Facebook is developing a virtual metaverse.

Facebook’s infamous CEO put tech enthusiasts across the globe in a flux by announcing the development of its own ‘virtual metaverse’ during the earnings call for the first quarter of 2021. And by that, Zuckerberg doesn’t just want you logging in to his social network. He wants you to live, work and essentially exist within the realms of his augmented reality. Sound’s all a bit ‘Ready Player One’ doesn’t it?

But what truly does the term metaverse encapsulate? Coined in Neal Stephenson’s 1992 sci-fi novel Snow Crash, metaverse refers to a convergence of physical, augmented, and virtual reality in a shared online space. For years, companies like Epic Games have included metaverse-like elements in Fortnite and Roblox as an attempt to increase the level of user interactivity. Facebook’s larger than life vision to build a maximalist, interrelated set of experiences would be an ultimate game-changer in the virtual reality world, if executed tactfully. Zuckerberg views this venture to be pertinent to Facebook; as a successful go at it would make the social giant a pioneer of the internet, and beyond. Furthermore, it will expand the horizons of the platform’s business model around that is predominantly concentrated around connecting people. 

For Facebook to successfully become a metaverse company, it must be compelling in every aspect of immersive reality technology; with its engineers being able to create a versatile digital game that can house billions of avatars. The social network has already made noteworthy progress in this initiative. Reality Labs, a newly formed division of Facebook aims to create a standard for the metaverse has researchers from various gaming backgrounds grappling with the concept of presence, and how it feels to be in a space with others. The division is also thoroughly developing AR glasses, more advanced VR headsets, and even software that allows users to teleport into other digital spaces. How cool is that!

Though amusing to the naked eye, the abstraction of a virtual environment comes with its own set of limitations and apprehensions. Firstly, the probability of creating a metaverse that offers absolutely unprecedented interoperability is rather questionable, given the Facebook’s ongoing anti-trust scrutiny that may bring along a cloud of distrust from the consumer’s perspective. The idea, which may burn a hole in the pockets of Facebook, may also take months if not years to fructify into Zuckerberg’s dream simulation. Mammoth tech companies like Apple and Microsoft often tend to romanticize futuristic concepts like artificial intelligence while they are still ripe, complicate definitions to a point where they turn blurry and often lose track of the original concept in the first place. However, if what Zuckerberg says is to be believed, “there will be many winners in the metaverse, but the more influential Facebook is in building it, the more this new online universe will reflect Facebook’s existing mission and business model around connecting people.”

In essence, the idea of a metaverse, apart from being straight out of a quasi-apocalyptic dystopian film, might possibly change the course of how we as a species perceive technology and its many wonders.