Making a Metaverse That Matters

CHAPTER 8VR, Interoperability, Web3, and Other Metaverse Myths

Twenty years of metaverse advocacy journalism is bound to leave a mark. Or quite a few, actually—bruises from watching many much-cherished ideas around the concept beaten down by the laboratory of life. Some of these myths somehow still persist, even as shiny new hobby horses arrive, both leading entire companies, organizations, and people down rough, unreliable paths.

Some well-trodden metaverse myths worthy of debunking (or at least roughing up a touch) include:

Myth: VR is essential to the Metaverse

As I note in Chapter 1, Neal Stephenson himself walked back from this notion almost immediately after Snow Crash was published. At any rate, the black and white display terminals that poorer denizens use in the novel hardly resemble VR as we understand it now.

It's still less the case in the actual consumer market. As of this writing in early 2023, the install base of the top-selling HMD, Meta's Quest 2, stands at an estimated 18 million. That's a decided niche when the Metaverse's addressable market must be targeted to all the world's Internet users—over 6 billion people.

VR headsets first enjoyed a flush of mainstream coverage in the early ’90s. Since then, every factor that supposedly limited their mainstream appeal has been addressed. We were told virtual reality sales would strongly grow once they were affordable—but although they are now less costly than video game consoles, sales are still anemic. We were ...