What are the most interesting use cases of the virtual world? Discover 5 things you can do in the Metaverse!
Since October 2021, when Facebook with Meta drew attention to this technology, there are those who promise that the Metaverse will be the future. But what can you do in the Metaverse today? Will it be a virtual world populated by cutting-edge social networks and video games? Or is it just a lucrative marketing opportunity for brands? In short, the decisive question is: will it be useful in our daily lives? The activities it will host will be of a varied nature, at the moment developers, brands and crypto companies are experimenting and proposing events of all kinds, from book presentations to weddings.
General trials of the Metaverse are underway and there is no shortage of difficulties, especially at the technical level. It is clear that to establish itself as the technology of the future, the use cases will have to be accessible and widespread, as well as the equipment to access them. We can only speculate about the future, but let’s return to the present and see 5 things you can do in the Metaverse today!
1. Attending a concert
One of the things you can do in the Metaverse is to attend concerts! These kinds of events started as a temporary solution to the interruption of live performances due to the COVID19 pandemic. But even now that in-person activities have resumed, concerts in the Metaverse have not been sidelined. The virtue of this mode of entertainment is interactivity, as participants’ avatars can interact from anywhere in the world and win prizes in the form of NFTs.
The most famous concerts so far have been: that of BLACKPINK, a K-pop group from South Korea, in the July 2022 battle royale video game PUBG. And those of Charlie XCX, Justin Bieber and Twenty One Pilots in the Roblox metaverse. These musical events in the Metaverse were celebrated and ‘nominated’ by MTV, which created an ad hoc award for virtual performances at the MTV Video Music Awards 2022.
Record companies are also planning to enter the Metaverse; Warner Music, for example, has decided to open a concert area on a LAND in The Sandbox.
2. Organising a business meeting
Those wondering what can be done in the Metaverse should not lose sight of all the implications for professional activities. This reality could be a useful resource for all those companies that rely on remote working. By organising these meetings, human relations and ‘office communication’ could be recovered. Remote working is becoming more and more common and is transforming the way people manage their lives and the way they understand space and cities. It is likely, for example, that in the future it will not be so essential to take a home near the workplace.
Some platforms that perform this service are Horizon Workrooms, Meta’s app, and Gather.town. The slogan of the latter is ‘remote working should not isolate – build the office of your dreams’. Hundreds of teams have already moved into their virtual office, Gather also hosts academic conferences and job fairs. Moreover, this is an effective alternative to expensive and logistically complex business trips for companies.
But how does a meeting take place within the Metaverse? Sammy King, a Meta employee, described how a virtual meeting takes place inside a Metaverse. Unlike in a traditional video conference, where only one person can speak at a time, thanks to a technology called spatial audio, participants can talk to each other as if they were in a real office. This feature, together with the high degree of immersiveness provided by virtual reality visors, makes the meetings completely different from those on Zoom or Google Meet. “For the past couple of years we have become accustomed to talking to people through screens, but now suddenly you have the feeling of being close to your colleagues even if you are working in different places. It’s a real breakthrough,” said King, commenting on his first meeting in the Metaverse.
3. Video games on another level
Among the things you can do in the Metaverse, however, is not just work! As can be gleaned from its etymology, this reality aims to be an extension of the real world, which in the field of video games takes the form of a realistic gaming experience. The prototypes of fully immersive video games that we know today are in the primordial stages of their development and consequently cannot yet convey the sensations that we might experience when playing in the future.
The technology that seems to have the potential to revolutionise the entire sector is virtual reality, for realistic video games. Haptic garments, on the other hand, aim to make users experience ‘on their skin’ (on a tactile level) what happens to their avatar inside the virtual world, a bit like in Steven Spielberg‘s film ‘Ready player one’. The Metaverse will also help video games develop their own economy. Play-to-earn games such as Axie Infinity, Star Atlas or even Metaverse games such as The Sandbox and Decentraland already have an internal economy that functions thanks to cryptocurrencies and tokens.
4. Attending a fashion show
Among the answers to the question “what can you do in the Metaverse?” There is also: “attend a fashion show”. The Metaverse Fashion Week in Decentraland 2022 was the first international fashion event in the virtual world and the second edition will take place from 28 to 31 March 2023. Last year, fashion houses of the calibre of Dolce & Gabbana, Tommy Hilfiger and Etro participated and the main objective was to involve as many people as possible in an environment that is often reserved for the few.
But there have been plenty more fashion shows in this reality! For example the Meta Festival in Dept in the Metapolis metaverse attended by Coca Cola, Calvin Klein, H&M and Netflix. Or the Digital Fashion Week in New York, an event where fashion companies were able to showcase their latest work and debate stimulated by films and speeches about the future of the industry.
5. Teleporting to the other side of the world
Let’s end this list of 5 things you can do in the Metaverse on a high note, that is: holidays!
Would you like to go skiing in the Dolomites or snorkelling along the coast of Bali while exploring locations in the Metaverse? Travel companies are already gearing up to allow their customers to experience excursions to the places they intend to visit. Thanks to virtual and augmented reality, you can get a taste of sunsets in the Moroccan desert or the Norwegian aurora borealis and thus decide whether they are really for you before booking your trip. Not only travel agencies, but also hotels and restaurants can use the Metaverse to their advantage. How many times have you ended up in a hovel that according to the booking ad was supposed to look like the Palace of Versailles? Or to end up in a dive bar while expecting to dine in a luxurious restaurant?
The Metaverse became popular after the COVID-19 pandemic, an event that showed us that our lives can change radically and suddenly. With the return to normalcy, however, this technology has not disappeared, but has continued its evolution. In some areas it has already been used and proved useful, while in others it still has some way to go. Despite this, however, the answers to the question ‘what can be done in the Metaverse’ are becoming more and more numerous, a sign that the development around this concept has never stopped. From virtual parades to play-to-earn video games to ‘a taste’ of your future holiday.
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