A year ago Mark Zuckerberg made a gamble on Metaverse, raising public’s attention and interest in the future form of living. At the same time, Zuckerberg’s envisioning of Metaverse has raised eyebrows as well. The most common criticism is that the era of Metaverse might come one day, but it is too far away and unrealistic from the current point of view, talking about it now prompts people to gamble on something that has no grounded infrastructures. Even more, it becomes an orgy of capital. However, there are indeed some fundamental elements in the Metaverse worth our wait, among which the ones that will be discussed in this blog are augmented reality and virtual reality (AR & VR) technology.
With a grand vision of Metaverse, under Mark Zuckerberg’s lead Meta continues his gambling on the vision and focuses on the VR technology that lays the groundwork for the Metaverse. Today on 12th Oct 2022, the $1,500 mixed reality headset Quest Pro VR ((five times the price of a Quest 2) is unveiled, which can blend the elements in the virtual world with the real world. Meta positions it as a tool for work as well as entertainment.
Quoting the comments of the guest in the video on the headset, this product tries to convince developers to build apps and experiences for this device instead of in the app stores on iPhone. However, since currently there are only a few actual apps in this device, it is hard to encourage developers to transit to the platform that Meta builds — Quest store; currently, there is also no compelling solution raised by Meta to deal with the dilemma. As the copywriter Kurt Wagner puts it, the device itself is slick but does not help much with the company’s current position (declining stock prices and increasing impatient stockholders).
However, as titans like Meta and Apple are investing in the development of AR & VR technologies, even though we are at the early stage of the envisioned future Metaverse world, it is still promising that AR & VR headsets would rebuild our everyday lives in a good way. For Meta, it will not only consider the availability of the headset, but also the possibility of overtake a portion of shares from Apple with respect to application development, which is one of the crucial factors that directly affect the public’s willingness of participation.
References
Kurt Wagner. (2022) Meta’s VR Will Become Cooler, If Investors Can Wait That Long. Available at: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2022-10-12/meta-s-vr-will-become-cooler-if-investors-can-wait-that-long
Ryan Mac, Sheera Frenkel and Kevin Roose. (2022) Skepticism, Confusion, Frustration: Inside Mark Zuckerberg’s Metaverse Struggles. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/09/technology/meta-zuckerberg-metaverse
