Artificial Intelligence, Virtual reality, and now Metaverse. The world seems to be turning out to be the science fiction we used to watch in movies and games. Remember OASIS from the movie Ready Player One? Facebook is all set to make that a reality for which the parent company has even changed its name to “Meta” to reflect its evolution from being just a social platform to creating the metaverse.

So, what are the benefits? Would it be worth the hype?

It is as interesting and beneficial as it sounds to live in a digital world. According to Meta (aka Facebook), Metaverse will be used in education, commerce, healthcare, entertainment, gaming, and most importantly, social networking. Interactions will be more personal even with your Facebook friend who lives miles away.

The Gaming world has already seen a limited form of metaverse through a game called Second Life and other VR-enabled open-world games. Meta is just a huge version of the same. Imagine playing a game of hologram chess anywhere you want! Or any other game you want with anyone in the world. Sounds interesting, right? Gaming companies like Oculus and Epic are already working in partnership with Facebook.

It is sometimes evident that the younger generation is always smarter and technology has always been a key player in influencing that. Metaverse in education is going to change the way people are going to learn. Imagine, opening a 3D hologram model from your palm like Tony Stark in Iron Man or teleporting your avatar to any place and to any point of time in history and looking at how events played out. Doesn’t the virtually immersive learning experience sound far better than sitting in a classroom with a teacher/instructor going on for hours explaining things to you? This is exactly what Meta is trying to achieve.

Meta is also looking to help the training of medical professionals and delivery of health services through the platform using VR and AR that will help the services to become cost-effective. It also benefits the users by allowing them to monitor their health which will help them in leading a healthier lifestyle.

In addition to all of these benefits, it will allow users to attend events, buy services and goods, and do much more in ways they could not have imagined before.

Meta is not without its challenges,

The implementation is not going to be easy. The kind of technology that is required to implement the metaverse is advanced and new. There will be a requirement of huge investments in technology and also making the same available to everyone. Especially in a country like India, where the concept of the internet was introduced just recently and these services aren’t yet widely available.

Metaverse might require a high data transmission speed and devices with better specifications since it is very graphic intensive.

There is also a fear that this will deplete human relationships and society. The former CEO of Google has stated that Artificial Intelligence, which is one of the technologies which will make Metaverse a reality, is “a giant false god”. It is feared that metaverse might bring in new customs that will adversely affect the culture and relationships in the real world.

One of the biggest problems that have also affected companies like Facebook and Google is privacy. How secure is the metaverse going to be? Can we trust the platform since we will live a second life in it? Platforms like YouTube, Facebook, Zoom, WhatsApp have always been criticized for controversies due to privacy and security risks.

And one of the most important questions being asked is, does humanity require a concept like Metaverse? Is it relevant?

Technology has evolved so much that even flying cars and humans are not far from being a reality. Even space travel is now slowly being commercialized. Hence, Metaverse is not science fiction anymore as we already have versions of it in the VR and gaming platforms. It is great to be alive at a time like this where humans are evolving with the help of technological evolution. The impact depends on how we embrace it. There will always be positives and negatives to Metaverse, and time will tell whether it will benefit or engulf our lifestyles.

Metaverse — The Future? or Just Another Gimmick? was originally published in AR/VR Journey: Augmented & Virtual Reality Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.