What we’ve been reading this year about the metaverse: good, intriguing, and downright terrifying
When we decided to focus our fifth anniversary issue on the metaverse, the Immerse editorial collective began hoovering up articles on the topic. While some of us have been tracking the term for nigh unto three decades, we still didn’t have a clear definition. Like: Where is the metaverse? Who owns it? How do I get there? And what will I wear?
Apparently we were not alone. “WTF?” was one of the top genres of articles we collected about the metaverse, followed closely by “Uh oh” once Facebook declared its intentions to rebrand itself as “Meta” and hire a small town’s worth of people to build it out. Now we are rounding out the year with a slew of stories about absurd wads of cash being dropped on virtual objects. Ahoy, bubble!
But among the primers and hot-takes, we also found some intriguing contemplations. How can we build an open metaverse? What’s the role of the metaverse in museums? Does the metaverse need a zoning board? How are we going to get ripped off in new and exciting ways?
Want to learn more? Read on!
So
what is “the metaverse,” exactly? (Ars Technica)December
November
- Investors snap up metaverse real estate in a virtual land boom, New York Times
- Facebook’s metaverse heralds a brave new underworld of metacrime, The New Republic
- We can’t walk blindly into the metaverse, Fortune
- Totalitarian cyber-creep: Mark Zuckerberg in the metaverse, Counterpunch
- What is the metaverse and why is Facebook so obsessed with it? BBC
- 10 companies that are following Facebook into the metaverse, Gizmodo
- Lightship is a new platform to build real-world AR apps, Wersh
- Our tech expert’s guide to entering the metaverse, Popular Mechanics
- Facebook is quietly buying up the metaverse, Vox
- Why Facebook’s metaverse is dead on arrival, New York Magazine
- So what is “the metaverse,” exactly? Ars Technica
- How to govern the metaverse, Wired
- Hey, Facebook, I made a metaverse 27 years ago, The Atlantic
- The metaverse is coming. Cathy Hackl explains why we should care. Freethink
- The genius behind the best metaverse Twitter thread, Wired
October
- The metaverse is bad, The Atlantic
- Welcome to the metaverse, The Week
- Facebook’s name change plan is a reflection of its real priorities, Vox
- The amazing things you’ll do in the “Metaverse” and what it will take to get there, Wall Street Journal
September
- What is the metaverse? A definition, Nick Kelly Research
- Reintroducing The Open Metaverse OS Paper, Outlier Ventures
- The DeanBeat: Will the metaverse bring the second coming of Second Life? Games Beat
- Facebook’s vision of the metaverse has a critical flaw, Venture Beat
August
- The fashion exec’s guide to the metaverse, Vogue Business
- Big Tech wants to build the “metaverse.” What on Earth does that mean? Washington Post
- The architects of the metaverse need to read the virtual room, Wired
- The metaverse giants wooing shoppers in a virtual world, Times UK
- The metaverse looks like hell, New York Magazine
- The top 30 most influential people in the metaverse, ReadWrite
- Roblox is a $45bn platform built largely by children working for scrip, Boingboing
- Facebook, Roblox see the “metaverse” as key to the Internet’s next phase, Wall Street Journal
- The metaverse — a merging of realities — is being built out this decade so you can live in it, Marketwatch
- The Metaverse is a dystopian nightmare. Let’s build a better reality. Niantic Labs
- Epic, Bored Apes and the story of the metaverse, Out of Scope
- Move over, space. Tech billionaires have a new utopian boondoggle: the “metaverse,” The Guardian
July
- Future Art Ecosystems: Art x Metaverse, Serpentine Galleries
- We need to kick big tech out of the metaverse, Wired
- Mark in the metaverse, The Verge
- WTF is the metaverse? Digiday
- Fueling The Metaverse: Epic Games buys biggest 3D model platform Sketchfab, Forbes
June
- The Metaverse Primer, Matthew Ball
- Sotheby’s auction house opens its official headquarters in the metaverse, Highsnobriety
April
March
- Roblox: How the children’s game became a $30bn bet on the Metaverse, BBC
- From sci-fi to reality: Evidence that the metaverse is closer than you think, VentureBeat
- Virtual land and spaceships: NFTs and the new crypto frontier, Al Jazeera
February
- The metaverse is coming, Wired
For more news, discourse, and resources on immersive and emerging forms of nonfiction media, sign up for our monthly newsletter.
Immerse is an initiative of the MIT Open DocLab and Dot Connector Studio, and receives funding from Just Films | Ford Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation. The Gotham Film & Media Institute is our fiscal sponsor. Learn more here. We are committed to exploring and showcasing emerging nonfiction projects that push the boundaries of media and tackle issues of social justice — and rely on friends like you to sustain ourselves and grow. Join us by making a gift today.