Q: What's a Meta Worth? A: $60 Million, Same As in Town
December 13, 2021 3:46 PM Subscribe
Of the person whose Instagram username was "@metaverse," they just banned her and didn't pay a cent.
posted by JHarris at 3:59 PM on December 13, 2021 [17 favorites]
posted by JHarris at 3:59 PM on December 13, 2021 [17 favorites]
Of the person whose Instagram username was "@metaverse," they just banned her and didn't pay a cent.
From the article:
"On December 4, two days after a New York Times reporter contacted Meta about the account, Baumann suddenly regained access to @metaverse.
“This account was incorrectly removed for impersonation, and we’ve now restored it," Stephanie Otway, a Meta company spokesperson, told Ars. "We’re sorry that this happened.”"
She might still get her payday.
posted by StephenF at 4:07 PM on December 13, 2021 [16 favorites]
From the article:
"On December 4, two days after a New York Times reporter contacted Meta about the account, Baumann suddenly regained access to @metaverse.
“This account was incorrectly removed for impersonation, and we’ve now restored it," Stephanie Otway, a Meta company spokesperson, told Ars. "We’re sorry that this happened.”"
She might still get her payday.
posted by StephenF at 4:07 PM on December 13, 2021 [16 favorites]
Of the person whose Instagram username was "@metaverse," they just banned her and didn't pay a cent
That story really highlights the perils of building a business dependent upon the good will of those behind a malevolent corporate entity. Requests for help go to the tech support equivalent of a hellban (unless you're lucky enough to catch the ear of a paper of record).
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 4:07 PM on December 13, 2021 [21 favorites]
That story really highlights the perils of building a business dependent upon the good will of those behind a malevolent corporate entity. Requests for help go to the tech support equivalent of a hellban (unless you're lucky enough to catch the ear of a paper of record).
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 4:07 PM on December 13, 2021 [21 favorites]
How is "the Metaverse" not just Second Life? I'm not being snarky here, I am genuinely baffled. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills reading stories about things like marriages in the Metaverse that are literally exactly the same as ones written 20 years ago about Second Life. Am I just not understanding some new technology involved? What is going on here?
posted by star gentle uterus at 4:16 PM on December 13, 2021 [66 favorites]
posted by star gentle uterus at 4:16 PM on December 13, 2021 [66 favorites]
I have genuinely been trying to grasp the concept, and what I'm beginning to think is that the metaverse as presented by facebook does not currently exist.
Am I wrong? Someone tell me where to go to look at the metaverse. I cannot figure it out.
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 4:23 PM on December 13, 2021 [2 favorites]
Am I wrong? Someone tell me where to go to look at the metaverse. I cannot figure it out.
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 4:23 PM on December 13, 2021 [2 favorites]
So far as I can tell, for the time being: stick your head between your knees, then head generally north.
posted by snuffleupagus at 4:24 PM on December 13, 2021 [8 favorites]
posted by snuffleupagus at 4:24 PM on December 13, 2021 [8 favorites]
I think the metaverse is still basically second life right now, but maybe kids who grew up with Minecraft will find it more compelling. I feel like it was kind of given a big boost by in person interactions suddenly being deadly, but I think we are seeing that even that is not enough to make the metaverse appealing right now.
posted by snofoam at 4:28 PM on December 13, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by snofoam at 4:28 PM on December 13, 2021 [1 favorite]
Keanu's not having any of Facebook's marketing bullshit (nor is he impressed with NFTs)
posted by knapah at 4:30 PM on December 13, 2021 [21 favorites]
posted by knapah at 4:30 PM on December 13, 2021 [21 favorites]
How is "the Metaverse" not just Second Life?
It's basically that. With much, much more boring owners.
posted by mhoye at 4:32 PM on December 13, 2021 [9 favorites]
It's basically that. With much, much more boring owners.
posted by mhoye at 4:32 PM on December 13, 2021 [9 favorites]
I'm guessing this validates that the Meta MetaVerse(tm)(r) is either going to have a crypto/fintech angle, or else they're worried someone else will.
posted by credulous at 4:45 PM on December 13, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by credulous at 4:45 PM on December 13, 2021 [1 favorite]
A colleague who gambles on cryptocoins was set to be part of the ICO for two different Metaverse NFT coins, and passed on both because the ICO was too large, indicating to him that there was too large an investor play there, which would depress volatility and keep him from flipping for large returns. Instead, he put some cash into Metapets, but that turned out to be a rug pull, and he lost it all.
I have no idea what I just wrote, what it means, or what conclusions I should draw from it.
posted by fatbird at 4:52 PM on December 13, 2021 [75 favorites]
I have no idea what I just wrote, what it means, or what conclusions I should draw from it.
posted by fatbird at 4:52 PM on December 13, 2021 [75 favorites]
isn't the main difference between this facebook metaverse stuff vs something like second life the fact that it's done by facebook, so there's as low a barrier to entry as it could possibly be? i don't like to play into the generational warfare narrative but can't boomers and our racist uncle easily get on whatever the metaverse is, because it's facebook, whereas to play second life or any of the other preceeding "virtual world" stuff it was a little bit more technically involved, like downloading and installing software and stuff? also because it's facebook it's already normalized and mainstreamed to all the facebook users who assume every living person on earth is also on facebook, so to these people getting into the metaverse isn't seen as some horrendous dystopic nightmare like it might be to us, but it's a new chance to be an early adopter, to be that person in 2007 who was the first person anyone knew who had an iphone
posted by glonous keming at 5:01 PM on December 13, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by glonous keming at 5:01 PM on December 13, 2021 [3 favorites]
How is "the Metaverse" not just Second Life?
It's Second Life + interoperability of some handwavey kind (i.e. people/companies can independently contribute, like the web) + the VR hardware of ~5 years from now. Maybe 10 years from now. VR, if you've had a chance to try it, creates a very real sense of 'being somewhere', but then the rest of the experience largely sucks. People buy a VR headset, use it and love for a short period, then never touch it again. The metaverse is the promise of extending that sense of presence. We're at the 'green text on a black screen' stage of its development.
posted by StephenF at 5:02 PM on December 13, 2021 [5 favorites]
It's Second Life + interoperability of some handwavey kind (i.e. people/companies can independently contribute, like the web) + the VR hardware of ~5 years from now. Maybe 10 years from now. VR, if you've had a chance to try it, creates a very real sense of 'being somewhere', but then the rest of the experience largely sucks. People buy a VR headset, use it and love for a short period, then never touch it again. The metaverse is the promise of extending that sense of presence. We're at the 'green text on a black screen' stage of its development.
posted by StephenF at 5:02 PM on December 13, 2021 [5 favorites]
How is "the Metaverse" not just Second Life?
It's basically that. With much, much more boring owners.
Yes. Metaface wants it to be more or less the version from Stephenson's Reamde.
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:04 PM on December 13, 2021 [4 favorites]
It's basically that. With much, much more boring owners.
Yes. Metaface wants it to be more or less the version from Stephenson's Reamde.
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:04 PM on December 13, 2021 [4 favorites]
Second Life but with True Names. No expectation of privacy.
posted by bonehead at 5:05 PM on December 13, 2021 [6 favorites]
posted by bonehead at 5:05 PM on December 13, 2021 [6 favorites]
Ever since Facebook bought Oculus I expected them to eventually come out with some virtual reality social network, but even so I didn't expect it to be this stupid.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 5:15 PM on December 13, 2021 [23 favorites]
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 5:15 PM on December 13, 2021 [23 favorites]
I remember reading that Wired article back in the day about that guy registering McDonalds.com as a lark.
While I am against namesquatting and ticket scalping on general principles, I suspect that $60M in specific principles would be sufficient to have me abandon said general ones.
Alas, part of my ADHD or whatever is general lack of executive function to do things like this in the first place.
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 5:32 PM on December 13, 2021 [7 favorites]
While I am against namesquatting and ticket scalping on general principles, I suspect that $60M in specific principles would be sufficient to have me abandon said general ones.
Alas, part of my ADHD or whatever is general lack of executive function to do things like this in the first place.
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 5:32 PM on December 13, 2021 [7 favorites]
> fatbird: "I have no idea what I just wrote, what it means, or what conclusions I should draw from it."
As near as I can tell, your friend was looking to get in on a couple of scams but realized he was too late to those and would likely end up getting scammed so he went in on a third scam but ended up getting scammed anyways (but in a different way than he would have gotten scammed in the first two scams).
posted by mhum at 5:34 PM on December 13, 2021 [23 favorites]
As near as I can tell, your friend was looking to get in on a couple of scams but realized he was too late to those and would likely end up getting scammed so he went in on a third scam but ended up getting scammed anyways (but in a different way than he would have gotten scammed in the first two scams).
posted by mhum at 5:34 PM on December 13, 2021 [23 favorites]
So is it time for a deathwatch pool for this place?
I'll take 6/15/2022
posted by sammyo at 5:41 PM on December 13, 2021 [5 favorites]
I'll take 6/15/2022
posted by sammyo at 5:41 PM on December 13, 2021 [5 favorites]
Virtual Burning Man last year opened my eyes to how powerful the VR experience can be. It was actually exciting! And actually fun! We actually randomly ran into people we knew! Then my wife had an actual social anxiety attack and we hid in a virtual corner for a minute. Ok so that part wasn't so great, but it shows the VR experience is powerful enough to trigger some real life feelings.
posted by keep_evolving at 5:49 PM on December 13, 2021 [6 favorites]
posted by keep_evolving at 5:49 PM on December 13, 2021 [6 favorites]
> I remember reading that Wired article back in the day about that guy registering McDonalds.com as a lark.
god, so do i. printed on paper, even.
posted by glonous keming at 5:55 PM on December 13, 2021 [3 favorites]
god, so do i. printed on paper, even.
posted by glonous keming at 5:55 PM on December 13, 2021 [3 favorites]
How is "the Metaverse" not just Second Life?
This is the company's whole business model. "The Facebook" was just MySpace with better marketing and less privacy. People were excited to join Facebook because at first it was new and exclusive, and then paradoxically because it was where everyone else already was. There was no great technological innovation at the core of Facebook's success (no disrespect to Facebook's engineers who have done lots of innovative things over the years, but at least as an outside observer most of that has been in response to meeting the needs of Facebook's growth rather than producing a radically new killer app that no one had seen before). Facebook took the already-established idea of social networking and re-implemented it, reaching market dominance through aggressive business tactics. I'm sure the plan for the Metaverse is much the same.
posted by biogeo at 6:29 PM on December 13, 2021 [8 favorites]
fewer flying penises, more zuckerbergs
posted by ryanrs at 7:01 PM on December 13, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by ryanrs at 7:01 PM on December 13, 2021 [3 favorites]
> fewer flying penises, more zuckerbergs
a distinction without a difference, surely
posted by glonous keming at 7:04 PM on December 13, 2021 [15 favorites]
a distinction without a difference, surely
posted by glonous keming at 7:04 PM on December 13, 2021 [15 favorites]
zuckerbags, s̸͚͓̤̝͎̼͈̮̪̓̀̀͗ͅu̷̹̲̖̭͍̮͛̀̈̏̿̎̃̚ͅŗ̶̛͗̂̾̆̃̎͆e̵̢̧̛̯̖͙̻̣͔̲̳̘̮̒̆̇͂̉͑̽̒̊͜͝͝l̷̘̠̱̺̯̳̞̞̟̪̦̙̑͗͒͑̾̈̊̂y̴̛̦̳̺̪̯̣̳̫̐̈́̃̏̈̎̕͜
posted by snuffleupagus at 7:39 PM on December 13, 2021 [5 favorites]
posted by snuffleupagus at 7:39 PM on December 13, 2021 [5 favorites]
I am just going to copy-paste a post I wrote about Second Life and the Metaverse a couple of days after Facebook announced its namechange:
I have been having myself a two-day eyeroll over Mark Zuckerberg renaming Facebook "Meta," and promising to "invent the metaverse," as if this were some new technological dream concocted by his genius to transform our lives in the future.
The metaverse already exists.
Here you see a photo of one of my friends (who lives in Florida), taking a ride on the back of another of my friends (who lives in Switzerland), through a hedge maze I (who live in Wisconsin) temporarily installed at my wife's music club, while a friend from Toronto was DJing. It was fun!
This was in Second Life, where my spouse and I met, and where I've been doing research since 2007. Founded 18 years ago, Second Life is a virtual world that saw its heyday of speculative corporate activity at the end of the aughties, but then settled down to a steady, mature community. Around 200,000 people per day currently spend time there.
Second Life has always referred to itself as part of the metaverse. Neal Stephenson coined the term "metaverse" in his 1992 novel "Snow Crash," to refer to a digital realm wherein humans in avatar form would interact with software agents. Today there are an array of virtual worlds--some gamified, some freeform. Roblox, for example, which also refers to itself as part of the metaverse, has exploded in size to now enjoy a huge user base, with 43 million daily visitors, the majority of them 12 or younger, running around in their avatars resembling Lego minifigures, chatting with others they encounter and playing games.
The metaverse already exists. People enjoy it because they get to experience co-presence, hanging out with their friends in avatar form rather than just texting one another. As my research has explored, this makes for compelling social interactions, and a lot of pleasure in personal exploration and embodiment. (Want to turn into a unicorn and give a friend a ride? You can!)
What Zuckerberg proposes, with a display of grinning, child-eyed wonder, is a future in which he and Facebook own the world we hang out in. To get into the metaverse, we'll need equipment "Meta"/Facebook sells to us. To clothe our avatars, we'll have to go to stores they own. Want to have a club or office or park to hang out in with your friends? Rent it from Meta/Facebook. Forget the oppression created by "company towns" a century ago--you'll live in a company *universe*. Want to turn into a unicorn and give a friend a ride? Well, it might be against the "verified identity" rules. But if it is permitted--better go pay Zuckerberg to rent the unicorn form.
Zuckerberg's fantasy of metaverse-domination is presented as benign, engaging, and entertaining. But just look at the mess his social media have made using just two dimensions. Do you think the empowering of hate groups, conspiracies, and polarization are somehow limited to conventional social media, and won't also manifest in 3D? No, what Meta/Facebook will do is remove the minimal brakes placed on Zuckerberg's company by people accessing Facebook and Instagram via Google and Apple. Currently, you get your apps at the Google Play or Apple App stores, and those companies can put some limits on Zuckerberg's company (like requiring it to allow users to opt out of being tracked across the web). Zuckerberg's so mad about that, and says it's "stifling innovation."
Zuckerberg isn't offering us a future utopia that he is creating out of selfless interest in our happiness. He's aiming to create a new, bigger, less-regulated monopoly, swallowing or displacing the currently-evolving metaverse worlds. Instead of just owning the platform where we write posts, he'll own the ground our avatars stand on. And then he'll let loose the algorithms. . .
A lot of the commentary I've seen on the company Facebook being renamed Meta has been about how this is just an attempt to distract the public and investors from the bad press Facebook has been getting. I don't disagree that this likely explains the timing!
But I see something more ominous than that. I see a company worried that it is losing younger users and addicted to constant growth seeking to speed the expansion of virtual-world interactions--and create a dystopic monopoly out of them.
And that would be a sad end to the promise of virtual worlds.
posted by DrMew at 8:10 PM on December 13, 2021 [50 favorites]
I have been having myself a two-day eyeroll over Mark Zuckerberg renaming Facebook "Meta," and promising to "invent the metaverse," as if this were some new technological dream concocted by his genius to transform our lives in the future.
The metaverse already exists.
Here you see a photo of one of my friends (who lives in Florida), taking a ride on the back of another of my friends (who lives in Switzerland), through a hedge maze I (who live in Wisconsin) temporarily installed at my wife's music club, while a friend from Toronto was DJing. It was fun!
This was in Second Life, where my spouse and I met, and where I've been doing research since 2007. Founded 18 years ago, Second Life is a virtual world that saw its heyday of speculative corporate activity at the end of the aughties, but then settled down to a steady, mature community. Around 200,000 people per day currently spend time there.
Second Life has always referred to itself as part of the metaverse. Neal Stephenson coined the term "metaverse" in his 1992 novel "Snow Crash," to refer to a digital realm wherein humans in avatar form would interact with software agents. Today there are an array of virtual worlds--some gamified, some freeform. Roblox, for example, which also refers to itself as part of the metaverse, has exploded in size to now enjoy a huge user base, with 43 million daily visitors, the majority of them 12 or younger, running around in their avatars resembling Lego minifigures, chatting with others they encounter and playing games.
The metaverse already exists. People enjoy it because they get to experience co-presence, hanging out with their friends in avatar form rather than just texting one another. As my research has explored, this makes for compelling social interactions, and a lot of pleasure in personal exploration and embodiment. (Want to turn into a unicorn and give a friend a ride? You can!)
What Zuckerberg proposes, with a display of grinning, child-eyed wonder, is a future in which he and Facebook own the world we hang out in. To get into the metaverse, we'll need equipment "Meta"/Facebook sells to us. To clothe our avatars, we'll have to go to stores they own. Want to have a club or office or park to hang out in with your friends? Rent it from Meta/Facebook. Forget the oppression created by "company towns" a century ago--you'll live in a company *universe*. Want to turn into a unicorn and give a friend a ride? Well, it might be against the "verified identity" rules. But if it is permitted--better go pay Zuckerberg to rent the unicorn form.
Zuckerberg's fantasy of metaverse-domination is presented as benign, engaging, and entertaining. But just look at the mess his social media have made using just two dimensions. Do you think the empowering of hate groups, conspiracies, and polarization are somehow limited to conventional social media, and won't also manifest in 3D? No, what Meta/Facebook will do is remove the minimal brakes placed on Zuckerberg's company by people accessing Facebook and Instagram via Google and Apple. Currently, you get your apps at the Google Play or Apple App stores, and those companies can put some limits on Zuckerberg's company (like requiring it to allow users to opt out of being tracked across the web). Zuckerberg's so mad about that, and says it's "stifling innovation."
Zuckerberg isn't offering us a future utopia that he is creating out of selfless interest in our happiness. He's aiming to create a new, bigger, less-regulated monopoly, swallowing or displacing the currently-evolving metaverse worlds. Instead of just owning the platform where we write posts, he'll own the ground our avatars stand on. And then he'll let loose the algorithms. . .
A lot of the commentary I've seen on the company Facebook being renamed Meta has been about how this is just an attempt to distract the public and investors from the bad press Facebook has been getting. I don't disagree that this likely explains the timing!
But I see something more ominous than that. I see a company worried that it is losing younger users and addicted to constant growth seeking to speed the expansion of virtual-world interactions--and create a dystopic monopoly out of them.
And that would be a sad end to the promise of virtual worlds.
posted by DrMew at 8:10 PM on December 13, 2021 [50 favorites]
I know what y'all are getting at comparing Meta's thing to Second Life, and I don't disagree--but I still can't help but wince at the comparison, because Second Life exists. You can go log into it right now! (And, yes, also, 15 years ago! But right now, too!) Metaverse, on the other hand, is, in its entirety, nothing more than a handful of cringey videos.
Full credit to other independent spaces that have grown up since Second Life, like VRChat, as well. But Facebook's Metaverse is no more a real thing than Apple's famous "Knowledge Navigator" video from 1987, and I do not expect Zuckerberg's vision to become any more real than the miraculous AI technologies in Apple's 34-year-old video.
posted by JmacDotOrg at 8:20 PM on December 13, 2021 [8 favorites]
Full credit to other independent spaces that have grown up since Second Life, like VRChat, as well. But Facebook's Metaverse is no more a real thing than Apple's famous "Knowledge Navigator" video from 1987, and I do not expect Zuckerberg's vision to become any more real than the miraculous AI technologies in Apple's 34-year-old video.
posted by JmacDotOrg at 8:20 PM on December 13, 2021 [8 favorites]
How is "the Metaverse" not just Second Life?
Blockchain!
posted by flabdablet at 8:49 PM on December 13, 2021 [13 favorites]
Blockchain!
posted by flabdablet at 8:49 PM on December 13, 2021 [13 favorites]
Vice nailed it: Zuckerberg Announces Fantasy World Where Facebook Is Not a Horrible Company
Facebook’s new name is “Meta,” and its new mission is to invent a ‘metaverse’ that will make us all forget what it’s done to our existing reality.posted by flabdablet at 8:51 PM on December 13, 2021 [14 favorites]
...
About halfway through the delusional fever dream that was Facebook’s biggest product announcement of all time, Mark Zuckerberg said that “the last few years have been humbling for me and our company in a lot of ways,” as Facebook has nominally had to grapple with the harm it’s done to this world. It’s hard to find anything “humble” about a proposal to fundamentally remake human existence using technology that currently does not and may not ever exist and that few are currently clamoring for. But Facebook's problems are too numerous to list, and so he is pitching products that don't exist for a reality that does not exist in a desperate attempt to change the narrative as it exists in reality, where we all actually live.
It's slightly worrying to me that Musk and Bezos grew up in the era when space was the dominant mode of SF, while Zuckerberg clearly imprinted on in the next wave, cyberpunk. I worry what the next generation of megalomaniacal billionaires will try to instantiate, given that the most dominant SF subgenre for the last two decades is probably post-apocalyptic dystopia.
posted by chortly at 8:59 PM on December 13, 2021 [15 favorites]
posted by chortly at 8:59 PM on December 13, 2021 [15 favorites]
One hopes they understand that the post apocalyptic dystopia was presented as a bad outcome, not something to be excited to experience. It's a faint hope given the popularity of luxury bunkers and repurposed cruise ships, but I for one can still hope they're hedging their bets and not telegraphing a desired outcome.
posted by wierdo at 10:00 PM on December 13, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by wierdo at 10:00 PM on December 13, 2021 [2 favorites]
Vitameatametaverse. It's so tasty, too! It's just like candy!
posted by kirkaracha at 10:35 PM on December 13, 2021 [13 favorites]
posted by kirkaracha at 10:35 PM on December 13, 2021 [13 favorites]
MetaDesign (a large global design and branding agency founded by Erik Spiekermann) released a metaverse for ‘brand experiences’ in the summer of last year.
“Virtual brand spaces for a material world. Your customers are waiting. Let them in–with MetaDesign Virtual Brand Spaces. Now people can interact with your brand in a deep, immersive, experiential way. Retail. Exhibition. Institutional. Revolutional.”
Money!
posted by romanb at 11:06 PM on December 13, 2021 [2 favorites]
“Virtual brand spaces for a material world. Your customers are waiting. Let them in–with MetaDesign Virtual Brand Spaces. Now people can interact with your brand in a deep, immersive, experiential way. Retail. Exhibition. Institutional. Revolutional.”
Money!
posted by romanb at 11:06 PM on December 13, 2021 [2 favorites]
>Virtual Burning Man last year opened my eyes to how powerful the VR experience can be.
[coughs][butler's voice]Sir is a Burner.[/butler]
I'm sorry your partner was adversely affected -- and not even by bad red and plue pills. I wonder if there is something like motion-sickness-of-the-social-balance where these real interactions brought together online don't have the same sense of reality and cause a social variant of motion sickness. The same unreality factors into John Gabriel's Greater Internet F__kwad Theory.
posted by k3ninho at 12:23 AM on December 14, 2021 [1 favorite]
[coughs][butler's voice]Sir is a Burner.[/butler]
I'm sorry your partner was adversely affected -- and not even by bad red and plue pills. I wonder if there is something like motion-sickness-of-the-social-balance where these real interactions brought together online don't have the same sense of reality and cause a social variant of motion sickness. The same unreality factors into John Gabriel's Greater Internet F__kwad Theory.
posted by k3ninho at 12:23 AM on December 14, 2021 [1 favorite]
I guess I’m probably over or under-thinking this to an extent unheard of until now, but this whole ‘brand’ just seems so poorly thought-out from an IP angle. Some here have pointed out examples of prior art re ‘metaverse’ and the term ‘meta’ itself is used so generically in so many places that I don’t get how they have/will be able to control trademark rights to either of them. It’s like something a bunch of 14 year-olds would dream up, but with less plausible technology.
posted by dg at 2:49 AM on December 14, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by dg at 2:49 AM on December 14, 2021 [2 favorites]
Is "Beige Key LLC" not the most hilariously office-space-dystopian name for a holding company?
posted by Nothing at 3:53 AM on December 14, 2021 [9 favorites]
posted by Nothing at 3:53 AM on December 14, 2021 [9 favorites]
Electrons tease, molecules sustain.
posted by dbiedny at 4:57 AM on December 14, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by dbiedny at 4:57 AM on December 14, 2021 [3 favorites]
To get into the metaverse, we'll need equipment "Meta"/Facebook sells to us. To clothe our avatars, we'll have to go to stores they own. Want to have a club or office or park to hang out in with your friends? Rent it from Meta/Facebook. Forget the oppression created by "company towns" a century ago--you'll live in a company *universe*. Want to turn into a unicorn and give a friend a ride? Well, it might be against the "verified identity" rules. But if it is permitted--better go pay Zuckerberg to rent the unicorn form.
Lessig's 2000 essay, Code is Law, seems increasingly relevant here.
Lessig's 2000 essay, Code is Law, seems increasingly relevant here.
Ours is the age of cyberspace. It, too, has a regulator. This regulator, too, threatens liberty. But so obsessed are we with the idea that liberty means "freedom from government" that we don't even see the regulation in this new space. We therefore don't see the threat to liberty that this regulation presents.posted by gauche at 5:26 AM on December 14, 2021 [3 favorites]
This regulator is code--the software and hardware that make cyberspace as it is. This code, or architecture, sets the terms on which life in cyberspace is experienced.
How is "the Metaverse" not just Second Life? I'm not being snarky here, I am genuinely baffled. I
I'd recommend "Hey, Facebook, I Made a Metaverse 27 Years Ago"
posted by rongorongo at 6:09 AM on December 14, 2021 [7 favorites]
I'd recommend "Hey, Facebook, I Made a Metaverse 27 Years Ago"
posted by rongorongo at 6:09 AM on December 14, 2021 [7 favorites]
I'd recommend "Hey, Facebook, I Made a Metaverse 27 Years Ago"
This is all excellent article. Thanks.
posted by medusa at 8:24 AM on December 14, 2021 [1 favorite]
This is all excellent article. Thanks.
posted by medusa at 8:24 AM on December 14, 2021 [1 favorite]
A lot of folks like to dunk on the NFT scam, and rightly so. It's basically "name a star" registries for gullible techbros! What value is there in "owning" a freely replicable digital file? Right-click, motherfuckers, do you speak it?
But here's the thing: NFT artifacts *can* have value inside a controlled system, like a video game. Imagine an MMORPG where NFT ownership was used to control access to exclusive outfits or rare weapons. Anybody can screenshot your shit, but in the context of the game world, the game developer can control who can access and use those digital objects.
Well,Facebook Meta Facebook is now angling to be that controlling company -- not for a single game, but for an entirely new protocol/layer of digital commerce, one they'd like to see displace the contemporary internet like smartphones and social media displaced Ye Olde Web 1.0. Some unholy conglomeration of Fortnite, Amazon, and Ready Player One. They'll talk a good game about interoperability and open standards, but they didn't drop $2 billion on Oculus and change their name to become the next Prodigy. They want to own and operate "Web3" to at least the same extent they own the modern web -- a walled garden that encompasses the world, and then DRM the bejeesus out of it to make bullshit cyberscarcity viable.
Maybe this is all an expensive boondoggle born of Zuck's love for VR mixed with a desire to distract from recent scandals. I mean, I love VR (Google Earth is amazing) and can still see the limited appeal the tech has right now. But if the only way to make the NFT "economy" meaningful is by running it inside a suffocating panopticon where you can't view, copy, or share digital files without licensed permission, the fact that Facebook and other tech companies are putting so much stock in it should make everyone extremely wary of what they might do to force that dystopian vision into reality.
posted by Rhaomi at 9:43 AM on December 14, 2021 [7 favorites]
But here's the thing: NFT artifacts *can* have value inside a controlled system, like a video game. Imagine an MMORPG where NFT ownership was used to control access to exclusive outfits or rare weapons. Anybody can screenshot your shit, but in the context of the game world, the game developer can control who can access and use those digital objects.
Well,
Maybe this is all an expensive boondoggle born of Zuck's love for VR mixed with a desire to distract from recent scandals. I mean, I love VR (Google Earth is amazing) and can still see the limited appeal the tech has right now. But if the only way to make the NFT "economy" meaningful is by running it inside a suffocating panopticon where you can't view, copy, or share digital files without licensed permission, the fact that Facebook and other tech companies are putting so much stock in it should make everyone extremely wary of what they might do to force that dystopian vision into reality.
posted by Rhaomi at 9:43 AM on December 14, 2021 [7 favorites]
"Meta" in the zuckerbergian sense is now just a way to grift investors the way Long Island Iced tea Company did when they changed their name to Long Blockchain Corp:
a company press release stated that “there can be no assurance that the Company will be successful in developing [blockchain] technology, or in profitably commercializing it, if developed.” But the rebranding with “blockchain” in the company name caused the share price to increase 500%.
In February 2018, NASDAQ delisted LBCC because it “believed that the Company made a series of public statements designed to mislead investors and to take advantage of general investor interest in bitcoin and blockchain technology.” In an Administrative Order dated February 22, 2021, the U.S Securities and Exchange Commission revoked registration of LBCC’s shares. The Order noted that the company had failed to file financial reports for years. Thus ends one of the great “blockchain” sagas.
posted by signal at 1:46 PM on December 14, 2021 [2 favorites]
a company press release stated that “there can be no assurance that the Company will be successful in developing [blockchain] technology, or in profitably commercializing it, if developed.” But the rebranding with “blockchain” in the company name caused the share price to increase 500%.
In February 2018, NASDAQ delisted LBCC because it “believed that the Company made a series of public statements designed to mislead investors and to take advantage of general investor interest in bitcoin and blockchain technology.” In an Administrative Order dated February 22, 2021, the U.S Securities and Exchange Commission revoked registration of LBCC’s shares. The Order noted that the company had failed to file financial reports for years. Thus ends one of the great “blockchain” sagas.
posted by signal at 1:46 PM on December 14, 2021 [2 favorites]
I have had the vanity license plate META for the last 20 years, and am now turning it in and getting something new because the number of Looks I've gotten lately Is Too Damn High.
I hate that this word has been stolen from us.
posted by dmd at 4:50 PM on December 14, 2021 [2 favorites]
I hate that this word has been stolen from us.
posted by dmd at 4:50 PM on December 14, 2021 [2 favorites]
I hate that this word has been stolen from us.
There should be a memetic commonwealth, protected by law.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 5:35 PM on December 14, 2021 [1 favorite]
There should be a memetic commonwealth, protected by law.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 5:35 PM on December 14, 2021 [1 favorite]
I'm not being snarky here, I am genuinely baffled. I feel like I'm taking crazy pillsThis comment reminded me of an article which may be useful because it explicitly addresses this exact feeling. No, you're not crazy. The metaverse is bullshit.
posted by valrus at 5:58 PM on December 14, 2021 [4 favorites]
The metaverse is bullshit.
Very solid article.
One glaring issue with the "metaverse" is its dependence on VR, without any really compelling reason for VR. I think this is mostly because VR was a hot, edge-of-tomorrow technology at the time some of the seminal books about the "metaverse" (Snow Crash, Neuromancer, etc.) were written, and it got tossed into the buzzword stew that the authors scooped ideas from. But there's not really any particular problem or need that VR satisfies in these scenarios.
The conventional wisdom, I guess, is that "VR is more immersive" or something like that. Except I'm not sure that's even true: humans are pretty good at getting immersed in lots of things, including printed words on cheap paper. Plus, how many more hours per day do most people have for being totally immersed in media? Aren't we the multitasking, laptop-on-lap-during-a-movie generation, anyway? If your product requires a user to completely immerse themselves, cutting themselves off from their surroundings (with the vulnerability, or at least inconvenience, that it implies), it had better do something pretty fucking cool in return. And with some exceptions, most VR stuff... doesn't.
The "killer app" of VR technology so far has been mostly simulator games. And sure, some VR sims are pretty neat. But they're kind of a niche product at best. I can't think of many general purpose tools that make use of VR. There's no VR parallel to Lotus 1-2-3. No VR WordPerfect. No VR email—hell, not even Blackberry Messenger.
If Facebook/Meta really wanted to make the "metaverse" happen, the first step would be coming up with a true killer app for VR, something that really takes advantage of the differences between a traditional mouse/keyboard/rasterpanel and a VR headset and gloves or whatever. And I haven't seen any evidence that they're even close.
Given Zuckerberg's budget, if it was up to me, I certainly wouldn't be farting around with VR avatars and virtual clothing for your virtual person that you sit in a virtual movie theater with: people have been down that road and it's just not that interesting. It's an evolutionary dead end, a tarpit. No, they'd be better off spending their money hiring all the top UI/UX experts in the world, putting them in a room, and slowly introducing increasing concentrations of LSD in the office soda fountain. Would it be guaranteed to work? No. But I'd have more confidence in it coming up with a compelling reason for the average person to horse around with VR, than trying to make the dream of the 1990s real in the 2020s.
posted by Kadin2048 at 8:59 PM on December 14, 2021 [9 favorites]
Very solid article.
One glaring issue with the "metaverse" is its dependence on VR, without any really compelling reason for VR. I think this is mostly because VR was a hot, edge-of-tomorrow technology at the time some of the seminal books about the "metaverse" (Snow Crash, Neuromancer, etc.) were written, and it got tossed into the buzzword stew that the authors scooped ideas from. But there's not really any particular problem or need that VR satisfies in these scenarios.
The conventional wisdom, I guess, is that "VR is more immersive" or something like that. Except I'm not sure that's even true: humans are pretty good at getting immersed in lots of things, including printed words on cheap paper. Plus, how many more hours per day do most people have for being totally immersed in media? Aren't we the multitasking, laptop-on-lap-during-a-movie generation, anyway? If your product requires a user to completely immerse themselves, cutting themselves off from their surroundings (with the vulnerability, or at least inconvenience, that it implies), it had better do something pretty fucking cool in return. And with some exceptions, most VR stuff... doesn't.
The "killer app" of VR technology so far has been mostly simulator games. And sure, some VR sims are pretty neat. But they're kind of a niche product at best. I can't think of many general purpose tools that make use of VR. There's no VR parallel to Lotus 1-2-3. No VR WordPerfect. No VR email—hell, not even Blackberry Messenger.
If Facebook/Meta really wanted to make the "metaverse" happen, the first step would be coming up with a true killer app for VR, something that really takes advantage of the differences between a traditional mouse/keyboard/rasterpanel and a VR headset and gloves or whatever. And I haven't seen any evidence that they're even close.
Given Zuckerberg's budget, if it was up to me, I certainly wouldn't be farting around with VR avatars and virtual clothing for your virtual person that you sit in a virtual movie theater with: people have been down that road and it's just not that interesting. It's an evolutionary dead end, a tarpit. No, they'd be better off spending their money hiring all the top UI/UX experts in the world, putting them in a room, and slowly introducing increasing concentrations of LSD in the office soda fountain. Would it be guaranteed to work? No. But I'd have more confidence in it coming up with a compelling reason for the average person to horse around with VR, than trying to make the dream of the 1990s real in the 2020s.
posted by Kadin2048 at 8:59 PM on December 14, 2021 [9 favorites]
Second Life but with True Names
Oh my god, this is how we get a real life (tm) version of all the fantasy worlds where learning someone’s True Name is the way to get power over them. Like Ursula Le Guin’s Earthsea.
So then we will have people in the meatverse with characters in the metaverse running an alias character who is their useful day-to-day avatar. And cyberjockeys and shadowrunners will fight black corporate ICE to find CEO true names to control their metaverse lives, which will, by then, run their meat lives!
I guess what I’m saying is that I am both thrilled and terrified by this Shadowrun/Earthsea crossover, but at least it’s intriguing.
posted by fizban at 1:59 AM on December 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
Oh my god, this is how we get a real life (tm) version of all the fantasy worlds where learning someone’s True Name is the way to get power over them. Like Ursula Le Guin’s Earthsea.
So then we will have people in the meatverse with characters in the metaverse running an alias character who is their useful day-to-day avatar. And cyberjockeys and shadowrunners will fight black corporate ICE to find CEO true names to control their metaverse lives, which will, by then, run their meat lives!
I guess what I’m saying is that I am both thrilled and terrified by this Shadowrun/Earthsea crossover, but at least it’s intriguing.
posted by fizban at 1:59 AM on December 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
I don’t have the metabolism for that.
posted by romanb at 4:52 AM on December 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by romanb at 4:52 AM on December 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
No, they'd be better off spending their money hiring all the top UI/UX experts in the world, putting them in a room, and slowly introducing increasing concentrations of LSD in the office soda fountain.
Is that you, Jean-Louis?
posted by snuffleupagus at 4:56 AM on December 15, 2021 [2 favorites]
Is that you, Jean-Louis?
posted by snuffleupagus at 4:56 AM on December 15, 2021 [2 favorites]
If Facebook/Meta really wanted to make the "metaverse" happen, the first step would be coming up with a true killer app for VR
I was involved in VR research at the start of the 90s. Yes, everybody had read Snowcrash and Neuromancer, but this was at a point where people had probably not yet heard of the WorldWide web. So the promise of The Metaverse at that time included letting groups of globally distributed people talk to each other, of making knowledge accessible, of allowing people to choose how made a first impression differently than would be the case in person - and so on.
The early 90s was also a time when VR pushed was one a set of technologies which helped advance what we now see as general computer technology: tricks for rapidly drawing and updating a virtual world, approaches to minimising network traffic and coping with latency, design of sensors to detect motion and rotation, haptic signalling and so on.
The standard everyday "internet" has now, of course provided all those wondrous-sounding new functions, with better usability than depicted in the books. We all hold productive multi-person meetings with globally distributed groups in a way that is considered completely unremarkable. The technology behind VR, too has also reached the "good enough" stage in many areas which were cutting edge 30 years ago.
So, in terms of inspiration, the whole idea of a metaverse now seems pretty much played out today. It wasn't back then so much. Oddly Neil Stephenson appears to have used the emerging rules of GUI based user interface design as an inspiration for Snowcrash (In the Beginning was the Command Line - 1999 - a "snow crash" was a term in use at Apple for what happened when a GUI based computer crashed).
I think the world awaits an author who uses today's rules of UX design to envisage the way things will go in the future.
posted by rongorongo at 6:10 AM on December 15, 2021 [3 favorites]
I was involved in VR research at the start of the 90s. Yes, everybody had read Snowcrash and Neuromancer, but this was at a point where people had probably not yet heard of the WorldWide web. So the promise of The Metaverse at that time included letting groups of globally distributed people talk to each other, of making knowledge accessible, of allowing people to choose how made a first impression differently than would be the case in person - and so on.
The early 90s was also a time when VR pushed was one a set of technologies which helped advance what we now see as general computer technology: tricks for rapidly drawing and updating a virtual world, approaches to minimising network traffic and coping with latency, design of sensors to detect motion and rotation, haptic signalling and so on.
The standard everyday "internet" has now, of course provided all those wondrous-sounding new functions, with better usability than depicted in the books. We all hold productive multi-person meetings with globally distributed groups in a way that is considered completely unremarkable. The technology behind VR, too has also reached the "good enough" stage in many areas which were cutting edge 30 years ago.
So, in terms of inspiration, the whole idea of a metaverse now seems pretty much played out today. It wasn't back then so much. Oddly Neil Stephenson appears to have used the emerging rules of GUI based user interface design as an inspiration for Snowcrash (In the Beginning was the Command Line - 1999 - a "snow crash" was a term in use at Apple for what happened when a GUI based computer crashed).
I think the world awaits an author who uses today's rules of UX design to envisage the way things will go in the future.
posted by rongorongo at 6:10 AM on December 15, 2021 [3 favorites]
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posted by snuffleupagus at 3:59 PM on December 13, 2021 [15 favorites]