Metaverse

In my final project, I would like to present the “metaverse” of the future. Several generations after a destructive war where most living space become under radiation, which made people’s room in the real-world limited to a 40 square ft unit. People shift their work, life, and social to virtual spaces. Just like there would never be only one operating system, I would like to portray two kinds of the metaverse, one as a more closed system like ios and another an open-sourced system, holding some similar but also opposite traits. 

The first metaverse is called “DOR” (Decentralized Operating Reality). In this verse, the user has a doorway, and each door is an access to a virtual space. DOR holds many characteristics that current companies portray as metaverse: Identity, friends, immersive, low friction, variety, economy, civility. Like Mark Zuckerberg’s video of his vision of socializing in Metaverse, the user has an avatar, home space, and goods based on decentralized currencies. There would be stores with NFT, and also high-priced auctions of designer-created virtual goods. Even though all goods are digital and can easily be replicated, DOR holds a protocol to protect goods, making sure only you would have access to your purchased goods. This protocol is also the reason for a closed system, protecting users’ goods from viruses. 

The second metaverse is called “The SEED”, as it is an open-sourced framework of metaverse instead of a virtual world itself. Users are able to change the underlying settings and grow many worlds from this seed. But also because of this openness and users’ ability to change the system, people get around NFT goods in many ways. Just like what Jussi Parikka showed in his paragraph about state-sponsored malware, this world can contain some company-sponsored viruses cause it infringes on companies’ benefits, but users live with it and most of the viruses no longer hinder basic use. This world also holds many opposite traits to the DOR: because of the opened system, this system is less stable and more vulnerable to viruses; many times that users can feel that they are in a virtual world, and more of sharing instead of economy. In this world, there is more entertainment, and many people design virtual goods and environments just for fun. Some people would share their designs free to download with optional patron price, and others sell goods with a set price with no limit on selling amount.

I present both worlds by creating an interface with Unity and creating surroundings with Maya, and it connects to the outer world by getting inputs from the audience, presenting the world according to their choice between two headsets. I hope that by allowing the choice between two headsets to symbolize that there would never be only one system of the metaverse.