Like all new technologies I see the dangers of a Metaverse but I also see the potential. And I think the overall benefits are going to outweigh the downsides in the long run. Being able to transport oneself into another world has the chance to revolutionize entertainment, video games and education. Imagine being able to see a live Broadway show or attend a lecture at a prestigious school without ever having to leave your home. For most of us it feels a bit lazy and like a glorified version of watching a video or a live streamed Ted Talk. But there are people in third world countries who have never had such opportunities before. These are places where they don't have reliable services or computers but they have smartphones and it's their only connection to world beyond their borders.
I'll admit that I am a bit biased however, I've been investing and playing in the Metaverse already. I have an avatar in SandBox which is just now opening up to investors and I have been exploring the world of DecentraLand. In DecentraLand I have played games and interacted with others. I even talked to someone about in-world jobs, where people are being paid in stable digital currency that's always equal to the US Dollar to to perform specific functions. In this case it was a virtual casino and they paid people to hang out, greet new players and ask if they needed any help figuring out how to navigate the virtual world. So kind of like a digital help desk but you interact with a real person and not preprogrammed responses from a computer AI. The pay structure was based on how long the virtual employee was online. Some people would be there a few hours a day for 2-3 days a week to full 8 hours a day 5 days a week and pay was anywhere from few hundred a month up to a few thousand. These past few years have definitely shown us that there are people willing and capable of working from their home computers. In some other countries the equivalent of $200-$500 a month is more than they could make at a "real" job.
The big danger I see is that being able to escape into a virtual world is detrimental to social cohesion. Two neighbors might not get along or even like each other; they drive different kinds of cars, have different jobs, completely different interests and hobbies and support opposite candidates at election time. But they are part of the same local community, go to the same church, shop at the same store, root for the same local home team and their kids go to the same school. When something happens that affects the community these two neighbors can come together in their genuine desire to keep the community safe. We are already seeing this dynamic changed by the internet and social media. Like minded people can easily create an echo chamber of ideas on places like Facebook or Twitter where any new ideas can be censored, blocked and ignored, which can't easily happen in a physical community. Retreating into social media can mean pulling away from the local community, which becomes dangerous when a person shifts their in-group/out-group dynamics to favor a remote community over, or even to the detriment of, the local community.
However there are also places like this forum. There are things I can talk about here, that I might not discuss otherwise, without the fear of being judged because I know that many of you have seen and experienced many of the same things that I have. That part of me which thought I was losing my mind over some of these things which were happening to me and around me needed to find answers. Those answers can't always come from the immediate community, after all it was partially because of my close circle of friends that I rejected the possibility of the things I experienced to begin with. Having the opportunity to be here and share in the insights of others has done more good for me personally than Twitter or Facebook has harmed me.
I think the Metaverse will be much the same. There will be toxic places but many more healthy one. Plus, we as a people will better learn the etiquette of how to navigate and balance our interactions in the Metaverse. Just like we managed to navigate communications when we went from talking around a bonfire to sending letters to dinner parties to talking on the phone then back to digital letters in the form of e-mail and chatrooms.
