You’ve definetly heard about the Metaverse, but what is it? how it can change your life? check all about the Metaverse on this post.
What is metaverse?
Recently we have seen Facebook, one of the biggest companies in the world changing its name to “Meta”. The reason according to Mark Zuckerberg was:
“Facebook is one of the most used products in world’s history. It’s an iconic social media brand, but it does not relate to everything that we build”.
The reason behind the change was mainly because of a growing desire of the company to create this new world called Metaverse.
The main goal of the metaverse is to create an interconnected world, where people and companies can create, share, work and meet at one place.
Metaverse is a connection between all and not one company’s initiative. The evolution of technology such as: Virtual reality, augmented reality, artificial intelligence, more sophisticated hardware and software, allows to create a global immersive experience.
This experience strengthens the interaction between people all over the world and not only for the common online activities that we are doing today.
Any activity that would be limited by physical distances becomes real in the virtual world known as Metaverse. For example practicing activities like pilates, riding a bike, playing tennis or even a chess match.
Besides it’s all being incredible and leaving people and companies excited for a brilliant future, there is a long path to be taken to allow all those things to be possible, in terms of hardware and software.
What is the Metaverse for?
The metaverse is the “evolution of the internet”. According to Zuckerberg, it should be thought of as “an environment where people interact with each other through technology”. In this new world we can interact with anyone, from anywhere, at any time.
It means that the way we work changes, as well the way we share experiences, having that in mind the physical borders are not a problem anymore in the metaverse.
How does the metaverse work?
According to Zuckerberg, we are still at an embryonic stage, where many technologies which will be used to make the metaverse real, are still in early and decentralized stages.
The metaverse needs that the available technologies reach a more mature level, so the virtual and real experiences become closer to each other.
Besides that, there are many other concepts, like NFT’s that need to be integrated to a model where all those technologies, concepts and devices can work together to guarantee the workflow of the Metaverse.
How can we join the metaverse?
To enjoy this new borderless experience, we still need hardwares, it means, physical devices such as: computers, VR glasses, motion sensors, etc. That allows us to visualize an extension of the physical world through animations in an augmented reality .
What is augmented reality?
Augmented reality is a technology that we are more familiar with. These devices use digital images overlaid on physical objects.
Augmented reality is already used in industries such as: education, healthcare, games, etc. A great example of augmented reality is the game Pokemon Go, that uses real images from the environment where the person is, and overlays pokemon’s images this way they seem physically real.
At the metaverse, augmented reality will have new applications. Will be possible to transform two-dimensional objects into three-dimensional images in the metaverse, like street art, paint jobs, drawings, etc.
What is virtual reality?
Virtual reality is often confused with augmented reality, since they are similar in concept. In augmented reality, only a few objects are displayed and represented in the real world, while in virtual reality people and objects are in another dimension.
In a VR environment everything is made by the machine. The experience of virtual reality is really close to the metaverse since the idea behind it is to build devices and softwares that allows the immersive experience to become natural.
Nowadays virtual reality has been used in areas like healthcare, architecture. industries, games, etc. Although virtual reality still struggles with some problems, like the dizziness caused by the contradiction between what you see and what you body feels.
As an example, when you play a VR game where the character flies but the person has the feet stuck to the ground, the body can’t process it well, then it can go sideways causing headaches and dizziness at the end of the experience.
The process capacity and size of the devices are still barriers to be broken. The VR devices still struggle with limitations of size, cables and graphics quality.
The biggest challenge is to transform the experience of virtual reality into something even more natural, without the need of devices that are not in harmony with human physiology.
What is mixed reality?
Mixed reality environments are the mix of broth technologies. Mixed reality unifies the real with the virtual world, bringing an unique user experience, in a way where the real and the virtual become undistinguished.
Does the metaverse already exist?
Many people think that the metaverse is something far away from existing. The truth is that many elements and concepts about the metaverse can not be brought to life since they depend on more advanced or expensive technologies.
Besides that, nowadays we can already see how the metaverse has been built through games, remote work platforms, virtual reality environments, etc.
Some parts of what we have seen are games like Decentraland, The Sandbox and Star Atlas.
All of those games have been based on virtual worlds where everything can happen just like in real life, it has its own tokens, the money used to buy clothes, land and accessories, also count with an economic ecosystem that reflects on the real world.
There are also NFT games, virtual and augmented reality, we still have the traditional games that simulate virtual worlds but are not related to the metaverse, such as: Minecraft, Roblox and Fortnite, it has a great user base, mainly composed by kids that can be the metaverse heavy-users in the near future.
Companies like Epic Gamers, Fortnite creator, already made events with big artists like Travis Scott, Marshmello and Ariana Grande. It shows the possibility of games and the real world opening themselves to new experiences.
People from all around the world could see concerts from artists that weren’t even in their country, besides having a totally different experience from a real concert.
Inside the virtual world, players can fly, visit new places or even other planets with the artists, as it happened in the concert of the rapper Travis Scott inside Fortnite.
What is possible to do with mixed reality?
As you have seen, the metaverse goes further than just a virtual universe. We will be able to use spaces, objects and things from the real world in the virtual world and vice-versa, through the mixed reality.
In this field today we already have some things being done and used in areas like architecture, engineering, health, games and many others.
Today the mixed reality is not quite explored since we still have hardware and software limitations.
Since it’s an interaction between humans, machines and the environment, more improvement is needed on the technologies of environment mapping, human body tracking, spatial sound, location and positioning, and some others that we will talk about in advance.
What are the limitations of the metaverse?
As you can see, today the metaverse depends on technology improvement in many field areas, we will take a closer look at them further.
There is not a convincing and immersive virtual reality environment today, since there is not enough technology to provide a solid mixed reality. But anyway, everything goes from a simple concept and then becomes reality.
Today there are many platforms that can provide a taste of what the metaverse will be in the future, through facilitated communication and shared experiences.
An example is the technology startup Deskmy. Inside the platform, it is like everyone is in a real office, even though the platform does not provide virtual reality technology.
The experience of being virtually present with people sharing the same experience and tasks, it’s really close from what we will have in the metaverse in a few years, with the difference of a more advanced technology and more immersive experience.
What are the main problems of the metaverse?
As with any new technology, invention or whatever it is, the beginning always has its issues, technologies that need to be improved and experiences that can go sideways when comparing the theory with the practice.
Two main problems are: Privacy and the experience of a unified and safe experience for everyone, are the technological limitations that we find today.
Privacy at the metaverse
Privacy on the internet became a big discussion topic in the early 2000’s, when the internet became popular, websites and social media started to emerge and the information from people started to be spread around the world.
Today we find almost the same problem, but in a more complex version: How to guarantee that personal information doesn’t get lost among thousands of interconnected spaces.
Also, how to guarantee that the identity and singularity of people can be preserved, since the representation by avatars and the “fingerprints” will be virtual elements, it means, could it be easily duplicated or frauded?
What do we have available nowadays?
Limitation of technology is also a big obstacle to be overcome in order for the metaverse to become a reality.
Nowadays virtual reality depends on huge and high processing devices, which makes the experience not as pleasant and immersive to the user.
The experiences of virtual reality need instant and real feedback to the user that is not fully optimized today. It can cause a mess with the brain because of the difference of what is happening on the screen and to the body.
There are limitations of holographic technology, sensors and computer graphics, but it’s a more specific subject that we won’t be talking about in this article.
What are the limitations of the metaverse?
There are some technologies that need to be improved or developed to the metaverse to work properly. We are not going to dive in deep, but some of them are:
- Display: It provides the information and feedback of what is happening and what can be done.
- Audio: Smaller, lighter and more adapted to the human anatomy audio devices with tri-dimensional capacity, they should be available soon
- Haptics: Devices that provide tactile feedback to the user, providing information of texture, weight, size, wtc. Also need to be developed and improved.
- Hand Tracking: Hand tracking is needed to depend less on wearable devices to control interfaces.
- Eyetracking: Eye tracking also will be used to improve the hardwareless experience.
- Mixed Reality: Augmented and virtual reality are essential technologies to the metaverse. Today we already have incredible experiences with those technologies, but still a long way to go on the development of them.
- Sensors: Sensors are another important part, since they help with the experience of using less wearable technologies attached to the body.
- Graphics: Graphics have been evolving and becoming more real, like ray tracing, it helps to simulate and reflect the real world in a more convincing way.
- Avatar: Avatar is an essential part to have good interactions at the metaverse, maybe the most important. The avatars need to reach a level where the accuracy, global sharing and exclusivity are not there yet.
- Artificial Intelligence (AI): Last but not least, artificial intelligence will be used on the entire metaverse, since the ecosystem will be big enough to support high capacities of information and interactions.
Will the experience in the metaverse be as real as in the real world?
It’s estimated that within the next 10 or 100 years the metaverse will be as real as the real world, with tactile, olfactory and sound experience that can replicate the same feelings we have in the real world.
The objective of the metaverse is not to substitute reality, but to add to it. Through experiences of mixed reality, the virtual world will be part of the real world. with objects, people and even money sharing both worlds.
What can be done inside the metaverse?
In this blue ocean of technology, software, innovative ideas, there is a question: How and where to apply all of it?
Of course there are some field areas that will have more advantages than others, check some of the main ones.
Education
Education will have a strong connection with the metaverse, from the development to the usage to create new environments and learning methods.
A proof of this link and the future of education for the metaverse, is the investment announced by meta of U$150 milion, on facebook reality labs and partnerships with Coursera and edX.
Besides that the metaverse will also use those technologies to feed a more immersive and hybrid learning environment.
It means that learning things like astrophysics, as an example, would be much easier with the immersive experience where the students could visit and see from close sight the planets and stars, or whatever they need to study.
Also in the metaverse students and teachers will benefit from the collapse of the physical barriers, by promoting chats and classes in a much more fluid and dynamic way with people all around the globe.
Fun and Relaxing
This is one of the areas that has been successful when enjoying new technologies. Games that use virtual or augmented reality, have big investments and have already been proven to benefit those who want to lose weight.
Today there are many kinds of games with all kinds of technologies, besides experiences like riding a rollercoaster, adventures in huge buildings or even flying between buildings like an eagle, as it happens in Eagle Flight.
One of the most known games nowadays is the BeatSaber, acquired by Meta. The game has become a reference, since it has a high quality and delivers a unique experience, making a partnership with the pop singer Billie Eilish recently.
The objective of the game is simple, the user has a lightsaber on both hands, just like Star Wars. To complete each phase the user has to use the saber to slice boxes that come in your direction. What is the sauce of the game? All of it is done in a musical rhythm.
Workplace
When we talk about the workplace, some people have thoughts on how the metaverse could help in the workplace’s future, that includes virtual rooms and remote meetings, more interactive and fluid.
Some big names like Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates believe in a future where the relationship between workers in a 2D environment will be substituted for meetings and interactions in virtual workplaces with avatars that reflect even the face expressions.
The main issue is understanding how to “get started” at the metaverse. With the technology available today, Is it possible to create an environment that has the same experience of this far future?
The answer is YES, and there we have deskMy, on this blue ocean with a lot of information, technology and abstract ideas. DeskMy comes with a proposal of bringing interactions, communication and workplace routine to a virtual environment.
Inside deskMy is possible to interact with coworkers, manage the office, have meetings, talk, play games and exchange experience and information in a much more fluid and fast way, without needing technologies like VR Glasses, special gloves, sensors or any other device besides your computer or smartphone.
Why does hybrid work play a big role in the metaverse?
It is important to understand why hybrid work has a big impact on this switch to the metaverse.
Hybrid work has become popular in past years, mainly after the COVID-19 pandemic. Many people were forced to work remotely and right after, when things calmed down, they had to make a decision to go back to the office or stay working remotely.
What happened was that people realized that remote work can be a great choice when talking about productivity, well being, spending time with family and friends, time saving, and that’s why on site work was not an option anymore for many people.
Here is where the hybrid work comes into play, a merge between remote work and on site work. Why is it so important to the metaverse? Well, it is simple.
Basically work in the metaverse will be a kind of hybrid work, but between a virtual and a physical world.
For that there are a few steps to be followed, like a new culture of work being developed and improved everyday, this is the hybrid work culture.
That’s why companies have been choosing hybrid work, mainly the ones who choose solutions like deskMy, are a few steps ahead from the ones who don’t.
Por esse motivo, empresas que adotam o híbrido e principalmente empresas que adotam soluções como a deskMy, estão alguns passos à frente das que não o fazem.
Being connected with tools that soon will be applied to the metaverse and developing a culture to make it happen properly is a must.
How deskMy have been applying the metaverse concepts today?
DeskMy has been applying these concepts of a 2D virtual environment, but soon will count with many immersive features.
The experience inside a platform like deskMy is still hard to describe, just as it is with the metaverse, since those are still new concepts and technologies that are revolutionizing the way people and companies work.
Working with deskMy is like getting into a virtual environment and transforming the laptop into a metaverse for work. It’s where teams collaborate, coexist and can enjoy integrations, spontaneous interactions with coworkers and much more in a fast, fluid and lightweight environment.
If you want to be one step closer to the future of work and the metaverse, trying to implement deskMy on your team or company is a great start.
