The reason I use quotes is because Zuck has stolen a word to represent his vision of a world people are already incrementally building for themselves, outside his control. His vision, where his Meta company is central to all this stuff, acts as identity provider and general enabler, and a market -- where Meta is central to even the concept of a metaverse, is shit.
Claiming the name as a brand is a scummy move. It's absolutely dripping with greed, hubris and cynicism. They created this problem, where it's difficult to promote or criticize the general idea of the metaverse and the Meta company version independently. It's the latter that I am confident will be a Black Mirror style horror story if come to fruition, and am urging people not to promote. Any major effort by a big tech company to wrangle the frontier into their walled garden is bad news, but Facebook's past behavior says they'd be especially bad.
We’re already spending significant parts of our days working, playing, exploring and communicating digitally. Dating is online. Commerce has moved online. Art and creators are online. Entertainment is online. Exercise is an AR experience. Connecting with IRL and new virtual-only friends is online. What is left? Food, sleep, sex, and odors? Important things, but a relatively small portion of what we do during our awake hours.
The substance part of the metaverse is already here and proven. We are in a period of refinement which includes technological advancements in the ways we experience it. More compact wearables (e.g. AR/VR headsets), 3D audio, High res displays and better visuals/graphics and most importantly, bridging these different types of experiences in some way, which is a software problem. These are the areas in which tech is trying to gain control and offer the cohesive experience.
I highly recommend you listen to this podcast episode with Bill Gurley (second life creator): https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/invest-like-the-best-w...