It sounds like an intrigueing idea, but I'm with the others - it's probably not a good idea in reality.

Besides being more complex than a website from the users point of view, it also brings additional costs for the salesmen - it's not enough to take a picture of the product anymore, instead it needs to be modelled, or otherwise visualized. Also, interaction between man and machine would need to be pretty tight before you can really examine such objects completely virtually - even then, it would still be a simulation, with no guarantees at all!

Besides, what exactly would the advantages be of a virtual world on top of this world? Personally, I'd rather take a stroll and actually get outside to walk to a real shop than steering a virtual character with the wasd buttons to a virtual shop - some physical movement is healthy and it's much better to have contact with people in real-life rather than a virtual, degraded replacement of it.

Bytheway, The Matrix, anyone?

We have a non-physics bound metaverse.

However, it is called "the Web".

It is possible that adding 3D interfaces to the browser could be useful, but as yet people haven't found much use for it.

Write a 3D browser plugin. Make generating 3D content cheap and easy. And you'll see a metaverse.

Why would they?

Well, the first reason is the same as why they already play in online virtual worlds -- the community. The second reason is for the free or less costly games that will be the result of both the advertising revenues & the lowered costs of game developement due to using the assets & tools of the metaworlds game engine.

I have been predicting exactly this for several years now, & we will see it in the not so distant future. My concept differs from the original poster's in a few regards, & basically changes what Second Life is doing wrong. I can't write it all down right now as I'm at work, but it's definately do-able, even with today's technology, & would definately answer everyones "Why would they? questions.

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Original post by ToppDog Well, the first reason is the same as why they already play in online virtual worlds -- the community.

Shopping is not, generally, a communal affair. Certainly not in the same way that play is. You can "meet" a random person and share a rich play experience without any awkwardness, but do you really want to go shopping with the middle-aged guy with the combover (who, of course, is presenting an avatar that is a lithe, nubile blond with oh-so-perky nipples) that you just met?

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The second reason is for the free or less costly games that will be the result of both the advertising revenues & the lowered costs of game developement due to using the assets & tools of the metaworlds game engine.

Games will never be free or less costly, no matter how much infrastructure can be reused. There will always be greater content creation or generation costs, and when those can be done fairly automatically by technology, the purchase and licensing costs of said technology will be significant (to offset the gains in terms of reduced per-content expenditure). There will be increased physical modeling and simulation costs, increased artificial intelligence expectations and costs, and so on.

The idea is enticing, but completely impractical. There simply is no clear benefit to either consumers or producers, making it a spectacular lose-lose.

Tell that to Multiverse, Microsoft, Second Life, & just about every corporation who has either already payed to have their products advertised or is looking for ways to have their products advertised in games in the future. If it's so impractical, why are all the big boys still trying to find ways to do it? Obviously they think differently. It will be done, & it is already being done in one form or another... it's only a matter of time before this kind of idea sees daylight.

Advertisement != shopping.

And the idea wasn't just to have it big virtual shopping mall, that was only one aspect of it >_>. Think of the mini-games you could script into the world... like area's with Counterstrike type games being played, or medieval communities. Like Topdog said, Second life & other companies are on the right track, but they need to stop thinking of it wholly as a "game" universe, and more of an alternate reality.

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Original post by ToppDog Tell that to Multiverse, Microsoft, Second Life, & just about every corporation who has either already payed to have their products advertised or is looking for ways to have their products advertised in games in the future. If it's so impractical, why are all the big boys still trying to find ways to do it?

I see. You're the clueless sort.

The cardinal issue here is the feasibility of Neal Stephenson's Multiverse from his book Snow Crash (really cribbed from Gibson's Neuromancer, or even Johnny Mnemonic, though I'm unclear on which came first). What applications the Multiverse are put to are secondary, because the system itself is not practical, efficient or particularly profitable. It has ludicrous overhead. It's only redeeming usage would be as a Holodeck - which is definitely not an avenue for something as pedestrian as shopping. It would be a very cost effective means of, for example, training soldiers in environments indistinguishable from the real world, given the costs of death and injury in physical approximations of military training (people die in training exercises, too).

What you cite as a counterargument is just regular commerce - the desire to get your product advertisements in front of elusive consumers in a fragmented digital media audience. *yawn* The idea there is to find a way to integrate mentions or positive connotations of your product with the media itself, such that consumers are transparently influenced to hold a more favorable disposition toward your particular brand of sprocket. This doesn't need a Multiverse. If anything, the Multiverse detracts from this because it would turn advertising and shopping into destinations in the absence of other forms of entertainment. Now, shopping for clothes and test driving cars may be fun, but shopping for CRM software? I think not.

What Microsoft et al are doing is leveraging companies like Massive Inc (which, incidentally, Microsoft acquired and plans to deploy transparently to all Xbox Live publishers as a revenue/monetization stream) to integrate their products, their products' likenesses, or favorable mention of their products into consumer entertainment that has shown it has an audience that will yield a resonable return on investment. That has nothing to do with the pie-in-the-sky notion of a "Multiverse."


Is there anything else I can clarify for you?

When I said "Multiverse" I am referring to the company that is creating the engine & tools to create MMO's with... And, when I was referring to Microsoft, I was referring to the fact that they want to create software packages to create games with. I was not referring to the "Metaverse" described in the original post. I never proposed developing futuristic VR technology simply to shop from home with.

I am only contesting the point that many of you are making – that advertising in a virtual world is a waste of time. Because, in my opinion, a virtual world (set in a modern day environment) is the one and only place that advertising is ever going to make any significant impact in the gaming world.

The original poster didn't ask if exactly replicating the Metaverse was possible, he asked if similar concepts from it could be achieved using todays technology... and the answer is yes.

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Original post by Oluseyi or even Johnny Mnemonic,

Johnny Mnemonic didn't have enough of a VR element to really "crib" from.