Mixed reality (MR) experiences allow people to interact with and manipulate computer-generated images in the real world, in real time. You use a headset but see and remain immersed in the real world while seeing and interacting with images using your hands – for instance, a 3D architectural floor plan for a new school or 3D schematic for an electric vehicle. At this point in time MR is mostly used in industrial, military and medical training and design. These settings can be created as fully synthetic computer-generated content, they can be made of real-world content (set in actual 360-degree video), or they can be a hybrid of both. Today’s fullest home or work VR experiences require individuals to use a head-mounted device and haptic controllers.

SAP for example has dedicated XR teams that are building applications like the SAP Virtual Office to remotely work in Virtual Reality. And on the Distributed Ledger Technology side SAP also has talented teams like the team behind GreenToken – this started off as a project with the palm oil producers of Southeast Asia. We applied blockchain to make their supply chains more transparent and prove to potential buyers that the palm oil was harvested sustainably, that the environment wasn’t damaged in the process, and farmers paid fairly. Now this project is looking to innovate supply chain transparency for a variety of other industries.

The idea is to create a space similar to the internet, but one that users (via digital avatars) can walk around inside and where they can interact with one another in real-time. In theory, you could, for example, sit around a virtual meeting table with colleagues from around the world — instead of staring at their 2D faces on Zoom — and then walk over to a virtual Starbucks to meet up with your mom, who lives across the country. In healthcare, VR could reform surgical training by letting surgeons practice a specific, on-demand procedure as many times as they wish, leading to a shorter learning curve. Medical researchers are also exploring the use of virtual reality in healthcare in fields such as pain management and pediatrics.

You are applying AR when you use your phone’s camera to translate signs and menus in real time from one language to another, or if you play Pokémon Go. AR keeps the real world central but enhances it with digital details that supplement the environment. Meta has revealed that they will be building on advanced technologies and softwares including their platform Horizon and integrating VR and AR technologies to create their own headset ‘Project Cumbria’ and glasses ‘Nazare’. At Roblox, their focus is on building an immersive world using existing gaming tech, rather than investing money and time into more advanced tech like AR and VR.

Metaverse content can be accessed through any device that has an internet connection, though ideally you should be using one with a VR interface. To put it simply, a blockchain is a decentralized ledger or database on which it is very difficult to erase or retroactively alter data. This is the system that facilitates cryptocurrencies and NFTs, and some claim that it could be used to underpin property ownership in the metaverse. While this might sound like science fiction, the technology to facilitate this extreme version of the metaverse is already being developed. The metaverse works in a very similar way to the modern internet, but with greater synergy between different services and websites and a lot more VR integration.

It relies on many of the same tenets, including greater user control, and likely will deploy many of the same cutting-edge technologies, such as blockchain and AI. Mirror worlds are digital {thephotonprojectnft.com|Metaverse|Metaverse NFT} creations that mimic the physical and social structures of the real world in a VR setting. Several companies are already working to create such representations of the entire planet.

Essentially, the metaverse is supposed to be a 3D version of the internet that is seen as the logical next stage of development, and would ideally be accessed through a single gateway. While the term has been floating around for the last few years, the word “metaverse” was actually coined by author Neal Stephenson in his 1992 sci-fi novel Snow Crash. In his book, Stephenson referred to the metaverse as an all-encompassing digital world that exists parallel to the real world. But in 2022, experts still aren’t sure whether the metaverse IRL could evolve into something similar. Getting people to even use their devices can be a challenge, as it’s estimated only 28 per cent of people who own VR headsets use them on a daily basis.

And then there are the accessibility challenges of VR that many companies are shrugging off for now. Meanwhile, Apple’s Vision Pro “solves” the problem of users who have to wear glasses by … selling prescription lens add-ons. This stands in relatively grounded contrast with other companies’ visions of the future, which range from optimistic to outright fan fiction. At one point during Meta’s original presentation on the {crypto quantum computer|Photon Project|https://thephotonprojectnft.com/}, the company showed a scenario in which a young woman is sitting on her couch scrolling through Instagram when she sees a video a friend has posted of a concert that’s happening halfway across the world.

There have already been changes taking place from a work perspective, with the metaverse allowing meetings and workshops to go ahead in a virtual environment with the use of avatars. It’s worth noting, however, that the metaverse also opens up some entirely new potential revenue streams. Obvious areas for monetization include cosmetic upgrades for avatars or access to metaverse-exclusive events. Users could even buy property in the metaverse, perhaps purchasing and customizing a space where they can meet with friends. We speak to three Capgemini colleagues exploring new technologies – Web 3.0, NFTs, and the metaverse – and ask them how a culture of innovation creates the space to experiment and learn.

There seems to be some level of human rejection of the technology.” Sleeker, better hardware that resembles a pair of eyeglasses could be the key to wider adoption, but the technology has yet to meet those needs. Today, many use cases primarily use virtual reality and focus on meetings or collaboration. Especially in a business environment, and for business processes, most applications focus on visualizing data along the process steps. Fortnite had proven that it is going to be more than a game where avatars run to gather weaponry or collect food. In the last two years, Fortnite hosted 2 major concerts by Marshmello and Travis Scott with the participation of 10.7 million users going online simultaneously.

Businesses will need to be proactive in creating a viable data privacy policy tailored to their organization and to work with the major metaverse platform owners and standards organizations to establish security and privacy safeguards. In addition, consumers will need to make an effort to understand the security and data privacy policies of both the businesses they frequent and the metaverse platforms on which those businesses reside. One of the most serious ethical issues related to the use of VR and other extended reality technologies centers on the exposure of individual mental models.

For example, Nvidia’s Earth-2 is a digital twin that aims to enhance the capacity for climate modeling. One example is Upland, a virtual-property NFT game (non-fungible-token game) where people buy, sell and trade virtual properties mapped to the real world – for instance, a real-world baseball stadium or museum. One obvious application for the IoT is in making metaverse users safer in their physical environments.

UPS has used VR technology to train drivers, Fidelity has used VR for remote onboarding of employees, and Walmart has used VR to train workers in its stores. One – more recent – case that many might be aware of is Decentraland, founded in 2015. Participants join the Forum for free and have access to all Forum member plenary meetings and Domain Group activities. Principals play a key role in Forum oversight with voting rights in member plenary meetings, participation on the Oversight Committee that manages the Domain Group Pipeline, and the right to stand for election to the Board of Directors. The Forum has fee waivers and other accommodations to encourage and enable Principal membership by diverse standards-related organizations.