Where is the metaverse?

What would life be without your daily blake poll

Yes, and since we don't have blake anymore, we will have to settle for your polls.

Behold, the metaverse:

http://www.sanriotown.com/onlinegame/index.php?s=introduction

Whups forgot the other option.

Whoa, the k key isn't THAT close to the z key!

oh sorry that was just a typo

Or maybe a freudian slip. I sure do miss blake

I think I last saw the metaverse in Siggy's ass.

Freudean slip, perhaps?

Here is the description of Metaverse (from wikipedia) so we don't argue about it day in day out:

The Metaverse, a phrase coined by Neal Stephenson's science fiction novel Snow Crash (1992) constitutes Stephenson's vision of how a virtual reality-based Internet might evolve in the near future. Although there are public-access Metaverse terminals in Reality, using them carries a social stigma among Metaverse denizens, in part because of the low visual quality of the avatars (the Metaverse representations of users) they provide. In the Metaverse, status is a function of two things: access to restricted environments (such as the Black Sun, an exclusive Metaverse club) and technical acumen (often demonstrated by the sophistication of one's avatar). The Metaverse is frequented mainly by the upper and middle classes.

The landscape of the Metaverse is a black ball 65536 km (216 km) in circumference, over 1.6 times Earth's equatorial circumference. The Street runs around the equator of the virtual sphere and is 100 meters across. 256 Express Ports are located evenly at 256 km intervals beside the the Street. These 256 kilometer intervals are further divided by Local Ports, one kilometer apart. Just like with terrestrial real-estate, you can buy a development license and build anything you want off the street so long it is aproved by the Global Multimedia Protocol Group, the group which specifies and runs the Street protocol.

Second Life is similar to Metaverse.

Several projects aim to implement the Metaverse:

Solipsis
Open Source Metaverse Project
Croquet project

?????

A rare moment.. I'm lost for words....

I think SL is more of a Metaverse than There is.

I think I saw Eboni steal the metaverse from my purse.

In my unpopular opinion the metaverse is a contrivance... a bit of science fiction fantasy that will never come to fruition as imagined. When it comes to using the net as a functional tool people will always want the most streamlined, efficient, and fastest way to accomplish their goals and tasks. The most common task will always be information retrieval and navigating a 3d environment with an avatar will always be the least streamlined, least efficient, and slowest way to access it. The 3d web will always be an offshoot of the net and will only appeal to a small subset of users.

You may now beat me with a stick

The stick, like the metaverse, is over there!

blaze, have you considered polls with less-wordy, more straightforward answers?

You have heard of false dichotomy, right?

...

The Metaverse will happen when SL (or another virtual world) is reverse compatible with the Internet and can be hosted from any server.

Well that could be true depending on the way you look at it. Basicly 3D Virtual space is the metaverse. The internet and everything in it could be a digital world. Including There, Second Life, Active Worlds, Blogs, Websites, ect...

Even Mr Stephenson recognized this fact. As you may recall from Snow Crash, the metaverse did not completely eliminate 2D applications. Hiro enters "flatland" to do some coding while out on a life raft in the Pacific, while YT's mother (along with most/all of her coworkers) also do their work in 2D. Really, the metaverse seems to exist primarily as a venue for entertainment and collaboration. Most of the uses portrayed in the book fall into these two categories. In these two regards, the metaverse makes perfect sense. As a medium for conveying nothing but information, its immersive qualities are completely extraneous. However, those very immersive qualities make it excellent for socializing, entertaining, and interacting.

Well said, Chip.

However, which is more efficient:

Uprooting your entire family and moving thousands of miles in order to interact more immersively with your colleagues to go to a school / job or to enter a place like SecondLife?

Or, conversely, let's say you are a 12 year old growing up in india and want to learn about some subject not taught locally. What's more efficient? Convincing your family to move or engaging in a virtual world at your local internet cafe three times a week for one hour?

No, physics (mass and gravity) have always been the road blocks of the mind. We like to say anything is possible when you put your mind to it, and now it is finally becoming real.

Worth repeating:

wow, blaze. Nice response to Chip, there!
/echo your sentiments


What will happen is quite the opposite - the WWW, blogs, etc will become a subset of the Metaverse.

You're welcome to disagree that this will happen, but you are misusing the definition of the term Metaverse.

Well that brings up a point. Since sub-metaverses exist such as Second Life and There the World Wide Web is already a subset. In JJ Ventrella's Birth of There page it actually says There is the metaverse (/Shrug) so there for Second Life is the metaverse too.

What if the metaverse is actually the internet. Sub worlds exist such as There and Second Life along with web pages and websites.

I think reverse compatibility and a distributed model are two absolutely necessary elements to really be "The Metaverse". Therefore neither SL or There is, currently.

I was inspired earlier, and wrote a blog entry about this subject:
http://secondtense.blogspot.com

it's at http://metaverse.net/

Question answered. Thread closed.

I just made a metaverse in my own mind when I fantasized about Kris having forum banning powers.

<Keanau> Woah. </Keanau>

I guess its like being cool, if you have to ask, then you aren't. If you have to ask if something is the metaverse, then by golly, it probably isn't yet. I'm sure there is some buzzing utopia full of tron-like gridlines and blazing geometric shapes representing various corporate zaibatsus somewhere, but it isn't here.

How 'bout all the developers of all online worlds create a Universal-Access-Account that will allow Universal (thought limited) access to all online worlds. Each online world charges a small one time fee, which helps cover their development costs invested by participating companies.

See this - this access would be limited - I'd not have full abilities when visiting WoW, SIMs, etc. if a SL Citizen, but you get the picture.

Then maybe we can see the creation of a Metaverse cause all players would be able to connect to all other online words via. the UAA.

*deletes Maxx's account in bullettime slomo mode*

If that's all it is then we're already there and have been for a long time now... in which case it seems to me that "metaverse" is just a buzzword for what's already pretty commonplace. Somehow I don't think something as ordinary as distance learning or collaboration across vast distances qualifies as what most people think of as the metaverse... or at least what I personally feel is worthy of the kind of reverance that people seem to feel towards the concept of the metaverse. SL does seem to be a pretty close approximation of the description of Stephenson's vision, but it's been years since I read Snowcrash... if this is all it is then what's with the near religious worship? Maybe I just read more into it than is actually there conceptually for other people. I won't be inclined to believe we're there until being in virtual reality is as sensory as being in real life. When the net meets the holodeck then I'll get really excited. Until then, as cool as the net and SL already are, I'd feel as silly having reverential awe about it as I would bowing in worship to a telephone. That being said, SL is by far the coolest telephone ever!