As the last 18 months have shown, the future of travel is not what it used to be.
Now with the arrival of the “Metaverse” – a 3D, augmented-reality, version 2.0 of the internet heralded by Facebook – could the future of travel be about to change again?
Leaving aside the existential risk that people might stop traveling in the real world – a bit like when Arnold Schwarzenegger’s character tries to do a “memory implant” holiday in Total Recall – this still throws up all sorts of challenges for travel.
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Should we be claiming “real estate” in the Metaverse, like we acquired dot-com addresses in the 2000s?
Already a plot of land in Decentraland, one of the more popular Metaverse environments, sold for $572,000 in April. And which Metaverse should we invest in: the Facebook one, Decentraland, or some other version?
It’s Betamax Vs VHS all over again. Equally who in your company should be leading this, technology or marketing?
There’s a lot of confusion, mystery and downright hype about the Metaverse for sure. But without wishing to get all Donald Rumsfeld, we could perhaps separate out the known knowns, the known unknowns and the unknown unknowns.
What can we definitively say about this right now? Even by Facebook’s own definition, any kind of advanced Metaverse – a 3D “embodied internet” in which people can have a persistent ‘presence’ and teleport to different places – is many years off. Not least as 3D glasses aren’t anywhere near everyday usable.
Nonetheless we shouldn’t overlook that to a significant extent the Metaverse is already upon us. Think virtual reality video gaming, crypto currencies, immersive online shopping experiences.
Metaverse and travel
In travel you don’t need to think of the minority interest virtual tour businesses or those accepting crypto payments (growing in number,…