I'm huge on VR -- especially WebVR -- but this isn't what comes to mind when I think of the metaverse opuses in the post. Telepresent chat rooms were never an important part of these stories. That's not where the magic is.<p>My take is that the metaverse is simply a software system so deep that it becomes part of everyday reality. And we've already built this, but our human-computer interface technology (mostly the software) sucks too much for us to see it. In the meantime we call it the web.<p>This looks like really cool tech, but I don't think the path to the matrix involves a new protocol, or a new data layer. I think it will come about by extruding our pre-existing software epic -- the web -- into our virtual and augmented environments, in the same way the iPhone compressed the software and ideas that already existed into our pockets.
I want to find this exciting but I can't help feel a little jaded when I hear Matrix's PR spin this as "the missing link" when we've already have countless attempts at creating 3D worlds like this but which all have since faded into obscurity. Heck, I even wrote my own "3D website" in the 90s using a long defunct web markup language called VRML.<p>It will be interesting if/when we finally get there but I don't expect this will be the breakthrough product. Though personally I think the real evolution of this tech will be more along the lines of augmenting reality with web tech rather than emulating virtual reality to behave like our physical world.
WebVR concerns me because of the garbage collector and the stop-the-world behaviors you see in browsers. VR is <i>touchy</i>. If you drop frames, you don't notice it just with your eyes, you notice it with your stomach. It feels really, really bad. Getting adequate perf out of a browser for this stuff seems really implausible.
<a href="http://www.geektime.com/2017/04/04/matrix-org-brings-cross-platform-open-comms-to-vr/" rel="nofollow">http://www.geektime.com/2017/04/04/matrix-org-brings-cross-p...</a> provides another take on this, fwiw, highlighting that the battle for an open VR web has to happen right now if we're to avoid a closed and fragmented future like we have today with instant messaging.
My immediate thought was Cobalt/Croquet. It's nice to see that they mention it, but only as "an ambitious project"; then go on to propose their own (part of) an ambitious project ;)<p>There are some <i>really</i> compelling things to like about Cobalt; not least the fact it incorporates a load of existing protocols (XMPP for chat, VNC for accessing "traditional" applications, etc.).<p>Unfortunately, its use of Smalltalk (which probably helped it reach so high so quickly) seems to be holding it back from more contributors and adoption. There are Javascript ports which have seen some limited usage, but they appear to be more constrained. Perhaps bootstrapping Squeak on WebAssembly would help, and maybe offering a layer of JS scriptability on top?<p>Whilst I wish Matrix the best of luck with their efforts, it would be equally great to see their protocols/ecosystems integrated into existing systems too :)
I am not sure showing 2D videos in WebVR is actually useful or better than a standard Google Hangout. I love having a web browser open while in a video call so I can look up references, share content and other things.<p>Thus this feels like it is trendy (wohoo VR!), but not actually useful.
Aside: To anyone finding the black-with-orange-stripes style weird/annoying, I'm guessing it is a reference to <a href="http://community-sitcom.wikia.com/wiki/Dreamatorium" rel="nofollow">http://community-sitcom.wikia.com/wiki/Dreamatorium</a> .<p>[Edit] Sorry, re: missed reference reference!
At last, a portal site!<p>Oh, right.<p>High Fidelity is worth a try. It's like Second Life with higher resolution, except there's nobody and nothing there.