Before we start talking about the new metaverses, we want to emphasize the importance of classic video chats and video conferencing services. In the modern world, they have become a very important tool for work, learning, communication with colleagues, family and friends. Therefore, Skype, Zoom, Google Meet and their like will continue to be in demand.
However online dating and communication with new people is a different matter. For these purposes, Skype and its alternatives are not the best fit. Firstly, you can chat on them only with people whose contact details you already have. Secondly, many of these sites simply lack interactivity. And this is where the metaverses come in!
What are metaverses, how do they work and what opportunities do they open up for us?
The metaverse is a permanent virtual space in which users can interact with other participants and with digital objects through their avatars. Something similar was very well portrayed in Steven Spielberg’s Ready Player One movie, where almost everyone had their own avatar in VR space, and virtual reality sometimes replaced real life.
Of course, at this stage of development, metaverses are still far from what they show in the movies. Starting with the quality of the virtual environment, ending with the possibilities of interaction with elements of the metaverse.
Mark Zuckerberg, the owner of Meta (ex-Facebook), was one of the first to seriously talk about metaverses. In 2021, about $10 billion has already been poured into the work of Facebook Reality Labs, a division that develops software for AR and VR. According to the latest data, about 10,000 people work at Facebook Reality Labs.
What opportunities will metaverses open up for us in the near future? We can think of several interesting situations.
- You connect to virtual reality and find yourself in a VR city along with thousands of other people. You can walk the streets, shop in stores, meet and chat with anyone nearby, spend time with friends, etc. Everything is like in real life, but without even leaving your home.
- You are attending a concert by your favorite band. Next to you are the avatars of other fans, an almost perfect effect of being there. Once again, all from your own home. No restrictions or health risks. Given the situation with Covid-19 and its uncertainty in the future, this is especially important.
- You go on virtual dates, meet each other, get to know each other better, after which you meet in real life, communicate and perhaps start an amazing relationship.
If you thought that the metaverses are something from the realm of fantasy, and that in the coming years we will not see anything like this, then we can convince you of the opposite. They already exist. For example, there is a Decentraland VR platform running on the Ethereum blockchain. Here you can create all sorts of artifacts and interactive objects, items and areas. They are NFTs that can be bought and sold within Decentraland. Fortnite players will surely remember Travis Scott’s 2020 virtual concert right inside the game. Another example is The Sandbox project. This is an online multiplayer game using blockchain technology, where you can also create NFT tokens, buy and sell digital objects, earning real money. Speaking of money… today there are various cryptocurrency games and commercial platforms that use elements of the metaverse and allow you to earn: SynCity from Binance, SPACE Metaverse, DOGAMÍ and others.
Metaverses and video chats: common features and key differences
Comparing video chat apps with metaverses is like apples and oranges. Skype or Zoom are just communication tools, nothing more. But if we are talking about chat roulettes, some common features with the metaverses can be identified. Online video chat is a space in which there are thousands of people. An internal algorithm randomly connects users to each other via video link, allowing you to start communication. This is how the original Omegle random chat works, as well as many Omegle alternatives: Tinychat, Omegle TV, OmeTV, Monkey and others.
We can also observe that online video chat in its classic form does not use VR and blockchain technologies. But this is most likely temporary. When the metaverse becomes truly mainstream, alternatives to Omegle will quickly start using the same technologies. We can only wait.
What are the main disadvantages of metaverses?
Let’s be honest, so far the metaverses look beautiful only in theory. In practice, there is still a lot of work ahead to ensure that VR worlds exist and work at full capacity. At this stage, the current metaverses have a number of disadvantages:
- The high cost of VR equipment and its low manufacturability. A basic VR kit from Valve, for example, costs nearly $2,000. Tactile suits cost tens of thousands of dollars. There are more budget solutions, but they are frankly weak from a technical point of view and aren’t able to give a feeling of immersion in virtual reality.
- Physical danger to the user. In a VR helmet, a person simply does not see the surrounding real world. Any careless movement can lead to serious injuries and even worse consequences. So far, VR is still not 100% safe.
- The disappearance of a person from the real world to the virtual one. Now it looks more like a fantasy, but in the future, people may well spend more time in the VR space than in reality. And this could be a serious addiction.
It also must be understood that not one metaverse in the foreseeable future will be able to give you a sense of presence in full. It’s all about human physiology. The resolution of the human eye is 576 megapixels. They cease to notice flickering at 60-90 frames per second, and in some situations the eye is able to notice flicker of 500 hertz. So in order to achieve the effect of presence, the video card must be able to display an image on a VR helmet with a resolution of 24K and a frame rate of 500 FPS or higher. In the foreseeable future, we will not see such video cards. And when we do, they will cost ludicrous money.
Metaverses are not quite our future yet
Metaverses are gradually penetrating into our lives. Yes, this process is not the fastest, and certain difficulties constantly arise. But any new technology faces similar difficulties.
Probably, in a few years, VR universes will become an integral part of our lives. But so far this has not happened. At the moment, for people who want to find new friends or even a soulmate on the Web, we recommend using online video chats and dating sites. So far they are much more efficient, simpler, clearer and, most importantly, cheaper. Plus when the metaverses reach a sufficient level of development, both video chats and dating sites will surely adjust to the new reality in no time at all.