I Never Metaverse I Didn’t Like
Uncanny Valley | WIRED
WIRED
4.1 • 570 Ratings
🗓️ 27 August 2021
⏱️ 39 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The metaverse. A simulated world, controlled with inputs from our reality to merge cyberspace and meatspace into one plane of existence. If this sounds like a sci-fi concept from the early ‘90s, that’s because it is. But now Facebook is trying to make the metaverse a reality.
The company has been exploring AR and VR tech with the goal of manufacturing a virtual experience that allows users from all over the world to interact in a shared dimension. So far, the most promising metaverse concept the company has shown off is a VR conference room for business meetings. Not super exciting, folks! However, Facebook has demonstrated that its tech has the potential to re-frame how we interact in the future—provided we all use Facebook headsets and apps from the Oculus store to meet up within the confines of Facebook’s platform.
This week on Gadget Lab, we talk with Peter Rubin, WIRED contributor and author of the book Future Presence, about Facebook’s grand vision and whether an open, platform-agnostic version of the metaverse will ever fully materialize.
Show Notes:
Read Peter’s story about Facebook’s Horizon Workrooms. Also, his story about the metaverse in Ready Player One. Peter’s book, Future Presence, is now out in paperback. Read Lauren’s story about Facebook’s wrist wearables. And Gilad Edelman has a take on cargo pants, obviously.
Recommendations:
Peter recommends the show Reservation Dogs. Lauren recommends taking a staycation, because you deserve it. Mike recommends Peter’s newsletter, The Peter Principle.
PeterRubin can be found on Twitter @provenself. Lauren Goode is @LaurenGoode. Michael Calore is @snackfight. Bling the main hotline at @GadgetLab. The show is produced by Boone Ashworth (@booneashworth). Our theme music is by Solar Keys.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Lauren. |
| 0:01.0 | Mike. |
| 0:02.0 | Lauren, have you ever visited the Metaverse? |
| 0:05.0 | Yeah, I think so. |
| 0:06.0 | I think there was this time when I was meeting with a Microsoft executive in a HoloLens2 |
| 0:10.0 | headset. |
| 0:11.0 | And then I had to switch between that and the HP Reverb G2 VR headset, which was connected to some |
| 0:18.0 | giant high-powered PC. |
| 0:25.4 | And like, I walked into my kitchen counter and I was like, I think I just hit the metaverse. |
| 0:26.8 | Is that, that sounds right? |
| 0:28.7 | Yeah, that sounds good to me. |
| 0:30.0 | I'll take it. |
| 0:31.1 | Yay. |
| 0:36.4 | Hi, everyone. Welcome to Gadget Lab. I am Michael Colori, a senior editor at Wired. |
| 0:43.2 | And I'm Lauren Good. I'm a senior writer at Wired. We are also joined today by Wired writer Peter |
| 0:48.1 | Peter. Hello, Peter. Welcome back to the show. Hey, Peter. Hey, guys. It is great to be here again. |
| 0:53.5 | Peter, we have you on because yes, we are talking about the Metaverse and we are talking about VR and you've written a book about VR. It's called Future Presence, How Virtual Reality is Changing Human Connection, Intimacy, and the Limits of Ordinary Life. How did I do? That's the full title. You did great. And it's out in paperback now, too. And there are additions of it all over the world. So even if you're listening to this in Korea or anywhere else, you can get a copy. That doesn't sound very high tech. Paperback? What's that? I know. There's audio and there's an ebook, too. Peter used to be an editorired, but even though he has moved on from our virtual four walls, he is still a regular contributor to Wired and a regular guest here on the show. So it's good to have you, man. Oh, man, it's so great to be back. I was just telling you before we started rolling, I miss our knees bumping together under the table in the two small studio that we used to use |
| 1:45.4 | to record this. And sharing our lung juice. And sharing as Lauren, as Lauren put it, our lung |
| 1:53.0 | juice. I have to give Alan Henry credit for that from our wire team. He's the one who first said |
| 1:58.9 | lung juice at one point. And now I just cannot get it out of my mind. |
| 2:02.5 | Even if that had been coined in 2019, it would have been gross, but now it's just, it's almost too much to take. |
| 2:10.9 | Doubly gross. Well, we could be recording this in person, but instead we are recording it virtually. |
... |
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