November 10, 2021

"[A] successful metaverse needs to have ways to make money. If you buy a Chanel bag, you also get to have it as an NFT in your metaverse."

"If I were Ferrari, I would be thinking about how to ensure IP protection such that someone has to buy a Ferrari offline to show a Ferrari in my metaverse or my Tinder profile. You essentially would be signaling power and wealth online, which would create a lot of mating opportunities or signaling capability in these metaverses..... But Facebook’s metaverse won’t work.... The fundamental mistake people make around these AR or VR experiences is to immediately think of sight as the entry point into a metaverse. When Mark Zuckerberg says, 'Imagine your friend is at a great concert around the world and you can join her.' Let’s play that out. I get a text message from my friend and I’m at the mall, or a movie, or at school. Am I going to pull out my handy Oculus and throw it on my head and start jamming to the Weeknd? It doesn’t make any sense. The Oculus is not a wearable.... When the internet came about, the initial vision for retail was that you would have these avatars that would go to a shelf for a sweater and then walk over to the cash register and buy it. It was just stupid and didn’t make any sense. We have these similar things now. We’re going to be legless avatars in a meeting?"

From "Why Facebook’s Metaverse Is Dead on Arrival" by James D. Walsh (NY Magazine).

19 comments:

peacelovewoodstock said...

Metaverse = "Clippy" 2.0

gilbar said...

i suppose,
'metaverse' Might be useful for folk that are afraid to travel and Like staying inside their house
But, I like Being There, not seeing there.
In 30 minutes, i'm off to the Ozarks, and then over to the Natchez Trace parkway, and up to Nashville

in the 'metaverse' i could sit right here, and look at pictures of it all!
Does That appeal to me? Not At All
Reality is Real computer sims are computer sims
Pretty straight forward.

wendybar said...

I'm so glad that I never fell into the "Designer" anything trap. I don't own a piece of ANYTHING designer...and that includes the Iphone. I don't even have a cell phone. Idiotic to me.

Achilles said...

Journalists are stupid.

There will be more money spent in Augmented Reality than else wise sooner rather than later.

Virtual reality will have massive commercial opportunities. One of the first will be "skins." People will pay real money to have people make them look special in virtual reality.

There will be entertainment and attractions in virtual reality complete with hormonal response enhancement and neural stimulation that make real life seem very bland.

Meetings and work will move there.

It is going to be a weird place for those of us who do not grow up in it.

Enigma said...

Been there, tried that with the Second Life platform now almost 20 years ago. It was quite successful with unregulated gambling, unregulated banking (per Ponzi scheme payouts), and fantasy cartoon sex. The first two were regulated away, while the third kept the platform alive. [Has OnlyFans destroyed that part of the business too? I have no idea.] Many visual artists also created very nice interactive environments too.

IBM and other corporations briefly tried to make avatar-driven meetings mainstream. It didn't work so well when one came dressed as a fox wearing a bondage outfit with a nametag such as "Mr. Magnificent CopperMountain".

See the Bruce Willis film "Surrogates" (2009) for alogical extrapolation of where Second Life and the Oculus Rift and VR could go.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0986263/


VR has always involved a lot of WORK. It'll have a gaming and entertainment niche, but there's never been a killer app so far.

Readering said...

Ferrari? Won't everyone in the metaverse use a segway?

Hammond X. Gritzkofe said...

I never met a verse I did not like,
Until I met the one from Zuckerberg.
All of "social media" can take a hike.
For them I would not give a half a turd.

tim maguire said...

The Oculus is not a wearable

That seems short-sighted. I could easily see a market for a virtual concert ticket if the VR is good enough. If it's not today, it soon will be if there's a market waiting to use it.

someone has to buy a Ferrari offline to show a Ferrari in my metaverse or my Tinder profile.

Probably correct, but also a sad statement about the corruption of trademark law. Trademarks are supposed to be for the protection of the consumer, not the company--likelihood of confusion was the watchword. A company's mark is only protected for the company's products. If Ferrari doesn't sell Ferraris in the metaverse, then it has no trademark interest there. Makers of virtual cars aren't in competition with makers of real cars. But, of course, ignorant judges and corrupt politicians have turned trademark law on its head so that now people think of it as a property right for the company that can (and even should) be policed everywhere, even when it does not serve the purpose of trademark.

MikeR said...

Kind of mind-boggling that someone would write an article on this and not mention Second Life or the other wannabes. Presumably the author never tried it. I used it for a while, but it was still too clunky. I expect that's about to be fixed.
But it had a whole monetary system which basically worked. And other nice features (you could build things, there was a programmer API to do more fancy stuff.) I liked it.
Clueless.

MartyH said...

Most dystopias aren’t deliberately planned but apparently ours will be.

Michael said...

Remember Second Life? Supposedly people were living there nearly 24/7 and having relationships and running businesses there. I never met anyone who had used it, I wouldn't even know where to go looking for it.

This sounds like that.

rehajm said...

...which would create a lot of mating opportunities...

Real ones or Meta™ ones?

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

This guy has zero interest in anything Zuckerberg is doing unless it involves bankruptcy or imprisonment.

Critter said...

The left’s enthusiasm for meta verse rests on the assumption that we are headed toward a world in which we don’t need vast portions of our population to work. We will need much more than a guaranteed income for that society to avoid total breakdown. Widespread use of the meta verse is a key enabler along with sex, drugs, entertainment and media control. All part of the new social construct in the eyes of the dystopian elites, who fully intend to live in a different culture than the one being created for the masses.

Joe Smith said...

As for goofy headsets, wait until you get the chip implanted : )

Don't underestimate the stupidity of humanity, especially Americans these days.

I have a friend whose kid loves gaming. All he wants for presents (birthday, etc.) is gift cards to spend on virtual weapons or forts or whatever exists only in the digital world.

It's just a giant money transfer with no associated fees.

It's kind of fucking brilliant.

Not for me, but people are becoming billionaires with this strategy...

Lurker21 said...

I'm disappointed.

He should have called his dream the "Zuckerverse," and his company "Zuck" or "Zuckervision."

mikee said...

If we aren't gonna be legless avatars in a meeting, we're gonna have legs on our avatars. For goodness sakes remember to wear your avatar pants. And make that long avatar pants, just to be clear.

Jm said...

Haven't seen anyone mention it yet but this also disregards the large motion sickness issues with current iterations of vr. Full disclosure I own a valve index virtual reality headset. There are a few tricks to lessen the motion sickness, having a fan blowing on you, higher framerates, even changing how your character moves between a smooth continuous walk or an instant teleport to a spot further ahead. The issue is mostly caused by your inner ear not matching up with what your eyes are showing you. You can get acclimated to the motion sickness but it doesn't ever totally go away, it just takes a few hours longer to hit you.

While many people might try the metaverse i doubt enough will of them will get through the motion sickness for it to be successful long term. There are definitely other issues such as the lack of content for vr, but the motion sickness problems have been there for years, and they dont seem to be going away.

Achilles said...

rehajm said...

...which would create a lot of mating opportunities...

Real ones or Meta™ ones?

The Meta ones will be better than real ones sooner than people think.

The hot chicks wont be out of people's league.