The inspiration for this blog comes from the recorded press release by Mark Zuckerberg when he changed the name of Facebook to Meta and gave his vision of the future. The title of his keynote from 2021 was “The Metaverse and How We’ll Build It Together.” I will deconstruct all the things that were wrong with it then and how he still doesn’t get it. But it captures a few themes that I will expand upon.
One, “the metaverse” does not exist, even in his promo. What we have now is what Michael Zyda calls “metaversi”, little islands that offer glimpses of an imagined future that will require a great deal of work by many people to achieve. My vision differs sharply from his.
Second he pleads for the help he needs help to achieve his utopian vision. And if some of the experiences from those others islands is helpful, many parts of the future metaverse will be created by user generated content and may not be tolerated by Zuckerberg.
This was my launching off point for my project. I have been at it for a few years now and will be for a few more years. I expect my opinions may change and I have vague ambitions of pulling it all together into something like a book one day.
Dale Fletter Blog Site 