The Gaping Black Holes in the Metaverse
- By Winston Thomas
- January 24, 2022
It looks like the Metaverse is here to stay, much to the dismay of its ardent critics.
Ever since Meta (formerly Facebook) made “meta” a proper noun, the humble prefix has created enormous chatter and interest (and not always in favor of Meta). Tons of money is piling in, and the skyrocketing virtual land sales are just mind-boggling.
Yet, no one has a clear definition of what the Metaverse is. What we have are “meta definitions.” The tech titans are defining it as a subset of their offerings.
Ask Meta, and it will say it is a virtual reality world of avatars in Horizon Worlds. Ask Niantic (the guys behind Pokemon Go), and they will say the real Metaverse will be augmented reality. Of course, we will need to find a better AR device or VR goggles. Meanwhile, Microsoft made a huge splash with its Blizzard buy, which some say is a Metaverse move and some don’t. But they also own the Minecraft Metaverse.
“Candidly, people are kind of bending the definition according to their strengths and ambitions. I mean, honestly, that's what's happening in the tech space,” says Will Duckworth, the Asia Pacific digital leader at EY.
Well, the truth is that the Metaverse will be all these things and more. And there’s a high chance of us living in different Metaverses — not just one.
What is certain is that the Metaverse shows that we’re way past the original intention of the internet, i.e., to communicate and share information, and need a platform that addresses our fragmented internet experiences.
A Metaverse promises this seamless experience as the building block. “I think when looking at the definitions across the industry, you're talking about the intersections of those modes of usage of the internet,” Duckworth observes.
It is already happening in some areas. Social commerce (or social media commerce), play-to-earn NFT games, and entertainment companies holding virtual events are some examples.
“The Metaverse offers any platform or probably many platforms that bring together these modes so that we can live in one digital space for all of those usages,” asks Duckworth.
The transportability hole
We’ve been down this road before. Second Life, IMVU, There, InWorldz, Meez.com, Minecraft, and Roblox offered versions of Metaverses. Now tech titans, with deep experience in social media and monetizing the internet are getting into the game. The entry has increased the volume of announcements, acquisitions, and mergers.
Yet, they remain silent on a major hole: transportability. Say you want to move your virtual self or avatar from Facebook’s Horizon Worlds to Niantic’s version of AR? Today, you can’t. Tomorrow, you may be able to, but it won’t be as seamless.
“I don't think that the fundamentals are there. You need a pervasive world to spend hours every day, and it has to be very dependable for that to be the way that we live; I think there are question marks,” explains Duckworth.
For transportability to work, you need to interoperate. And for that, you need standards. There aren’t any.
“So I think consumers will start to demand transportability of themselves just as we do in the physical world. I'm the same person, whether I walk into an office, walk into a bar, or a coffee shop, and I have the same wallet in my pocket. I think we're going to expect that pervasiveness in the Metaverse because that's already a bit of a hassle on the internet,” says Duckworth.
The privacy hole
Another question on everyone’s mind is how well Metaverses will protect personal data.
Some Metaverse companies have had brush-ins with authorities with data privacy abuses. And as new acts and laws to protect personal data come online, it will be interesting to see how these companies will offer protection.
“I'm already seeing tensions around that on social networks and in the commerce space the last few years. For us to make this shift to the Metaverse space, there's got to be better standardization around identity, data ownership, and privacy,” says Duckworth.
“If we're looking at interoperability of your identity and your avatar in potentially multiple Metaverse platforms, what are the standards that map that out? And who governs and controls that?” he asks further.
There are some bright sparks at the edge of the Metaverse. For example, a nonprofit called Oasis Consortium is gathering tech companies to self-regulate. Companies signed on, including Roblox and video gaming company Riot Games.
One major player that is not in the consortium is Meta. They are taking a different route with a USD50 million investment in global research and program partners to develop Metaverse products responsibly.
At the fringes are the criminal syndicates and state actors. They have yet to reveal their hand, and avatar theft can become a significant Metaverse nightmare.
“So there's absolutely concerns in any new technology, you're going to get a criminal element looking to exploit,” says Duckworth.
Proponents of Web3 (essentially the World Wide Web on the blockchain) feel they have a solution with peer-to-peer models of Metaverse where data residency owned by the consumer is decentralized using the blockchain.
“But, I think those models have yet to be really defined,” Duckworth continues.
Boldly go where no man...
While it's still early on the Metaverse, Duckworth does not think chief digital officers (CDOs) and their companies should wait.
“There's actually an opportunity in the Metaverse because it's so immature. It's a space to experiment right now, again, if you remember what the internet was like in the mid-90s,” he explains.
Consumers will also be forgiving of those mistakes. “But consumers will appreciate the fact that a brand is trying to engage differently with them. So weirdly, there's more opportunity to experiment and make mistakes in the Metaverse space than there is on standard digital platforms today,” he adds.
Not all Metaverses will survive. As consumers and businesses gravitate toward some, Meta-Metaverses will be born. Others will burn out in supernovas or wink out of existence like when Thanos snapped his Gauntlet fingers.
“Let there also be no illusion — this whole trend is being driven by the tech industry. It's not a pull from consumers. Now, that's not to say that it won't become the next trend because consumers rarely know what they want next,” Duckworth adds.
The CDOs who are ready will have lots to gain. And we may even finally settle on that elusive definition of a Metaverse.
Winston Thomas is the editor-in-chief of CDOTrends and DigitalWorkforceTrends. He’s a singularity believer, a blockchain enthusiast, and believes we already live in a metaverse. You can reach him at [email protected].
Image credit: iStockphoto/Naeblys
Winston Thomas
Winston Thomas is the editor-in-chief of CDOTrends. He likes to piece together the weird and wondering tech puzzle for readers and identify groundbreaking business models led by tech while waiting for the singularity.