Capturing the Metaverse: How Satellite Photography Can Help Create Immersive Virtual Environments for Crypto-Based Platforms

The metaverse, a term coined by sci-fi author Neal Stephenson, refers to a future realm of connected, immersive virtual spaces where people can interact with digital objects and each other in ways that mimic or exceed real life. Once a far-off dream, the metaverse now seems closer than ever due to rapid advancements in virtual and augmented reality technologies, high-speed networks and computing power. Tech giants and investors are pouring billions into making the metaverse a reality, heralding it as the next evolution of the Internet. Yet as with any hyped emerging technology, visions of the metaverse’s potential vary widely. Experts remain divided on just how immersive and widely adopted the metaverse will be by 2040, with optimists foreseeing transformative changes to daily life and skeptics doubting it will become a well-functioning part of day-to-day reality for most.

Augmented and Mixed Reality Expected to Outpace VR

While much metaverse hype centres around virtual reality (VR), where users don head-mounted displays for fully immersive experiences, many experts believe augmented reality (AR) and mixed reality (MR) will ultimately see greater adoption. Louis Rosenberg, AR pioneer and CEO of Unanimous AI, predicts:

“The augmented metaverse, will replace mobile phones as our primary gateway to digital content. The transition from mobile phones to AR hardware will begin the middle of the 2020s and will be complete by 2035, possibly sooner.”

AR, which overlays digital information onto real-world environments, and MR, which allows for interaction with digital objects placed in the real world, have several key advantages over VR. Users can still see and interact with the real world, rather than being completely cut off from it. AR and MR also have more practical uses, from displaying heads-up navigation and information to enabling immersive work and educational applications. As Avi Bar-Zeev, co-creator of Microsoft’s HoloLens, explains:

“VR fundamentally strips away the most common constraints of reality: location and travel, physics, even sometimes time … The potential for AR is much larger than what will be found in fantasy- and entertainment-based platforms and pure VR.”

While VR will continue to see growth and innovation, particularly for gaming, socializing and specific business/education uses, experts largely expect it to remain more of a niche technology used for targeted applications rather than an “all-day, everyday” metaverse interface.

Pioneering Visions of the Metaverse’s Potential

Proponents paint visions of a fully-realized metaverse as a series of linked, fully immersive 3D virtual spaces that become extensions of the physical world. These shared environments would in essence function as a new plane of existence, where people spend significant portions of their lives working, learning, socializing and transacting. As venture capitalist Matthew Ball describes:

“The Metaverse will be a massively scaled and interoperable network of real-time rendered 3D virtual worlds which can be experienced synchronously and persistently by an effectively unlimited number of users with an individual sense of presence, and with continuity of data, such as identity, history, entitlements, objects, communications, and payments.”

Some of the key characteristics envisioned for an actualized metaverse include:

• Unprecedented interoperability between virtual spaces and experiences
• Robust digital economies with extensive trading of virtual goods and currencies
• Extensive social features enabling rich interactions and collaboration
• Highly immersive and personalized environments tailored to each user
• Blurring or replacement of boundaries between virtual and physical spaces

In this sci-fi inspired view, the metaverse becomes a transformative new medium for all manner of human activities, unleashing waves of creativity and enabling experiences impossible in our physical reality – from attending school on an alien planet to touring Ancient Rome to teleporting to live events around the globe. Jon Radoff, CEO of Beamable, predicts:

“The fundamental shift is toward thinking of virtual property and virtual identity as ‘real’ and/or important. One can trace the origin of the metaverse back to Dungeons & Dragons before it was digitized and look at it as an imaginary, creative space of social interaction and storytelling. Everything since then is simply technologies that have digitized, dematerialized and democratized access to this category of experience.”

However, even metaverse bulls acknowledge major technological, economic and user experience hurdles remain to realizing this expansive vision. We dive into some of these obstacles and concerns next.

Sci-Fi Dreams vs Practical Realities

While the metaverse’s most ardent proponents take inspiration from immersive sci-fi concepts like the Holodeck in Star Trek or the OASIS in Ready Player One, the path to realizing such visions remains laden with challenges. Despite significant advancements, today’s VR experiences still face issues with bulky hardware, limited graphical fidelity, high costs and potential user discomfort. Achieving the fidelity and ubiquity envisioned in fiction will require major breakthroughs in display technology, battery life, 3D graphics rendering and haptics, along with dramatic reductions in cost.

Perhaps the larger question is one of demand – will the average person really want to spend hours per day in fully immersive VR environments? As Computer Scientist Avi Spivak questions, “Will VR offer enough value over existing smartphone + web, at a low enough ‘cost’ (price, usability, social acceptability, battery life) that it will take off?” He and other experts note that previous VR hype cycles, from Second Life to Google Glass, largely fizzled due to underwhelming user demand and experience limitations.

For the metaverse to truly take off, it will need to offer compelling, must-have use cases and experiences that go beyond what’s possible with today’s web/mobile apps. Until then, many believe uptake of fully immersive VR will remain a niche activity for dedicated gamers and enthusiasts rather than a mass-market, general purpose computing platform.

Concerns Over a Corporate & Authoritarian Controlled Metaverse

Beyond technical and adoption challenges, a vocal contingent of experts express alarm about the societal risks posed by a metaverse primarily controlled by a handful of tech giants or authoritarian states. They fear a repeat of – or even amplification of – the myriad issues besetting today’s mega-platforms, from rampant disinformation and privacy erosions to addictive, polarizing algorithms and walled gardens that limit user agency and competition.

As Ethan Zuckerman, Director of the Initiative for Digital Public Infrastructure at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, warns, “Facebook became Meta for two simple and obvious reasons. First, its brand as a social media platform has been badly muddied by years of mismanagement and irresponsibility.” He predicts their vision of the metaverse catching on “with some classes of people, but not with the large mass of humanity.”

Mary Anne Franks, President of the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative, foresees major challenges ahead in ensuring an equitable and safe metaverse for all, noting:

“We are already seeing the same problems with immersive technologies that we see with existing internet services: the metaverse is already being used as a tool of harassment, abuse and misinformation. These problems are going to get much worse before they get better as tech companies focus on profit over safety and governments fail to proactively address predictable harms.”

Even some who see great potential in the metaverse urge extreme caution in its development. Steve Wilson, a privacy consultant and principal analyst at Constellation Research, asserts, “Social media, digital spaces, digital reach and immediacy can be wondrous. We need to triangulate the best of human organisation and digital technology to synthesise a true VR ecosystem.”

Ensuring an Open and Ethical Metaverse

Experts advocating for a more open and decentralized metaverse often point to blockchain and Web3 technologies as key to realizing that vision. Cryptocurrencies, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and smart contracts could provide the underpinnings for thriving, decentralized virtual economies outside the control of any single corporate or state entity.

As Cathy Hackl, a leading metaverse strategist, explains, “In this decentralized future we’re building, everyone will be able to monetize their creations, as opposed to Web 2.0, where the platforms own the content and the creators make very little…In Web3, creators actually own the things they create as NFTs, which have real monetary value.”

However, other experts caution that today’s blockchains and Web3 apps remain immature, untested at scale, highly volatile and still largely controlled by an elite technocratic class. Achieving a truly decentralized and equitable metaverse, they argue, will require developing far more robust governance models and instituting strong, enforceable protections around user privacy, security and agency. As Avi Bar-Zeev puts it:

“For the metaverse to be a safe place that’s good for humanity as a whole, we’re going to need cooperation between companies, governments, standards bodies, non-profits, and ethicists. Everyone needs a seat at the table to build an open metaverse based on a foundation of ethical design, user safety, privacy, and inclusion.”

Ultimately, realizing such a collaborative vision for an open metaverse amid the competitive dynamics and profit motives of Big Tech will be an immense challenge. Much like the web before it, the metaverse’s developmental path reflects an age-old tension between the liberating and oppressive potentials of transformative new technologies.

A Still Uncertain and Unevenly Distributed Future

Despite the grandiose visions and influx of investment, many experts caution that the metaverse’s future remains highly uncertain, with myriad technical, economic and societal hurdles still to overcome. While computing performance, network bandwidth and XR technologies continue to advance at a rapid clip, it remains unclear whether they can progress to a point where extremely rich, immersive and ubiquitous metaverse experiences become a seamless and widely affordable reality.

As Shawn Dubravac, Chief Economist at the Consumer Technology Association, notes, “The biggest uncertainty about the metaverse is not whether it will happen, but rather what form it will take and over what time horizon it will happen.” Even if the technical challenges are solved, the metaverse will need to offer compelling, killer applications and use cases that drive mass adoption. Whether a critical mass of users will want to spend significant portions of their lives fully immersed in virtual worlds, as opposed to dipping in and out for specific applications, remains a key question.

Equally concerning is the risk that access to advanced metaverse technologies and high-bandwidth connectivity remains unevenly distributed, deepening already stark digital divides. If only wealthy consumers and nations can afford premium VR/AR hardware and lightning-fast networks, the metaverse could become a playground for the privileged rather than a great equalizer. As Amy Sample Ward, CEO of the Nonprofit Technology Enterprise Network, argues:

“Building the metaverse by some for some will result in a very different offline world and a very different metaverse or online world than if we build it by all for all. What does an inclusive metaverse look like? What timeline does an inclusive metaverse require?”

For the metaverse to truly reach its potential as a transformative medium for all of humanity, bridging these divides and ensuring equitable access must become a critical priority.

Conclusion

The metaverse in 2040 will likely fall somewhere between the grandest visions of tech optimists and the deep skepticism of more cautious voices. Elements of a more immersive and connected virtual realm are beginning to take shape, with progress in AR/VR technologies, virtual economies and online social experiences accelerating. We are likely to see a proliferation of metaverse-like spaces and applications emerge, from virtual workplaces and immersive entertainment to digital asset marketplaces and mixed reality-enhanced real-world environments.

However, a Ready Player One-style, all-encompassing metaverse that supplants physical reality still seems a distant dream, contingent on exponential advancements in underlying technologies along with seismic shifts in consumer behavior. The path there is strewn with immense technical, ethical, legal and societal challenges yet to be resolved. Much will depend on the choices made today by the powerful tech firms, investors, regulators and standards bodies shaping the metaverse’s early contours. Will they prioritize the user freedoms, decentralized innovation, strong protections and equitable access necessary for a truly open and inclusive metaverse to flourish? Or will we see a replication or even amplification of the walled gardens, data extractivism, addictive design patterns and other ills plaguing the modern web?

Amidst this uncertainty, one thing is clear – the metaverse’s development will have far-reaching implications for our economies, societies and humanity’s very relationship to technology in the coming decades. We are only just beginning to grapple with its potential and pitfalls. For all the hype and hand-wringing, the true shape and impact of the metaverse is still very much ours to define and decide. The choices we make today will ripple out through the virtual worlds of tomorrow.

FAQs