Who is going to develop it? It is sort of the decentralized bottom-up organic growth model versus the centralized top-down approach, and each has its advantages. In my way of thinking, it doesn’t happen unless you create an open system that is kind of analogous to the open web or the early internet where anybody who is interested can latch on to a shared protocol and begin to build what they want to build. A lot of what people build is going to go nowhere, but some of it is going to be taken up and embraced and used by large numbers of people.

Neal Stephenson – LAMINA1

And to finish it off we have this quote from Chris Cox of Facebook discussing the Killer App for the metaverse.

Workrooms is an example of a piece of software that we build to allow folks to have meetings in VR. So, you put on a headset and rather than a zoom call or a skype meeting you can actually get together and have an experience of being together in a room. It’s an avatar that is rendered as a body, but you have spatial audio and you can see body movements and you can see hand gestures, so rather than seeing faces in front of you, you have presence.

We view the feeling of presence as the essential ingredient for the user experience for something that feels metaverse-like.

Workrooms for us has been the “Killer App” of something that is really a meaningful reason to put a headset on in a work context.

Chris Cox on the “Killer App” for the metaverse.

The post Killer Apps and Balanced Building of the Metaverse first appeared on MetaverseWatcher.

First off is the question of whether or not the metaverse is device dependent? Will it only be accessible via VR headsets and AR glasses? Or will people be able access it on normal laptops and smartphones? In the video clip below, Chris Cox from Facebook gives his take:

Neal Stephenson, Author of the novel Snow Crash (see below) that is often cited as the founding of the Metaverse, shares what his new company LAMINA1 is doing to create metaverse identity solutions on the blockchain.

The post A New Reality – Building the Metaverse at the World Economic Forum 2023 first appeared on MetaverseWatcher.

The future of manufacturing looks bright, especially when considering how technology will continue to transform production in the coming years through the use of emerging technologies like virtual reality and 3D printing.

How will manufacturing companies use these new technologies? This article explores how one aspect of the manufacturing industry will be affected by emerging technology—the Metaverse as it relates to manufacturing companies.

Massive Model Storage

Why haven’t you heard about 3D printing and all its possibilities until now? Well, there is a good reason for that. As it stands, 3D printers have only been able to print extremely basic shapes.

In order to create anything more complex, you need to manually modify them (and you wouldn’t want that). Now, however, researchers at Columbia University have found a way to store digital 3D models and transform them into physical objects by fusing sand or plastic dust into layers.

This new technique will enable production of huge objects such as cars in a matter of hours instead of days or months. The same method could be used on smaller scales for everything from medical devices (printed prosthetics) to everyday products like computer parts and iPhone cases.

Virtual Reality Training

VR creates an opportunity for companies to train their employees on-demand, without worrying about limits on space or time. For example, engineers can simulate an installation and test out different tactics before building a prototype.

Similarly, sales teams can rehearse their pitches in a virtual environment, perfecting each word before meeting with clients in person. There are plenty of ways manufacturing companies will take advantage of VR; it’s up to you to imagine them!

The possibilities extend far beyond training. By creating an immersive experience, manufacturers can create marketing opportunities that were previously impossible or very expensive to produce. Imagine being able to hold a customer’s hand as they walk through your factory and watch your product come together from start to finish!

It might sound like science fiction now, but it’ll be reality sooner than you think. To get ready for the future of manufacturing, here are some things you should consider

Collaborative Design

As 3D printing and product development continue to evolve, we’ll see a decrease in large-scale manufacturing. Most consumer products will be designed in small batches by manufacturers or design firms and then distributed digitally to consumers.

Mass production has already begun shifting toward small batch production, with many companies releasing new models every few months or even weeks. The only difference is that today these companies release it through brick-and-mortar retailers instead of digitally.

When 3D printing becomes more widespread, these designs can be released at once digitally with each iteration adding new layers of functionality to each model, completely changing how consumers interact with products and manufacturers alike.

Advanced Mold Design and Analysis

The world is changing and manufacturing businesses are adapting to reflect that. In times past, machining was a labor-intensive task that required much physical force.

But with computer-assisted design (CAD) systems, it’s now possible to design a part on a computer and then build it using 3D printing or some other kind of advanced manufacturing process. The ability to use CAD makes it easier than ever for businesses to make parts at their own factories—or even in their customers’ facilities—instead of outsourcing all production work to an outside vendor.

Although 3D printing and additive manufacturing technologies have gained widespread adoption in recent years, many manufacturers are still struggling with one big problem: Designing these new kinds of parts properly so they can be built at scale efficiently by machines.

Rapid Prototyping

A 3D printer can allow you to make a physical, tangible model from your idea in just hours. This is called rapid prototyping and it’s going to change how we approach manufacturing for good. Instead of investing millions in a single product before you know if it will work, companies will be able to rapidly test out new ideas on 3D printers.

The initial investment in building a prototype is minimal and as soon as a design gets approved, you’ll have an inexpensive machine that makes mass production cheaper than ever before. And because of metaverse technology, you won’t even need to print each part individually. You can print them all at once with a single command.

In addition to reducing costs associated with prototyping and production, 3D printing also opens up opportunities for consumers to customize their products like never before.

When consumers are involved in every step of creating their own products, they feel more connected to them—they want them more! —and that results in higher sales volume across multiple industries (just look at Etsy).

Quality Assurance

High quality assurance is a must for any manufacturing company, no matter how big or small. To make sure you’re shipping a quality product, you can use software to test and analyze every aspect of your product—the materials used in its construction, how much stress it can withstand, etc.

By using virtual reality (VR) simulations for testing, companies can save on overhead costs and improve efficiency. You could even conduct virtual hands-on trials by allowing customers to try out their products before they purchase them.

Inventory Management

Improved inventory management will mean decreased excess inventories and faster delivery times. Retailers can see exactly where an item is at any given time. In addition, consumer habits can be used to reduce excess inventory.

If a product isn’t selling well in store A, it can be moved to store B, making sure that more products are moving and aren’t sitting in boxes gathering dust. This could drastically cut costs for businesses since they won’t have to carry as much dead weight around with them all day.

Order Tracking & Fulfillment

The main advantage that virtual reality will provide manufacturing companies is immediate order tracking and fulfillment.

Virtual reality will allow customers to see exactly what they are ordering, at each stage in its creation, so that they can confirm it was made according to their specifications before authorizing payment.

This immediacy will help eliminate problems such as errors in communication or interpretation. If an issue does arise, companies can quickly make adjustments before further production begins and avoid shipping faulty products out to customers.

The post The Industrial Metaverse: a Brave New Future of Manufacturing first appeared on MetaverseWatcher.

This nascent expansion to the tech industry has developed new products to make the virtual world feel real. We need these products for the smooth transition between the physical and the digital world. One such product is Meta’s Project Cambria.     

What is the Metaverse? 

We’ve got the back of everyone who still can’t wrap their head around the metaverse. You must first understand the metaverse thoroughly before we move on to discuss Project Cambria. The Metaverse is the future of the internet. Every tech giant is working on it. Facebook even changed its name to Meta to stay ahead of everyone in the race. 

But what exactly is the metaverse? Neal Stephenson coined the term in his 1992 sci-fi book, Snow Crash. Metaverse refers to a virtual world that exists parallel to our physical world. The virtual world will have everything that exists in the physical world, schools, offices, shopping malls, etc.  

We can interact with others in the metaverse using our digital avatars. According to the big tech CEOs, we could take classes, shop, attend meetings, and play in the metaverse in the future. The virtual world is a 3D version of the internet and an extension of social media. 

The metaverse is currently in its beginning phase. We can only speculate what the metaverse is going to be like. Many speculated about the internet in the 80s. However, it is very different from all those speculations. The same can happen to the metaverse. It may not be like how the experts are describing it right now.   

How can you Access the Metaverse? 

You can access the metaverse from different portals. There are many options available in the market. Currently, we don’t have a single universal portal to access the metaverse. Like the internet has many different websites and applications you can access, so the metaverse has many different destinations, with bridges between them. Numerous tech companies are creating their separate metaverse experiences. 

For now, you can access the metaverse through multiple platforms like Decentraland, Sandbox, Fortnite, and Roblox. They offer a variety of experiences, from gaming to live entertainment to real estate. All you need is to acquire some hardware like Google Cardboard, Oculus Quest2 headset, or Valve Index VR. 

These products give you an immersive experience in the metaverse. Some experts say you can access the metaverse through your smartphone, tablet, or computer. Though it will take away the immersive experience, you can still try it out and see what all the hype is about.   

Project Cambria is the next-generation Metaverse hardware product to be released by Meta (Facebook).  Project Cambria will give a better and more immersive metaverse experience than the currently available products. 

Introducing Project Cambria

Project Cambria is Meta’s upcoming high-end virtual reality headset. Meta created this headset using their Presence Platform. Project Cambria will have much higher resolution image sensors than current headsets. The current Quasi headsets display passthrough content in shades of gray. On the other hand, Project Cambria will make the real world look much more realistic inside the headset. 

Meta posted the below video highlighting the difference between the Quest and Cambria headsets. There is a massive difference in both experiences. Although we can enter the digital world through the Quest headset, it is not as immersive and real-like as the Cambria headset.

The video shows just how exactly the Project Cambria metaverse headset made the digital environment more colorful and realistic. Mark Zuckerberg also released a demo reel on his Instagram and Facebook feeds. In the mixed reality demo real video, he was interacting with a cartoonish character and appearing to paint its environment over the real world.

Janko Roettgers tried out the Cambria headset briefly. He said that Cambria’s video quality still isn’t photorealistic, though it’s closer to decent quality home video. Mark Zuckerberg told him that Cambria’s improved sensors are better at distinguishing between different real-world objects so that it knows where to place the virtual ones.  

Project Cambria is one of the several metaverse headsets that Meta plans to launch. Meta wants to create a truly immersive digital world and creating top-notch hardware to access that world is their priority. 

What Else do We Know About Project Cambria?

Meta is pretty camera shy when it comes to showing off Project Cambria. The metaverse headset was blurred even in the reel posted by Mark Zuckerberg. However, a few leaked images and files give us some information regarding the high-end VR headset. A YouTuber and a tech analyst, Brad Lynch, released several images on his Patreon page. These images appear to be CAD files of Project Cambria.

He also explained a few features shown in the images. He said Cambria offers smooth adjustments between interpupillary distance (IPD) sizes for more precise user comfort. This feature isn’t available in the Quest 2 headset. In addition, he alleged that the headset has two glacier cameras on the front left and right, and one Teton high-resolution RGB camera in the center. The latter camera is used to colorize the monochrome stereo glacier sensors. 

Moreover, Lynch has alleged that the Cambria headsets will have the following features: 

• 2,160 x 2,160 MiniLED Backlit LCD Panels (2)
• Custom Pancake Lenses (2)
• 16MP Color Camera for Color Passthrough
• Eye + Face Tracking (IR Camera-based)
• Qualcomm XR2+ Gen 1 SoC
• 12GB LPDDR5 RAM
• 256GB SSD
• WiFi 6E Support
• 5000 mAh battery

Although there isn’t much information available on Project Cambria, it is speculated that Meta is targeting developers and tech enthusiasts for the sale of their product. The Project Cambria metaverse headset will be priced significantly higher than $800. And it’s one of the first among the several innovative VR headsets Meta is planning to launch.   

Final Thoughts 

Project Cambria will help facilitate a more immersive metaverse experience. The high-resolution colorful imagery produced by the Cambria headsets will be better than what we are used to right now. However, there is still a long road ahead. The metaverse is a futuristic idea. Hence, it also requires futuristic devices. Cambria Project is a great step towards creating these innovative devices. However, Meta is not stopping here. They will create many more such high-end VR devices using their Presence Platform.

The post Meta’s Project Cambria: an Entry Portal to the Metaverse first appeared on MetaverseWatcher.

Decentraland is a decentralized virtual world, or a metaverse, where people can sell, buy and build virtual property stored on the Ethereum blockchain. In this virtual world, people can own their digital assets and create anything in their spaces. In Decentraland, users can buy land, known as parcels. This land and virtual any property built on it is an NFT called LAND. On LAND, users can build casinos and social media platforms or offer services for education, tourism, and much more. Many large corporations such as Nike and Coca-Cola have already established their presence inside Decentraland. Fidelity Investments has also established a residence within the Decentraland metaverse.

Tokens 

The three types of Decentraland tokens that fuel its digital economy are:

1. MANA
2. LAND
3. Estate

MANA is the currency of Decentraland, which can be used to buy or rent LAND and other goods and services. MANA is an ERC-20 fungible token.

LAND is a type of ERC-721 token. Each LAND token is a unique non-fungible token and represents a unique 16m x 16m parcel of digital real-estate within Decentraland. MANA is burned, or spent, in exchange for LAND parcels.

Estate is the third token and, like LAND, is also a type of ERC-721 token which is non-fungible and unique.  Estates are collections of LAND parcels that are directly next to each other.

All three tokens are interlinked. Tokens are used to pay for the land, items, and entertainment. MANA can be traded on cryptocurrency exchanges. When LAND is bought in exchange for MANA, that latter is burned, which means there is a finite supply of MANA. Users store these tokens in crypto wallets.  

How Does it Work?

Decentraland’s metaverse consists of three key elements: a decentralized ledger for ownership, a protocol to describe the contents of parcels, and a network for social interactions. The protocol consists of three layers: 

1. The consensus layer tracks land parcel ownership through Ethereum’s smart contracts.
2. The LAND content layer is responsible for the happenings in each parcel and rendering the content in the virtual world. 
3. The real-time layer provides peer-to-peer connections for user avatars. 

How to Invest in Decentraland? 

To invest, potential investors have to buy MANA using centralized exchanges. To do this, they can choose a cryptocurrency exchange, create an account and buy the token. Moving forward, investors can stake MANA and generate yield income on their staked investment. 

Decentraland Governance 

Decentraland is governed by MANA, LAND, and Estate holders instead of a centralized entity. These holders dictate what happens within the virtual space. This governance system is known as the Decentraland DAO (decentralized autonomous organization). Any changes in the space are voted by the users who hold wrapped MANA and LAND. Wrapping means that users cannot spend or transfer their MANA until the voting process is adjourned. 

Users who own more tokens have more units of power. For example, each MANA has one unit of power. Decentraland also has a Security Advisory Board of five members who review governance proposals and supervise bug reports. The board makes decisions that positively affect Decentraland. 

What is Decentraland Marketplace?

Decentraland Marketplace is like other NFT marketplaces in the digital ecosystem, but it works slightly differently as a metaverse project. The marketplace is where users trade and manage all Decentraland on-chain assets. Each transaction in this marketplace burns MANA. The value of burnt MANA is the fee charged for the transaction. The marketplace is tailored to users’ comfort, and the layout they see of the marketplace is what they want to see. For instance, when users select an NFT shown on the main layout, they would see specific information on that NFT, such as price, bids, and transaction history. 

Users can then choose their actions, such as placing a bid or buying the NFT. Decentraland is different from other NFT marketplaces, especially regarding payment methods. Decentraland Marketplace does not support PayPal or credit cards. This means that users need to have MANA-tokens to navigate the marketplace. MANA can be obtained through bigger centralized exchanges. 

What Companies Are Using Decentraland?

Many companies have seen the potential of investing in Decentraland and are making their marks in the metaverse platforms. Some of these companies include:

Samsung

Samsung 837X is Samsung’s metaverse store in Decentraland. Its design is based on the company’s flagship store in New York City, where users can experience all products virtually. Samsung hosted the unpacked event at 837X in the Decentraland.

Atari 

Atari, the pioneer of gaming brands, owns virtual property in Decentraland, popularly the Atari Casino. Visitors can play Atari-themed games and attend branded events here.  

Prager Metis

Prager Metis opened a virtual office building in Decentraland, claiming that businesses will need to use these when metaverse replaces the internet. 

Nike 

In 2021, Nike acquired the RTFKT (Artifact). The Artifact is a digital fashion brand in the NFT community which has launched wearables in the metaverse. 

Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola launched their NFT collection in Decentraland, followed by a celebration in the virtual world where they auctioned the NFTs. Users attending this celebration won NFTs. A Coca-Cola friendship box NFT package was also launched during this auction to commemorate Friendship Day. 

Sotheby’s

Sotheby’s has a virtual gallery in the Decentraland metaverse. The company auctioned its artworks in this gallery, and the work of famous artists was displayed there. 

Future of Decentraland 

Decentraland is unique in the market, but it is still in its developing stage. It has progressed through several stages, namely the Stone Age and the Bronze Age. There is no doubt that this virtual metaverse will gain popularity because of the current generation’s appeal to it. In the future, new features will continue to be added to allow users to explore the creativity of entrepreneurs and gamers worldwide. 

The goal of Decentraland is to establish its own economy whereby people can trade their assets and entertain themselves inside the game. Decentraland’s worldwide acceptance will allow a change in the ecosystem of business and experiences.

The post Decentraland – Explaining the Most Active Metaverse of the Year first appeared on MetaverseWatcher.

1. Virtual Fidelity property in Decentraland, that offers “gamified” financial education
2. FMET – an official Fidelity ETF that gives exposure to metaverse-related companies

With these two offerings we see that Fidelity is expecting the metaverse to grow in a major way and has positioned itself to profit not just from financial investment growth, but also to expand the core business into the metaverse itself and offer its financial education services in the metaverse as well as brick-and-mortar. This marks yet another company moving its corporate business into the metaverse reality.

Fidelity is often at the forefront of emerging technologies. They were one of the first companies to embrace Bitcoin and their research department has been mining Bitcoin for many many years. It is no surprise that they are leading the way in the metaverse. Will we be looking back in 5 years to see Fidelity once again had amazing foresight into the future of technology?

To take a video tour of Fidelity’s office in the Decentraland metaverse on Fidelity’s youtube channel!

The post Fidelity Investments Expands into the Metaverse World with Decentraland first appeared on MetaverseWatcher.

When asked to comment on digital currencies in the wake of the Terra/Luna algorithmic “stablecoin” crash that precipitated the broader crypto market crash, the director made sure to separate digital currencies into 3 groups, which she went on to give her position on each group:

1. Central Bank Digital Currencies
2. Asset-backed Stablecoins
3. Non-backed coins

Presumably responding to the Terra/Luna crash that occurred a few weeks prior to her comments, she stated:

When somebody promises you 20% return on something that is not backed by any assets how would we normally call this thing? We would call it a pyramid. In other words this is pyramid in the digital age, but we should not be mistaken to immediately classify everything in the digital world in a negative way because there are three categories. The first one is Central Bank Digital Currencies, they are backed by the state and they offer finality when transactions are settled.

On the topic of CBDCs, she remarked “90% of central banks are exploring CBDCs” and “[digital currencies are] moving so fast the International Monetary Fund has to embrace it.” before going on to discuss some of the CBDC pilot projects that are already underway “China has a pilot with 128 million participants”. From Kristina’s perspective, it seems clear that with countries already implementing pilot projects, there should be some level of global coordination through a body such as the IMF.

Next on her list, the director addressed stablecoins specifically, saying “Stable coins backed by assets are OK. They look a lot like money market funds, but funds in this digital space”.

Last on the list were what she termed non-backed coins and spoke some words of empathy and caution for those investing in these risky coins: “I want to be very direct that I do feel for the people that lost money because part of the reason they lost money is not being educated in this new investment world.”

The director made some intriguing comments on bitcoin itself, saying:

Bitcoin may be called coin but it is not money. Why? Because a prerequisite for something to be money is to be a stable store of value so you can actually plan around it.

Ending on a positive note and encouraging her colleagues not to throw in the towel after the recent digital currency panic, she states:

I would beg you not to pull out of the importance of this world because of what Julia said. It offers us all faster service, much lower cost, and more inclusion, but only if we separate apples from oranges and bananas

Watch this video to see Director Georgieva’s comments:

The post IMF Managing Director Embraces CryptoCurrency and CBDC at WEF first appeared on MetaverseWatcher.

Starting off we hear from Peggy Johnson, CEO of Magic Leap, as she describes the view of the metaverse from Magic Leap’s headquarters in this clip:

Later on in the disucssion, Peggy sheds light on who she sees as the first corporate adopters of metaverse technology: medical devices and industrial training.

Magic Leap is working with industrial plants and factories to develop training systems where a new employee can put on an Augmented Reality headset and learn how to operate a piece of complex machinery or get expert advice and tech support if an existing machine has broken down.

Perhaps more interesting is the near term product they are developing for brain surgeons. This is an actual product that will be approved to be in the actual operating room to help assist with brain surgery. Watch this clip to here more about industry applications in the metaverse:

Switching directions, we hear from Ed Lewin of Lego Group discuss Lego’s partnership with Epic Games. Ed sees tremendous opportunity in immersive educational experiences as you can see in this clip:

And to cap it all off, we get some fascinating insight from famed Swiss Neuroscientists Pascal Kaufmann as he discusses his ideal predictions for how the metaverse can help revolutionize the scientific process by providing AI lab assistants capable of doing the laborious research and solution generation and free up the scientists to focus on asking the right questions that guide the scientific process and create progress.

It’s clear that the metaverse is getting serious attention from industry. As we covered yesterday, it’s one of Microsoft’s areas they expect a 10x-100x change and are investing heavily in it. It will be interesting to see the progress the industry makes in 2022 and 2023 and how that may shape discussions at the next World Economic Forum 2023 in Davos.

The post Practical Metaverse Applications from World Economic Forum 2022 first appeared on MetaverseWatcher.

We’ll review the highlights of the discussion and report on some great quotes from the panelists: Peggy Johnson from Magic Leap, Omar Sultan Al Olama from the United Arab Emirates, Chris Cox from Facebook (now Meta), and Philip Rosedale from Second Life.

Meta’s Chief Product Officer, Chris Cox, started the session off with a great description of how Meta thinks of the metaverse it is building:

“I at least think about it as the next chapter, the next evolution of the internet, except where it gets less flat. If you think about the primary metaphors for the internet to date have been about web pages and literally two-dimensional objects that we peer at through screens. One of the most trends in computing is that the computer moves from the basement to the desktop to our pocket, as has happened over the last 50 years. And we believe, I think we as an industry believe that it ultimately gets closer to the senses, to the eyes, to the hands, to speech. So keyboard input goes away and peering at everything through a screen in our pockets eventually goes away. The metaverse is a way of describing a transition to a three-dimensional environment.”

Chris Cox – Chief Product Officer, Meta

Before we get to the other highlights, watch Chris give his description from 02:09 – 02:55 in this video:

Chris also discusses how hyperlinks were the foundational primitives of the internet, and forecasts that the primitives of the metaverse will be what he calls “complex hyperlinks” and functionally provide the links to navigate directly from one Web3 experience to another.

“If you think about the hyperlink just as a really brutalist simple metaphor for the structure of portability that made the original internet work. I click on a blue word and you will go from one service to another service. That was the structure that enabled Google, that enabled sort of the first generation web services to build utility because we had some agreement on what the primitives were of the internet. The primitives in the metaverse are going to be more complicated because travel. The equivalent of the hyperlink in the metaverse is I can go from Second Life into a work meeting and I can go from there into an educational experience where I”m visiting the colosseum, and then I can turn it all off and be in an A/R (augmented reality) experience where I can just pull my messages up or I can translate the person who is speaking a different language next to me. These are the kinds of things I think we’re all envisioning.”

Chris Cox – Chief Product Officer, Meta

The event is wrapped up with a discussion over rating content in the metaverse and some debate about what sort of revenue model will succeed.

The post Making the Metaverse in Davos – World Economic Forum 2022 first appeared on MetaverseWatcher.