THE VERSE BEFORE ΜΕΤΑ

Why Meta's metaverse is failing and why the Pico 4 is a step in the right direction

- JONATHAN HO

IN HIS NORMAL LIFE, he is a quiet programmer for the "respectable software company" Meta Cortex; while in private, he is a computer hacker who penetrates computer systems under his hacker alias, Neo. That's the reality and premise of 1999's The Matrix.

In our cultural imaginations largely shaped by the Wachowskis and Neal Stephenson's 1992 sci-fi novel Snow Crash, the Metaverse is an idealised immersive successor of the Internet; a virtual space where billions of users will move, interact and operate across myriad different but interoperable worlds while retaining their avatar identities and virtual possessions. Our facsimile is, alas, nothing like that.

In our prime universe, the "metaverse" is often used to refer to a hypothetical or theoretical shared virtual space. In our reality's iteration, it is imagined by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg as a cartoonish universe accessed through the Internet. At launch, Meta initially had set a goal of 500,000 monthly users by the end of 2022, but internal documents obtained by The Wall Street Journal show the company has fallen far short of its goals for regular monthly users; Meta's Horizon Worlds only garnered around 32,000 people.

In psychological terms, humans are driven by esteem needs. Described as the fourth level in Maslow's hierarchy, these include self-worth, accomplishment and respect derived in part from achievement and mastery, independence and the desire for reputation or respect from others through status and prestige. The problem with Zuckerberg's vision is that cartoon avatars answer none of these psychological drives. The truth is, neither will the Pico 4. However, it does let you feel, in a quasi-realistic environment, a semblance of accomplishment that sitting in front of a desktop in an environment like Horizon Worlds will not; even World of Warcraft will do a better job of answering that need.