Nagle said:
Anybody working on metaverse stuff? Defined, minimally, as a shared 3D world with substantial user-created content.

Both? I've worked in quite a few shared worlds, both traditional and VR. And I've also done contract work for Oculus, with [NDA], and with [NDA]. Some contracts are tough on the resume. ?

I don't like your minimal definition. Basically that fits every MMO world, multiplayer world, and even old MUD/MUSH from the late 1970s.

There are lots of procedural terrain generation systems. There are even procedural city and road system generators, but they're usually only good enough for aerial views. You can't land and look at storefronts.

If you build a metaverse that big, it will be empty of people, because you can't get anywhere near enough users. Even Second Life has 40,000 to 50,000 concurrent users spread across an area the size of Los Angeles, and feels empty. Decentraland has about 2000 concurrent users spread over 10 square miles, and that feels empty.

The other side of that problem is that if you have too many users in one area, most systems choke. The Spatial OS people were supposed to have fixed that, but, years after the product announcement, nobody seems to have made it happen. In fact, there is, as far as I know, no MMO with a population density comparable to a moderately busy city block, say 2000 people. That's one problem a metaverse design needs to solve. Roblox is trying. They want to have stadiums full of people where you can wave to your friends on the far side. They have enough users to justify the development effort.

So, anybody else headed down that road?

frob said:
I don't like your minimal definition. Basically that fits every MMO world, multiplayer world, and even old MUD/MUSH from the late 1970s.

“Shared 3D world with substantial user-created content.” Most MMOs don't let users build much. MUD/MUSH systems didn't have 3D. Also, this definition includes all the people making “metaverse” noise who are just selling some blockchain thing and have no 3D world.

It's substantial user content that makes it hard. You don't get to grind all the content through a level building tool and Q/A before it goes live. One of the big technical problems with metaverse systems is that you need something comparable to that step somewhere in the asset pipeline. Without that, the system chokes on user content and runs slow, like Second Life.

What about Sims 4, or SimCity? What about Minecraft? What about world-building games, or games that let you place structures like Lego Worlds or No Man's Sky or Ark or Raft or Terraria or so many others? Again, I don't really like what you defined for “metaverse”.

Oh, no, nomenclature arguments.

The definition matters quite a bit.

If I counted what you excluded a few posts ago, nine titles. If you count the ones above I have worked on five. If you only include VR, three. If you are talking deals involving Meta, one.

hplus0603 said:
Approximately nobody will ever strap on a scuba mask just to have a meeting at work.

Yeah. We've done that at work, but only because we work in games.

I've had a meeting interrupted by a T-Rex smashing the wall and killing team members. It took a few minutes to regroup.

I've had a meeting where people were surrounded by raptors (it was held in someone's base), mid-meeting they all attacked when their owner accidentally bumped a key to ‘attack my target’. Naturally someone jumped onto war drums and started pounding away while panic ensued until the raptors were brought back under control. We switched to a neutral location after that.

I've had multiple meetings in the neutral log cabin (see above) with tiki torches and benches, jumping up to the front to give our standup reports in game clothing. One time listening to one guy give his report in heavy body armor, followed by someone who gave her report wearing a string bikini, followed by a guy in an inflatable Rex costume. That was a weird one, hearing the voice and seeing the bikini model.

I've had a meeting where the boss had to ask people to stop hitting each other with a baseball bat, a golf club, and floppy fish, or at least do it quietly.

I've had meetings in a bowling alley, where we'd throw virtual bowling balls and bowling pins at each other because we could.

VR meetings can be a weird perk of the job. I'm sure people would do more of that if they thought they could get away with it.

Right, you have to have meetings in a neutral space. People do that in Second Life all the time. Outfits aren't a big deal, but gradually it turns out that people who look at least modeerately serious get taken seriously. Oversexed is easy, so that says “loser guy”.

Here's a routine meeting in Second Life:

Not neutral as in accepting to humans. Neutral space as in it wasn't in someone's base with all defenses set to neutral, so someone doesn't accidentally kill half the virtual teammates by re-activating the defenses. Since the week before several people were attacked by raptors during the meeting while someone banged on war drums.

The person in the bikini model was a female, the model was customized to look an awful lot like her. I know several of us (including me) had questions. Everyone was smart enough to keep their mouth shut, at least in the group setting.

I'd avoid the big long table like that, although it helps to do something to make it clear who is speaking. One person in the center of a ring, or up on a podium in front of the co-workers who goof off to break the tedium works better in our experience. A table setting in VR felt gross among our group.