Imagine that you (or your avatar) are attending a close friend’s wedding in the Metaverse. Because you are on an inevitable business trip. Or imagine this. Are you a nostalgic time travel junkie and want to go back in time and see first-hand how your ancestors once lived? How would you feel if they teleported you to a place (or outer space)?
These scenarios, previously prey to sci-fi writers and futurists, could become (hypothetical) possibilities soon. And take it easy and with enthusiasm. Thanks to the metaverse!
The term Metaverse is a portmanteau of “meta” (meaning “beyond”) and “universe” and has been around for 30 years. First used by Neil Stevenson in his 1992 science fiction novel Snow Crash, it was an envisioned successor to the virtual reality-based internet. Seven years later, the 1999 film The Matrix awakened humanity to virtual reality. The Metaverse may contain elements from a fictional world, but it is neither dystopian nor utopian, even if it’s hard to come up with a clear definition of the term. Yosuke Matsuda, CEO of Square Enix, argued that trying to define the metaverse ” limits the imagination of the creator”.
Will it be the next big thing for the world, or will it become another fad to be hyped beyond its worth? It does not replace it! It complements our real life in countless ways. We can loosely define the Metaverse as a parallel virtual world that directly impacts almost every daily activity of human life.
The Metaverse will “combine immersion, real-time interactivity, user intervention, interoperability across platforms and devices, and the ability of thousands of individuals to interact with,” according to a McKinsey & Company research from June 2022. It has concurrent use cases outside of just gaming.
As the report rightly points out, each generation of display technology has brought us closer to content. From your TV in your room 12 feet away, to your personal computer 1 meter away, to your mobile device. Just one meter away from our eyes. “And with each transition, the level of personalization and advertising revenue has increased, as has the time we spend on our devices and their secondary social impact. What does the future hold in store for us as we move to fully immersive experiences?”
Major industries currently using the Metaverse include fashion and apparel, financial services, retail and FMCG, media, technology, and telecommunications. By 2030, consumer and business use cases for the Metaverse could be worth $4 trillion to $5 trillion, according to a McKinsey & Company analysis. The possibilities are endless, ranging from product marketing to customer engagement, public service (by 2023, Seoul will be the first city to host the Metaverse public service platform), virtual tourism (Ariva Digital’s Wonderland platform allows users to connect to fictional destinations and mock-up purposes Travel to Earth will soon be possible), and much more.
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