from Real Clear Markets

The Metaverse Will Change the Way We Live, Think and Work

By Roger James Hamilton

At GeniusU we talk a lot about the metaverse and how it will usher in – like the first iteration of the internet – a new era and change the way the way we learn, interact, collaborate, and run our businesses.   

This is the year 1995 (the year the internet was launched) all over again, but much much bigger. The metaverse is only in the first stage, but it is here.  Now, its participants are wearing goggles and glasses to enter a new 3D world, but the day will come in the not-too-distant future when there will not be virtual headsets or augmented reality glasses, but chips implanted in humans that allow them to connect in real-time by simply thinking the name or business or organization or friend with whom they want to interact. 

Let’s start with Fortnite as an example. Fortnite is an MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) in which 100 players fight it out until the last man standing in a fast-paced, action packed 3D environment which was developed by Epic Games. It was recently valued at $17 billion. In 2020, 15,000,000 gamers experienced Fortnite’s Galactus event. According to Charlieintel.com, Epic has nearly 400 million registered users. The demand for 3D virtual reality games is off the charts and growing. Roblox, a gaming/educational platform, has 160 million users.

Keep in mind, the very first MMORPG, Everquest, launched in 1999, and barely a year later, Everquest creators Ken and Roberta Rucker sold their company, Sierra Online, to Cendant for $1 billion (with a B). That’s $1.6 billion in 2021 dollars, and that was just the first glimmer of the metaverse.

While the internet was built on code, today’s metaverse is built on engines that build 3D universes. Discover Unity, a game engine that can create 3D, VR, and AR experiences for any industry, including “Auto, AEC, Film, and More.” Fifty-three percent of the 1,000 top-grossing mobile games globally are powered by Unity, according to their website.

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