Originally Broadcast: September 21, 2021
The metaverse is being hyped, but what the heck is it? I unpack the main parts of the metaverse--the next generation of the internet--in this quick 2 minute tour.
#metaverse #gamedev #augmentedreality
Jon Radoff: The Metaverse is the next generation of the internet, but lets unpack a lot of the things people have in mind. It's heavily influenced by multiplayer games, which have led the way with real-time functionality and networking. Is this training people on the future of Office Live where most knowledge workers can collaborate from anywhere? You'll also hang out with friends and enjoy new immersive music and social entertainment experiences in the Metaverse. This is all powered by an enormous foundation in cloud-based computing infrastructure. A wealth of creative development tools have unleashed an economy of entrepreneurs and creators. Some of this creativity is happening inside centralized playgrounds, but we're also seeing the growth in decentralized open platforms. Blockchain technology is innovating by giving us a wealth of decentralized marketplace infrastructure, wallet and transactional technology, giving you sovereignty over your own assets and identity and enabling small teams of developers to do amazing things. That may even lead to a fully interoperable set of worlds in sandbox gaming environments as well as new classes of games built around the collectibles first. A lot of this wouldn't be possible without the GPU innovation over the last two decades. That's enabled 3D engines to make it far easier to create immersive content. GPUs are also core to artificial intelligence, which enables more human-centered interfaces and may someday collaborate with us in the creative process itself. Innovations like 3D, AI and the Internet of Things will enable simulations of many facets of our world. We'll explore immersive worlds via virtual reality, but augmented reality will layer the Metaverse over the physical world. Detailed maps and positioning data will inform planet scale Metaverse applications. Network speeds are getting faster and faster, not only 5G, but another order of magnitude leap with 6G. The Metaverse is going to change everything.