In 2021, Mark Zuckerberg rebranded his company to Meta. Since then, the brand heavily invested in a new gamble: Facebook’s metaverse Horizon. This bet has had such an impact on the crypto world that just its announcement made NFTs a not-too-late investment.
Therefore, discerning the potential Horizon Worlds holds is vital. How this metaverse fares will dictate the future of many other digital worlds.
What Is Facebook’s Metaverse?
Zuckerberg’s digital space is Horizon Worlds, a metaverse designed to connect millions, just like Facebook.
Generally, speaking, one of the objectives metaverses have is to create a strong community. However, as for Horizon Worlds, this is the main idea behind the project. People can experience the digital world together as they play minigames or just hang out.
Nevertheless, the project is still in its early stages. Many features are yet to be polished or are straight-up not available. For instance, interoperability, the concept of multiple metaverses working in tandem, will probably take a few years to be fully developed.
Fortunately, people are already experiencing the novelty of Horizon Worlds, be it from the app itself or other platforms. Artists and architects are participating in the creation of that metaverse and many others, while investors and gamers are exploring its many possibilities.
The Importance of Horizon Worlds
Facebook’s metaverse is a project that is relevant to various fields. Most probably, its future will affect the prospects of several industries.
On the one hand, metaverses will either benefit from Horizon Worlds or get held back by it. Although platforms like Decentraland don’t rely on others’ popularity, the public opinion on Meta’s cyberspace will fall onto them. It’s a double-edged sword.
Additionally, the metaverse will also influence the future of the gaming industry. It’s no coincidence that Horizon Worlds is following Roblox’s recipe for success, which is minigames. If the project blooms, VR community-centered games will become a trend in the upcoming years.
On the other hand, the metaverse increased the demand for 3D artists and architects. That’s why pieces of art in the digital world are evolving into more complex artistic expressions. Creators are more innovative by the day, a reason why the metaverse is so visually appealing.
Hence, 3D NFT art and architecture saw the metaverse as their new field of work. Overall, Horizon Worlds brought light to numerous businesses.
The Relationship Between The Metaverse & Real Life
The metaverse has a closer relationship with real life than people think. This technology will leave its footprints in industries and, eventually, in people’s lives.
Real Estate
Architects have found a way to apply metaverse technology to other fields; such as the case of 3D rendering for real estate.
Users can either buy land in cyberspaces to work on or purchase an already built structure. This makes designing and experiencing a property more accessible for businesses and customers. Digital twins ultimately smooth out real estate.
In fact, digital architects are in demand thanks to the metaverse boom. More and more real estate and digital word projects need 3D designers. In the case of real estate, digital twins lessen the costs of structure planning, while cyberspaces need appealing infrastructure for users to interact with.
Augmented Reality
The gaming developer Niantic showed the world how AR-based games can color people’s experiences with their great hit Pokémon Go.
Augmented Reality refers to the layering of 3D interactive objects in a real-world environment. This is an idea that many games and apps tried to improve over the years. Fortunately, in 2016, with the release of Pokémon Go, players were fascinated by this concept.
Given that the interest in immersion and AR skyrocketed, metaverses capitalized on this. For instance, OVR, a digital world for crypto investors, allows users to see 3D designs added to real-world locations. Naturally, Oculus VR is also putting its money on AR technology.
Horizon Worlds and many other platforms will positively modify how people interact with the real world.
Retailers
Engaging customers is a crucial strategy for retailers to dominate the market. VR and AR platforms are perfect for the job.
The COVID lockdown inspired retailers to hone their e-commerce competence to allure potential customers. Metaverses will sweep away the old-fashioned method of shopping and give birth to a digital approach to purchases.
Buyers will be able to interact with products digitally before even deciding on them. Gucci, for example, launched a marketing campaign in 2020 that involved trying out shoes via AR with the Snapchat app. Users of the platform were charmed by this idea.
The potential uses of AR in both marketing and entertainment are worth investing in for many companies, including Oculus VR.
How Will Facebook’s Metaverse Change Our World?
Even though Zuckerberg didn’t invent the term metaverse, his project is sure to change the digital world.
Virtual Reality
Seeing that VR headsets will be the hardware needed to enter Facebook’s metaverse, it’s quite possible to witness some tweaks to them.
Meta’s CEO bought Oculus VR in 2014. Since then, the company has been steadily investing in Virtual Reality. At the time, this was a huge deal: Oculus Rift was the most popular VR headset. As a result, Meta held the future of VR hardware.
Following that trend, Oculus VR kept on developing finer products. The latest models, Oculus Quest and Meta Quest 2, launched in 2018 and 2020, were by far their most sophisticated goods. These projects were a success and expanded VR’s reach.
If Oculus VR, under Meta’s leadership, follows through with that trend, it’s quite possible to see VR headsets as a mainstream product. For example, Virtual Reality and architecture might go hand in hand in the coming years.
The path this company decides to walk on will undoubtedly affect the VR market as a whole.
Cryptocurrencies
Facebook, or rather Meta, has always been known as a company to tail trends and successful projects. One of those trends was the creation of a cryptocurrency.
In 2019, the brand announced the development of a stablecoin: the Diem coin. Even so, the project didn’t live much but made it clear Meta’s intention of partaking in the crypto market. The fact that metaverses need a currency to stimulate playability only supports that idea.
In all likelihood, Horizon World will feature tokens on release. Nonetheless, it’s unclear whether the company will have an enclosed economy for its currency or will insert it into the crypto scene. If the latter is true, the currency will achieve significant marketability.
Decentraland is a good example to show why that would be the case. MANA, Decentraland’s token, is one of the top dogs of the crypto market and it’s only been in the market for about five years. One can only fathom the impact a coin from such a renowned company would have.
Nevertheless, crypto coins are no new trend. It’s vital for Meta to offer a unique token if it wants to have a chance of prevailing.
The Metaverse
Facebook’s metaverse will, without a shadow of a doubt, shape how digital worlds are designed.
Despite the fact that metaverses encourage creators to participate in them, said support is not enough for an artist to design on a particular platform. The crypto market is a speculative market that has no guarantees, after all.
On the contrary, Meta will bet on 3D artists on an unprecedented scale. The company announced they’re investigating how to make creating in Horizon Worlds profitable. That level of commitment has awarded the company a colossal acceptance.
Nike, in its humble beginnings, trusted the athletes that wore their products and invested in them. Meta is trying to apply the same strategy that made Nike the largest apparel company in the world.
Moreover, Zuckerberg’s project will have a huge impact on the features present in metaverses. A multimillionaire company is sure to find and refine the traits inside the digital world. Horizon Worlds’ can even evolve into the epitome of cyberspaces: a sophisticated platform that supports its creators.
Social Media Platforms
Although Meta’s social media platforms are already popular enough, if the metaverse is widely acclaimed, its users will increase astronomically.
Instagram, Facebook, and Whatsapp are all owned by Meta, but their operating system is not. Google and Apple have far more control over these platforms than people give them credit for. Hence, it’s difficult for the company to modernize its trademark apps.
Fortunately for the brand, if Meta dominates the VR market, these platforms would have another medium to function. As a consequence, all three apps would be revamped to fit Virtual Reality’s operating system. The way people interact in them would transform as well.
Going further, the trio will retain a higher presence in the gaming industry. Some argue this is for the better, but others fear it’s for the worse. Games would be way more engaging and focused on community building at the cost of less anonymity.
Metaverse projects envision anonymity as a necessary quality of digital worlds. The inclusion of social media platforms may threaten that line of thought.
Conclusion
Facebook’s metaverse project will have a huge impact on people’s lives and companies’ futures regardless of its outcome. The fate of social media platforms and Virtual Reality technology hinges on this unprecedented bet on cyberspaces.
Only time will confirm if that gamble was worth the shot. Nonetheless, the metaverse scene will keep on growing.
