According to a new Gartner prediction, 25 percent of people will be using the “metaverse” every day in just four years, whether it’s for shopping, education, work, entertainment, or socialising.
Meta (Facebook), Microsoft and Nvidia are laying the groundwork for their own metaverse platforms and virtual empires in the year 2026 despite uncertainty about the metaverse’s future. VP of Gartner Research Marty Resnick says that vendors are already making it possible for people in the digital world to replicate their lives, from attending virtual classrooms to buying digital land and building virtual homes.
What? In order to prevent someone else from purchasing your home in the metaverse, do you have to buy the virtual version of it? (Remember when you had to buy your own domain name in the 1990s, or when you had to buy CDs and MP3s of all your vinyl albums?). You might be interested in this virtual Brooklyn Bridge if I could get you a great deal on it.
When it comes to the metaverse, Resnick claims there are two schools of thought:
“The first is that it’s going to be a fantastical world, similar to Ready Player One, where you can visit all kinds of interesting places and even travel to Jupiter.” “It’s a fantasy world,” he says. If I want to hold a virtual event at The Plaza in New York, someone will own The Plaza and a digital twin representation of The Plaza will exist in the metaverse, according to other proponents of the metaverse as a digital twin of the physical world.
The question of who owns what looms large if we create a digital twin of the metaverse. Whether or not anyone can build a replica of The Plaza in New York is a question that needs to be answered. According to Resnick, that’s one of the many issues that need to be resolved. There must be a limit to the amount of digital real estate available. Resnick has advised CIOs who have inquired about purchasing digital real estate to be cautious when doing so. Start small and work your way up. To test the waters, buy a small amount. But don’t bet too much money just yet.
In order to be prepared for the metaverse future, organisations must have a physical presence, an online presence, as well as a metaverse presence in order to be successful.
One of the problems caused by the epidemic shift to online has been addressed by the metaverse. Everyone could then use a window on their desktop computer to participate in class or work meetings after that shift occurred. A major issue, says Resnick, is that the users would also have one or more other windows open at the same time on that computer. Despite the fact that they are participating in a virtual meeting, they are also watching a baseball game and playing chess with a friend. It was much more difficult to hold someone’s undivided attention when they were no longer physically present.
Resnick says one of the metaverse’s promises is the ability to reclaim your undivided attention. A person playing a video game is immersed in a state of trance-like concentration. We’d all benefit greatly if we were able to get that one-on-one time back, from vendors and marketers to college professors and employers.
When it comes to shopping online, customers have the option of comparing prices and terms from a variety of retailers in different windows. Your customers aren’t going to walk into your store and only look at the products you have on display. Using a metaverse location, retailers could once again draw customers into a virtual store and block out the rest of the world. Virtual reality headsets, on the other hand, could provide the user with additional information at the press of a button.
As soon as I enter a store, I use my glasses to search for reviews of a specific product,” says Resnick. “Either that, or I’m looking for nutritional data.” “A collective virtual shared space, created by the convergence of virtually enhanced physical and digital reality,” is how Gartner describes a metaverse. Persistence, enhanced immersion and device independence make it ideal for use with a wide range of mobile and head-mounted display devices.
When it comes to NFTs and Digital Currencies, what’s the deal?
Digital currencies and nonfungible tokens (NFTs) will be necessary to enable a virtual economy because the metaverse will not be owned by a single vendor. Since none of the metaverses are connected yet, there isn’t anything that exactly matches this definition today, but companies like Microsoft are working on similar experiences.
According to Resnick, the creation of a metaverse entails three steps. The first step is to enter the virtual world, which is made easier with VR goggles or a headset on your head. VR glasses like Ray-Ban Stories or Snap Spectacle version 4 are expected to be widely available in 2024 or 2025, making VR technology more accessible. It’s also a matter of reshaping the physical world or inventing new virtual locations for people to visit. Lastly, the ability to buy and sell NFTs using digital currency is critical. In video game platforms like Roblox and individual Minecraft servers, much of this functionality is already available.
Resnick explains that “gaming drives a lot of our emerging technologies.” “In gaming, technology advances much more quickly.”
What CIOs Must Do Right This Second
Gartner predicts that by 2026, 30% of organisations will have products and services ready for the metaverse, despite the fact that the metaverse will provide the infrastructure. As a result, it’s time to get serious about education and preparation.