The Metaverse will Change Everything. For better or worse, we decide.

In?The Innovator’s Dilemma, author Clayton Christensen defines disruption as “a concept, product, or service that either disrupts an existing market or creates a completely new market segment resulting from new technologies or new business models.” Think for a moment about how Apple disrupted BlackBerry, how Netflix disrupted Blockbuster, how Amazon disrupted Borders, how Uber is disrupting taxi services, how Tesla is disrupting the car industry, or how Airbnb is disrupting the hotel industry. I admire Clay and his milkshake Innovation.

At the core of each of these industry disruptions is technology, which is why great companies understand that to stay in the game they must transform. About half of the S&P 500 companies will be replaced in the next decade because of disruption. That leaves companies with a choice: Leverage technology to help you transform or become the next Blockbuster.

While (Generative) AI is generating huge buzz for all the right reasons (see Bill Gates' take on this dawn of a new era: https://www.businessinsider.com/bill-gates-ai-letter-chatbots-future-predictions-2023-3) reasons, including ChatGPT=4, Google's Bard etc, the metaverse remains IMO the piece de resistance. Yes, the metaverse is a new technology platform on which metaverse apps get built, but more importantly the metaverse is an entirely new sales, marketing, and customer/field service channel (the last new channel we had was the internet, when websites for general use began to appear in the early 1990s). That's geekspeak for my interpretation: the metaverse is the 1st singularity of our times - igniting a new Infinite Economy (annexing the Experience Economy) in the Exponential Age. Simply put - it's a fork in the Future of Humanity. We may choose to over-financiliase this 'new' Virtual World like how we did the current monetary system (and as Ray Dailo cleverly puts it - starts the endless Big Cycle) OR we may venture in brave new worlds in metaverse where past x present x future meets. The metaverse is where time 'slows down' and valuecreation goes exponential - human productivity has never seen such amplification, ever. The alternate realities in the metaverse, the probable vs improbable futures play-out 'faster' in the metaverse - allowing us a short glimpse into the future! Another way to look at it - the metaverse allows for the existence of a theoretical entity = InfiniteJourneys. The idea that journeys eg life-journeys can become so circular they eventually hit singularity and become infinitejourneys is plausible in the metaverse. Think of being omni=present in the metaverse, across all VirtualWorlds. This has profound implications - and what we're seeing today (bakc to reality) is about to change every aspect of our reality - starting with how (today) business is conducted.

The metaverse is a virtual, 3-D immersive environment, where you can explore virtual worlds, meet, and communicate with others, attend dedicated meetings and events, be creative, learn, and have fun. You access the metaverse using either virtual reality (VR) headsets, augmented reality (AR) glasses, mixed reality (MR) devices, or traditional 2-D devices including PC/laptops, smartphones/tablets, and game consoles.

The forecast calls for strong metaverse growth: 70 percent of all brands will be present in the metaverse by 2027. Twenty-five percent of consumers will spend one hour daily in the metaverse by 2026; Gen Z will spend 50 percent of their time there by 2030.

Spending and investments in the metaverse are staggering: In 2021, users spent $110 billion on digital goods in the metaverse. In 2022, venture capital funding for the metaverse surpassed $120 billion. This year, South Korea opened Meta Seoul, becoming the first country to create an entire virtual city to better serve its citizens. The virtual city enables visitors to take virtual tours of historic sites, attend concerts and festivals, and shop at virtual stores. Meta Seoul also offers a range of games and sports; it even houses a university campus.

Leading metaverse applications, other than gaming, include these:

• Medicine.Leading neurosurgeons change their surgical approach 24 percent of the time after viewing the tumor using metaverse technology; they also operate with the metaverse goggles on.
• Training.All types of companies (including the Mayo Clinic) increasingly are leveraging metaverse technology for onboarding personnel, where they are documenting up to a 60 percent improvement in content recall and retention.
• Sales, marketing, customer/field service.I see these CRM applications as driving the explosive future growth of the metaverse (e.g., companies are showing savings of up to 75 percent in field service).

I’ve written quite a few times how companies are leveraging the metaverse to power life-journeys and InfiniteJourneys eg to sell (e.g., Warby Parker’s Virtual Try-On app), to market (e.g., Lockheed Martin’s approach to marketing the Orion spacecraft to NASA), and to service customers (e.g., Boeing’s use of the metaverse’s remote assist functionality to service customers globally). To learn more about everything 'verse & Web3 check out : https://www.dhirubhai.net/posts/lukesoon_4-ways-to-build-a-sustainable-successful-activity-6970901287999614976-9Dac?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop : pretty much our collective thinking on the subject.

So how will the Metaverse change everything? Some thoughts Walking the Future-back..

• VR and AR hardware and software will reach ubiquitous status.
• Metaverse-based collaboration will be a common feature of office work, much as Zoom is for communications today.
• Businesses will evolve from accommodating work-from-home to remote work/online collaboration as a competitive advantage.
• Support services will evolve to AI and AR-supported “do it with me.”
• Cryptocurrencies will stabilize and three of them will become more widely accepted.
• Trade shows and conventions will operate as hybrid events with increasing value drawn from digital attendees.
• Broad audiences will gather for massive multiplayer games and professional sports, leading to creative, secure, personalized ads and services during the event.
• All businesses, from small businesses to global enterprises, will have metaverse-based experiences as part of their go-to-market approach.

Will we be piorneers that welcome the metaverse and learns all about how it can impact our lives? Or will we put our head in the sand and hope the metaverse will soon pass as another technology fad? Here's the clinch; would I read books, tell fantastical stories, about dragons (Imugi) to my daughter vs donning VR goggles and watching these leviathans come to life and fly magically all over ? Will we buy 5-6 figure paintings for the living room for our thespian friends to admire, or will we stand-up infinite galleries (of NFTs) in the metaverse for everyone to admire? There's a disconnect between Gens X , Y and Z " eg. Gen Z does not hesitate to respond positively to each of these questions since they are leading the metaverse charge. For me, it's the inevitable. 3D Internet or Virtual World(s), don't matter..