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The metaverse is bullshit

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Re: The metaverse is bullshit

#551

Post by NaN1352 »

The scariest part about people like Mark Zuckerberg is they actually believe their own drivel.

I believe much of it comes down to left brain hemisphere dominance, as would suggest Mc Gilchrist’s "The Divided Brain".

These people are ungrounded, and most concerning is they are less capable of empathy (a scientific fact outlined in the book I mentioned).

It really does not bode well for society that these people have so much power and money, as it’s not just them, but millions of people around the world slowly getting out of touch themselves through using apps and services created from this "left hemisphere dominant" attention to the world.

Re: The metaverse is bullshit

#552

Post by dymk »

JohnAaronNelson wrote: post #491
dymk wrote: post #466

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Avatars may provide a better way to express authenticity and vulnerability compared to text or a video call.

“You can get to know me better by the mask I put on”

…and you don’t put on a mask over text or video call?

Re: The metaverse is bullshit

#553

Post by [deleted] »

am_lu wrote: post #546
DeusExMachina wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I could not find much data but it seems that the finale of Games of thrones had 19 million viewers [1], while the books sold 90 million copies [2]. Since I guess the latter are cumulative over all the five books, it looks like books and series have a similar performance. Looking at something similar, the Lord of the Rings had around 80-90 million viewers (very rough estimation from the global box office [3]) while th…

19 million counted legal viewers. Myself and everyone I know just torrented it.

[deleted]

Re: The metaverse is bullshit

#555

Post by kordlessagain »

noir_lord wrote: post #334
fredophile wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Billions and billions spent on making movies as polished as possible, yet "I thought the book was better" is what we always hear. How many people watched game of thrones? How many people read all of the published books in a song of ice and fire? The book might be better but movies and TV are a lot more popular.

Books tap directly into the imagination in a way that films (very) rarely do. The most amazing special effects in the world can't match my imagination for fidelity and if they did, they'd still not be mine . I've noticed that the book to TV/movies I like aren't because they are good adaptations so much as they are close to what I imagined. It's rare that happens but when it does it makes the TV show a deeply enjoyabl…

Some of us don't manufacture alternate visual realities in our heads.

Re: The metaverse is bullshit

#556

Post by jayd16 »

mlac wrote: post #472
mox111 wrote: post #416

I think that a lot of the cynicism about this space comes from theorisers who have not yet tried VR for themselves and experienced viscerally + emotionally for themselves, the fact that it is a total game-changer for work and play. The thing with this space is, enough smart people are sufficiently excited by this new media and working on realising its potential, that it will inevitably end up producing value that can…

I will use VR when I can put on my headset, anywhere, and be transported to my "desk". I want to be able to take documents and move them around in VR, read them, put them on my "table", and then have apps that appear as monitors. So I can move and pull up email in front of me, "grab" an attachment, and "put" it into another email that I will compose. And have emails look like a stack of papers that you could actually…

At least for something like this, I can't help but think a laptop is better, haha.

Now if we were talking 3d modeling or art, something that would use the spatial input of AR instead of a keyboard, that would be exciting. In fact you could almost do this today if the Hololens had some better productivity apps.

Re: The metaverse is bullshit

#557

Post by axby »

axby wrote: post #507

Can someone explain why NFTs have anything to do with the metaverse? I heard about browsers easily supporting cryptocurrencies as an important step to it, that kind of makes sense. But do any average people buy NFTs for any reason besides being tricked into it as an (extremely dubious would be putting it politely) "investment"?

TL;DR: my best guess (based on not much reading about this) is that perhaps they pitch NFTs as an inter-company form of people paying twitch to send messages to everyone watching the stream?

Specifically, beyond all the delusion of the metaverse as discussed in the article... are these people seriously pitching that average (or even top 1%) people will create content, and people will pay not to view the content, but just to be listed in the blockchain database that says that they own that content?

That sounded crazy to me before I wrote it, but I just realized: apparently Twitch (the video game streaming site) makes quite a bit of money from people paying just to send a message to all the other people watching the same stream. I don't understand this and haven't been able to get into Twitch, but maybe that's what they mean.

Still though, it seems dishonest to call that buying an "NFT". At that point you're bidding on being seen by all the other people watching the stream, not just to be listed as the "owner" of some digital content.

Then again, devil's advocate, people used to say that the internet had no applications for regular people. All it would take for NFTs to become important is for everyone to agree that they are important, and for some reason choose to read the stuff written by whoever buys the NFTs.

That seems crazy to me now, but I suppose it's not too far off from paying to send messages in a twitch stream. Maybe if all the companies agree to integrate viewing the NFT purchases with viewing the stream, then it would work? People also voluntarily read comments, so maybe NFTs would simply be the way of having an HN/reddit style comment tree on twitch streams, substituting karma for cryptocurrencies.

This gives me very unsettling vibes, but maybe the world would be a better place if you needed to pay 10 cents to make a comment, and if the content producer received that money for creating popular and engaging content. (Ugh, new dystopian idea: someone being able to make a living by posting articles that start flame wars)

Re: The metaverse is bullshit

#558

Post by parasubvert »

emilsedgh wrote: post #305

Metaverse is not bullshit. It's a sign of desperation. Facebook has _nothing_ for the future. * Blue app is already on it's death bed. * Instagram is already seeing a massive decline in quality and engagement as its getting close to the end of its lifecycle. * They managed to survive Snapchat, but I think that made them think Instagram is too big to fail. Thus, they didn't go after TikTok. It was a mistake. * What's…

I think this is optimistic. Oculus is winning the early rounds of the VR market war.

Google in 1998 was just another search engine. Netflix mailed DVDs. Amazon grew from $150 to 600m revenue and had just started selling music and movies.

Facebook non-ad revenue is $3b annually and growing. Oculus store and devices account for easily half or more of that number. Beat Saber on the Quest 2 alone has cracked $100m. Beat Saber!

The biggest drag on Oculus right now is the need for a Facebook account. The switch to Meta fixes this, makes Facebook just one of many properties, with an eye on the prize. It’s like Microsoft pivoting to Azure and away from Windows years before Nadella did.

Valve could step up, or Apple, or Google. But otherwise Facebook is running away with VR, and that will have a massive impact on all of us.

Re: The metaverse is bullshit

#559

Post by gfodor »

unixbeard1337 wrote: post #549
gfodor wrote: post #529

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, no doubt. But the arguments fielded on HN as to why these various technologies are dead ends and will implode once people become rational are weak. They're usually from people who literally have never used the technology (or, used it many years ago.) At best, they have, don't get it (which is fine) but then go on to make the leap that since they didn't get anything out of it, the whole thing is a house of cards…

>This is not something to ignore and dismiss, unless you think Zuck is a complete idiot. Well...

unixbeard1337, I hate to break it to you, but Zuck is not a complete idiot.

Re: The metaverse is bullshit

#560

Post by Philadelphia »

2sk21 wrote: post #519
tailspin2019 wrote: post #459

The Facebook presentation struck me as a vision that’s about 20-30 years out of date, just with “better” graphics. There didn’t seem to be anything new in there and it feels detached from any reality - even a reality in which we might find ourselves in 10-20 years. I’m generally bullish on VR/AR in the long term. But this is not it. What also frustrates me with these types of presentations is how misleading they are…

I agree. Metaverse of 2021 reminds me so much of the "information superhighway" of the 1990s.

It reminds me of the Bubble Yum Gum VR exhibit that traveled across malls in the mid 90’s

Edit: Found an article about it. Actually in 1993-4 https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/os-xpm-1993-06-19-93061...

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