Why is the metasverse so popular? Some say it is the trend of the future, some say it is capitalists to cut leek hype concept. What exactly is the meta-universe? Why does so much capital flock to it?

What is the meta-universe

Do you remember the oasis in Ready Player One, which is probably the true picture of the meta-universe?

In 2018, the American science fiction adventure film Ready Player One was released. If you haven’t seen it, you are strongly advised to watch it.

The current concept of the meta-universe represents the future iterations of the Internet, a “perceived”, “persistent”, shared “virtual universe” with 3D virtual Spaces.

Metaverse is a translation from Metaverse. As a prefix, meta usually means “beyond” or “beyond”, which can be translated into Chinese as “chao” or “yuan”. Verse stands for the universe and is derived by removing the prefix uni. Metaverse translated into Chinese means beyond the reality of the universe, which can be translated as Metaverse or super universe, which is what most people now call the Metaverse.

Metaverse is a term coined by Neal Stephenson in his 1992 science fiction novel Snow Crash. In the novel, humans communicate with each other through their avatars in a virtual three-dimensional space. After writing the novel, Stephenson wrote in his postscript to Avalanche, he also played Habitat, a meta-cosmic-like role-playing online game. As early as 1982, the concept of cyberspace emerged, and Metaverse can be regarded as the extension and development of these concepts.

Metaverse is different from today’s massively multiplayer online games in that it is persistent, more realistic, and more akin to the real world than the current mainstream online games.

The state of the metadverse

A lot of things happened in the metasverse in 2021:

Sandbox gaming platform Roblox was the first company to write a metasverse into its prospectus, and it made a successful debut on the New York Stock Exchange this year with a $40 billion market cap on its first day of trading.

Tencent has partnered with Roblox to represent the game Lobos in China.

South Korea announced the establishment of the Meta-universe Alliance, to build a unified VR, AR platform.

Facebook has announced plans to create a metasomes, and Zuckerberg says he wants to make Facebook a metasomes company in the future.

Microsoft has released virtual software called Microsoft Mesh based on its HoloLens2 smart glasses.

Epic Games decided to make Fortnite a meta-universe game.

Xiaomi has officially released the Mi Smart Glasses Discovery Edition.

Byte investment code Universe, also officially launched in this year’s meta-universe game “Restart the World.”

Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang announced that nvidia will expand into the metasverse business. .

At present each big tycoon has the layout of the meta-universe, but we are not the same form of participation. Smart wearable devices launched by Microsoft, Apple and Xiaomi enable people to experience the virtual world through smart glasses. Some game companies launch a variety of role-playing games and game wearables, trying to create a virtual world through games; Some companies use social networking to create more realistic, three-dimensional chat and interaction scenes to enter the local meta-universe. Some companies are launching virtual workspaces that allow people to work at home in the same way they do in the office…

The technology that the metasverse needs

The development of Internet hardware, software and network is indispensable to the realization of the meta-universe.

The user experience in the metaverse, which is close to the real scene, needs richer and smarter sensors to connect the human senses with the digital world. Smart glasses, for example, allow people to see virtual worlds; HaptX developed feedback gloves that create a sense of touch; Sensor technology for taste and smell has been slow to develop, and a major breakthrough is needed to simulate real experiences. The true metasomes require more equipment, more sensory touch, and a full range of experiences.

The meta-universe needs VR, AR, MR and other technologies to describe the virtual world and make the virtual 3D world more real and vivid. Immersive experience requires a more realistic environment. Not only the scenes seen by eyes should be real, but also the scenes heard by ears and felt by the body. Only all-round 3D stereo effects can bring an immersive feeling.

How the virtual economy is regulated in the meta-universe. How to define the value of virtual goods, how people trade, who will control the housing price of virtual world, who will manage virtual world inflation? Blockchain technology may be a good choice, but more rules and guidance are needed to fully solve all the problems of virtual economy development.

The persistence of the meta-universe requires the persistent storage of super-large scale data, which puts forward new requirements for our real-time read-write technology, persistence technology and storage devices.

Network aspect, more real virtual scene, interactive experience, is bound to have larger data transmission. When 5G will be fully popularized, when the 6G era will come, and how Web3.0 will be implemented are all the problems and challenges we are facing.

conclusion

The full vision of the metasverse has not been fully defined, and it is not clear how far we are from it, but whether the term is a gimmick or an ideal, the Internet technology behind it is sure to continue to evolve and improve; New technologies are often the first to hit the ground running in the most commercially viable scenarios. After individual scenes are landed and developed, they will continue to spread to every corner of life.

Just like the three industrial revolutions, new technologies are bound to change the way people live in the future.

Of course, while caring about the meta-universe, we should also base ourselves on the present and care about the real universe.

A link to the

[1] en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metave… [2] web.archive.org/web/2014060…

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