Meta won’t build a dedicated metaverse after all, exec says
... “All of us have a stake in the metaverse,” Clegg writes. “It isn’t an idea Meta has cooked up. There won’t be a Meta-run metaverse, just as there isn’t a ‘Microsoft internet’ or ‘Google internet’ today.”
Meta’s vision, as Clegg explains it, is for the “metaverse” to be a “universal, virtual layer that everyone can experience on top of today’s physical world — one where you can have a consistent identity (or even set of identities) that people can recognize wherever they see you.” This idea raises many questions for Meta’s business, perhaps most importantly: If the metaverse isn’t owned, how can Meta possibly maximize its profits off of it? ...
Decentralization and capitalism do not play well together. Clegg can assure us there’s not a “Microsoft internet” or “Google internet” all he wants, but both of those companies do have extreme power over the internet as we experience it. That control is how Big Tech makes its big bucks.
If Meta isn’t owning the metaverse space — owning at least its share of the market — then it loses what’s kept it so valuable. It’s unlikely the company will purposefully give up the control it’s wielded for so long to stick to this decentralized ideal. ...
