds Twitter account posted that more than 10,000 worlds had been created — though Meta hasn’t been clear about how it plans to moderate the growing platform.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mark Zuckerberg Says Metaverse Project “Capable Of Much More” After Graphics Were Ridiculed
BY
VASPAAN DASTOOR
PUBLISHED 2 DAYS AGO
Horizons World will receive updates that will improve its graphics.
https://www.thegamer.com/mark-zuckerberg-metaverse-horizons-world-capable-of-much-more/?utm_source=TG-FB-P&utm_medium=Social-Distribution&utm_campaign=TG-FB-P
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Verge:
Sony says the PlayStation VR2 headset is coming in “early 2023” but does not reveal its pricing — The virtual reality headset will launch next year — Sony’s PlayStation VR2 headset is coming in “early 2023,” according to posts the company made on Twitter and Instagram.
Sony says the PlayStation VR2 is coming in early 2023
The virtual reality headset will launch next year
https://www.theverge.com/2022/8/22/23317342/sony-playstation-ps-vr2-release-date-early-2023?scrolla=5eb6d68b7fedc32c19ef33b4
Tomi Engdahl says:
Buy The Right To Build A Nakagin Tower Anywhere
https://hackaday.com/2022/08/25/buy-the-right-to-build-a-nakagin-tower-anywhere/
Perhaps one of the most globally iconic buildings of that era could have been found in Tokyo, in the form of the Nakagin Capsule Tower, Kisho Kurokawa’s 1972 Metabolist apartment block. This pioneering structure, in which individual apartments were conceived as plug-in units that could be moved or changed at will, never achieved its potential and was dismantled, looking more post-apocalyptic than futuristic in early 2022, but it could live on in both digital form and reconstructed elsewhere as the rights to its design are being auctioned.
Unfortunately there appears to be some NFT mumbo-jumbo associated with the sale, but what’s up for auction is a complete CAD model along with the rights to build either real or virtual copies of the building.
https://www.dezeen.com/2022/08/16/nakagin-capsule-tower-rebuild-auction/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Zuckerberg says Meta’s next VR headset will launch in October and will focus on ‘social presence’
https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/26/zuckerberg-says-metas-next-vr-headset-will-launch-in-october-and-will-focus-on-social-presence/
Meta is launching its next VR headset this October at the company’s Connect conference. CEO Mark Zuckerberg made the announcement late Thursday, fittingly, in an equally surreal environment: the Joe Rogan Experience podcast on Spotify.
He said that the new VR headset, a sequel to the popular Oculus 2, will focus on “social presence,” with features like eye-tracking and face-tracking. Zuckerberg said that the headset is designed to capture users’ facial expressions and have them replicated on their avatars in real time to enhance non-verbal communication. He also noted that while Meta’s AR glasses are a few years away, the headset launching in October will have some mixed reality features.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Grimes has dismissed Mark Zuckerberg’s efforts to build a Metaverse, calling the Facebook founder “under-qualified”.
Grimes calls Mark Zuckerberg ‘under-qualified’ to run the Metaverse
‘If Zuck oversees the Metaverse it is dead,’ said the musician
https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/news/grimes-mark-zuckerberg-metaverse-facebook-b2154037.html#Echobox=1661539165
Grimes has dismissed Mark Zuckerberg’s efforts to build a Metaverse, calling the Facebook founder “under-qualified”.
In a post on Twitter, the musician – born Claire Boucher – wrote: “If Zuck ‘oversees the Metaverse’ it is dead and people who care about art and culture are building something else. Also this is bad art.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Trademark filings suggest Apple is considering calling its mixed reality headset “Reality One” or “Reality Pro” and its specialized chip “Reality Processor”
Trademark Filings Suggest Apple May Be Securing ‘Reality’ Names for AR/VR Headset
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-08-28/what-will-apple-call-its-ar-vr-headsets-reality-one-reality-pro-names-emerge#xj4y7vzkg
The iPhone maker is aiming to enter the new product category next year.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The latest issue facing Meta is whether the virtual environment, where users can design their own faces, will be the same for everyone, or if companies, politicians and more will have more flexibility in changing who they appear to be.
Facebook’s Metaverse Could Be Overrun By Deep Fakes And Other Misinformation If These Non-Profits Don’t Succeed
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldelcastillo/2022/08/29/facebooks-metaverse-could-be-overrun-by-deep-fakes-and-other-misinformation-if-these-non-profits-dont-succeed/?utm_campaign=socialflowForbesMainFB&utm_source=ForbesMainFacebook&utm_medium=social
Mark Zuckerberg’s virtual-reality universe, dubbed simply Meta, has been plagued by a number of problems from technology issues to a difficulty holding onto staff. That doesn’t mean it won’t soon be used by billions of people. The latest issue facing Meta is whether the virtual environment, where users can design their own faces, will be the same for everyone, or if companies, politicians and more will have more flexibility in changing who they appear to be.
Rand Waltzman, a senior information scientist at the research non-profit RAND Institute, last week published a warning that lessons learned by Facebook in customizing news feeds and allowing for hyper-targeted information could be supercharged in its Meta, where even the speakers could be customized to make them appear more trustworthy to each audience member. Using deepfake technology that creates realistic but falsified videos, a speaker could be modified to have 40% of the audience member’s features without the audience member even knowing.
Meta has taken steps to tackle the problem, but other companies are not waiting. Two years ago, the New York Times, the BBC, CBC Radio Canada and Microsoft launched Project Origin to create technology that proves a message actually came from the source it purports to be from. In turn, Project Origin is now a part of the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity, along with Adobe, Intel, Sony and Twitter. Some of the early versions of this software that trace the provenance of information online already exist, the only question is who will use it?
Launched in 2020, Project Origin is building software that lets audience members check to see if information that claims to come from a trusted news source actually came from there, and prove that the information arrived in the same form it was sent. In other words, no tampering. Instead of relying on blockchain or another distributed ledger technology to track the movement of information online, as might be possible in future versions of the so-called Web3, the technology tags information with data about where it came from that moves with it as it’s copied and spread. An early version of the software was released this year and is now being used by a number of members, he says.
But the misinformation problems facing Meta are bigger than fake news. In order to reduce overlap between Project Origin’s solutions and other similar technology targeting different kinds of deception—and to ensure the solutions interoperate—the non-profit co-launched the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity, in February 2021, to prove the originality of a number of kinds of intellectual property. Similarly, Blockchain 50 lister Adobe runs the Content Authenticity Initiative, which in October 2021 announced a project to prove that NFTs created using its software were actually originated by the listed artist.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Facebook Misinformation Is Bad Enough. The Metaverse Will Be Worse
https://www.rand.org/blog/2022/08/facebook-misinformation-is-bad-enough-the-metaverse.html
Here’s a plausible scenario that could soon take place in the metaverse, the online virtual reality environments under rapid development by Mark Zuckerberg and other tech entrepreneurs: A political candidate is giving a speech to millions of people. While each viewer thinks they are seeing the same version of the candidate, in virtual reality they are actually each seeing a slightly different version. For each and every viewer, the candidate’s face has been subtly modified to resemble the viewer.
This is done by blending features of each viewer’s face into the candidate’s face. The viewers are unaware of any manipulation of the image. Yet they are strongly influenced by it: Each member of the audience is more favorably disposed to the candidate than they would have been without any digital manipulation.
This is not speculation.
Virtual reality environments will enable psychological and emotional manipulation of its users at a level unimaginable in today’s media.
In the metaverse, it’s easy to imagine this type of mimicry at a massive scale.
At the heart of all deception is emotional manipulation. Virtual reality environments, such as Facebook’s (now Meta’s) metaverse, will enable psychological and emotional manipulation of its users at a level unimaginable in today’s media.
I have been working on problems of deception, disinformation, and artificial intelligence for close to four decades, including two terms as a program manager at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). We are not even close to being able to defend users against the threats posed by this coming new medium. In virtual reality, malicious actors will be able to take the age-old dark arts of deception and influence to new heights—or depths.
The very same features that make virtual reality environments so attractive as communication environments—the sense that you’ve teleported into a synthetic world—can also harm their users. When it comes to emotional manipulation, two features of the metaverse are particularly important—presence and embodiment.
“Presence” means that people feel they are communicating with one another directly without any type of computer interface. “Embodiment” means that the user has the feeling that their avatar or virtual body is their actual body.
Even in virtual reality’s current, primitive state, these two sensations are what make VR so powerful. They are also what makes emotional manipulation in VR so dangerous.
In VR, body language and nonverbal signals such as eye gaze, gestures, or facial expressions can be used to communicate intentions and emotions. Unlike verbal language, we often produce and perceive body language subconsciously.
Virtual reality environments allow interaction among people that exploits the full range of human communication. Person-to-person interaction at this intensity and scale has not been possible in traditional social media environments.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mark Zuckerberg promises ‘major updates’ to Horizon avatars after his is widely mocked
Zuckerberg said Meta’s headsets are ‘capable of much more.’
https://www.engadget.com/mark-zuckerberg-horizon-graphics-avatars-204551743.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
ZUCKERBERG’S LIFELESS METAVERSE AVATAR IS COMICALLY DIFFERENT FROM THE ONE HE ADVERTISED
https://futurism.com/the-byte/metaverse-different-advertised
Last October, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced sweeping changes at the company that would rename it Meta and give it a new “North Star”: a headset-heavy, AR-forward metaverse which, as the founder explained in a series of videos and digital renderings, would eventually become an “even more immersive” and “fully embodied” internet.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/426715#:~:text=Akihiko%20Kondo%20took%20his%20love,Gaga%20on%20her%20world%20tours.
Fictosexuality is the term used to describe those people who are sexually attracted to fictional characters and in Japan little by little it becomes a trend, to the extent that there are companies that develop technology to offer users holographic couples. Akihiko Kondo took his love for a fictional character one step further by holding a “getting married” ceremony with Hatsune Miku , a virtual singer who has starred in several video games and has even accompanied Lady Gaga on her world tours. The ceremony took place in 2019, after the man was able to communicate with the hologram via Gatebox, a company that develops devices to holographically show characters that do not exist.
At the time Akihiko and Hatsune monopolized the headlines of the newspapers and the media and now they do it again because the support for the Gatebox software that allowed the interaction of the man with his virtual wife, is no longer available and for the same reason, can no longer communicate with her.
Fictional sexual relationships, ideal for the metaverse?
Although the relationship between Akihiko and Hatsune Miko seems strange, we could see them more frequently thanks to the fast-paced development of the metaverse and digital environments. In some countries, fictional sexuality becomes common, since an entire content generation industry revolves around it. But as long as those relationships depend on hardware and software that can become obsolete or depend on upgrades, they will remain short-lived.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Reuters:
Meta agrees a deal with Qualcomm to produce custom Snapdragon chips optimized for its Quest VR devices; the chips will not be exclusive to Meta
Meta, Qualcomm sign pact on custom virtual reality chips
https://www.reuters.com/technology/meta-qualcomm-strike-agreement-custom-virtual-reality-chips-2022-09-02/
Tomi Engdahl says:
It may thrive one day—but in 2022, the metaverse has to date been a slow-motion trainwreck.
Why Is Meta’s Metaverse Such a Misfire? The virtual world’s most noteworthy spokesperson certainly isn’t helping the cause
https://spectrum.ieee.org/metaverse-meta-misfire?share_id=7210131&socialux=facebook&utm_campaign=RebelMouse&utm_content=IEEE+Spectrum&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook
Mark Zuckerberg isn’t a great ambassador for the metaverse.
Meta’s CEO kicked off another round of controversy with a screenshot celebrating the launch of Horizon Worlds, the company’s AR/VR metaverse platform, in France and Spain. Shot in the style of a selfie, it shows a poorly detailed rendition of Zuckerberg’s avatar staring past the camera. Crude 3D models of national landmarks sit behind him on a generic green landscape.
“It was a horrific PR move to put out those photos,”
Meta’s metaverse hype leads to real-world backlash
Zuckerberg’s virtual selfie quickly went viral across numerous social media accounts. A tweet by user @ordinarytings, which claimed Horizon Worlds is “surely dying in the dark,” led the charge with more than 31,000 likes and over 4,500 quote tweets or retweets.
It’s not unusual for a tech CEO to receive a thrashing on Twitter, but the scale of the response–boosted by Mashable, The Daily Dot, and Kotaku–was suffocating. It’s hard to mount any defense of Meta’s ugly, simplistic screenshot. “I think the response is fair,” says Richards.
Clearly, Zuckerberg’s post did not go as planned. But this begs the question: why?
“If they’re going to use game tech to build a VR game platform that’s supposed to be a cross between a Roblox style UGC platform and a social MMO, maybe they should have people who have experience.”
—Rafael Brown, Symbol Zero
Rafael Brown, CEO of metaverse event company Symbol Zero and former game designer, thinks the company’s metaverse issues are rooted in difficulty keeping up with the level of fidelity common in the game industry.
“Facebook is out of touch with game-style software development practices and expectations on art direction and character/avatar development,” says Brown. “Keep in mind their other internal projects like Quill, et cetera, that they’ve jettisoned and lost [staff over].”
There are other signs of instability.
“All I wonder is, if they’re going to use game tech to build a VR game platform that’s supposed to be a cross between a Roblox style UGC platform and a social MMO, maybe they should have people who have experience,” says Brown. “They really need better art direction, technical art direction, game direction, and tools direction.”
Where does Meta go from here?
Zuckerberg tried to quell criticism with a follow-up post that with a planned update to avatar graphics. It’s an improvement, to be sure.
But the real glimmer of hope was shown at SIGGRAPH, a computer graphics conference held in August of 2022.
A group of researchers from Reality Labs, Meta’s AR/VR research division, showed a paper titled “Authentic Volumetric Avatars from a Phone Scan,” which describes how smartphone photos with depth of field data can be paired with machine learning to achieve sharp, photorealistic results with accurate real-time facial animation. The detailed expressions shown by researchers at Reality Labs stands in stark contrast to the current state of Horizon Worlds’ avatars.
Richards notes that Meta’s current mainstream headset, the Meta Quest 2, may be partially responsible for the Horizon Worlds’ limitations.
Meta might be ready to turn that corner with a headset to be announced at Oculus Connect 2022.
Zuckerberg said the upcoming, yet unnamed headset will offer “the ability to now have eye contact in virtual reality, have your face be tracked so that your avatar is not just this still thing, if you smile, or you frown, or you pout, whatever your expression is, to have that actually in real time translate to your avatar.” His remarks sound a lot like what’s already been shown at SIGGRAPH and in other, earlier Meta research demos.