The Metaverse is Death
The Metaverse is Death
Tim O’Connor – Center for the Preservation of Humanity – 9/27/2022
“Much like Johannes Gutenberg revolutionized printing to bring the first wave of self-education to the masses that helped spark the Renaissance, the metaverse promises to seriously transform business models and the lives of the people behind them. Gartner researchers reported executives have spent over $120 billion in metaverse-related ventures in the first half of 2022 alone. They expected 30% of organizations in the world will have products and services ready for the metaverse by 2026. To be clear, the metaverse is pure vision, predicated on the emergence of what many call Web 3.0, the next iteration of the internet where networks of interconnected real-world, augmented, and virtual experiences fuel a creator economy.”
That is the opening paragraph of an article in Forbes today. Forbes is owned by A Hong Kong firm named Whale Media Investments. In other words it is owned by China. China was opened up because it’s people are used to being slaves to the leaders of the nation which is sad, but true. For millennia China was ruled by emperors and soon after the emperor system was ended, Mao came in and demanded allegiance to the himself and the state which he embodied. The Chinese people have never really known freedom, their leaders have always been about authoritarianism and crushing any disturbance, including demands for freedom, with force. And now, Forbes, owned by China, is exporting China’s authoritarianism by demanding we all end up in the prison called the metaverse.
This is not the first such article and will certainly not be the last about humanity’s ‘need’ to adopt the metaverse into their lives. Forbes isn’t the only exporter of Chinese authoritarianism either. These types of articles are appearing more and more frequently in other publications as well. Dozens of articles are out there just from the last week including the coverage of a new book, the need to rewrite our laws and view justice from a digital perspective, and Walmart’s entry into the metaverse. All of these articles point to an implementation of Chinese authoritarianism for the whole globe. Anyone who doesn’t want to go to the metaverse will be left behind at best or just liquidated at worst – the Chinese system doesn’t have any respect for an individual.
That is the plan anyway. The primary driver of people being forced into the metaverse is coming from the business sector. This is why this Forbes article is so important to dissect. In the next paragraph the digital commodifization of humanity is described:
“‘In the metaverse, people will own everything they create, collaborating across a decentralized universe of experts,’ said Martin Wezowski, chief futurist at SAP New Ventures and Technology. ‘The metaverse is a new platform for value creation from human relationships and community-building. Imagine being on a business call where natural language processing catalogues the major discussion points, and blockchain technology tokenizes them for ownership by the speakers, creating immutable proof of each person’s expertise and value. Business leaders need to rethink strategies and operations to stay relevant in the creator economy.’”
What do people create in the metaverse? 0’s and 1’s and that’s it. They aren’t growing, transporting, selling, or preparing food. They aren’t providing water to communities. Those ones and zeros won’t build a house. Instead there is going to be a focus on entering an artificial intelligence directed digital gulag – voluntarily – in order to create relationships. In the meantime people will have to – again voluntarily – create an non-fungible token (NFT) of themselves.
NFT’s are interesting. Investopedia defines them:
“Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are cryptographic assets on a blockchain with unique identification codes and metadata that distinguish them from each other.
“Unlike cryptocurrencies, they cannot be traded or exchanged at equivalency. This differs from fungible tokens like cryptocurrencies, which are identical to each other and, therefore, can serve as a medium for commercial transactions.”
Any human being who creates an NFT out of themselves has basically given up on living a life in the real world. The same goes for anyone who creates a digital twin of themselves. That businesses, as well as other entities, are seeking to push the vast majority of humanity into the digital gulag is not being hidden. It’s being covered as an inevitability:
“‘Metaverse applications are expected to work across the real world, on your mobile device, in augmented reality on your goggles, and in the virtual world wherever you are, through any wearable,’ said Wezowski. ‘Currently there are closed environments in gaming or finance where blockchain technology creates NFTs — non-fungible tokens that have value. In manufacturing, some companies are using digital twins to capture and analyze sensor-based data from machines. The metaverse will scale distributed, verified data across billions of devices, transactions, and people.’”
All devices are to be connected. All locations are expected to facilitate the connectivity to allow permanent access to the metaverse. This is being brought to humanity through gaming and finance. It is the financiers who, as a group, hate physical humanity the most (if you are a financier, do you get why individuality is important yet?). They see the masses of humanity and seek to cull the population to make the world better for themselves. Gamers do it for entertainment. But that doesn’t go far enough, the metaverse needs to get everyone in it. As the Forbes article continues:
“‘We’re experimenting with the concept of the ‘digital ME’ that would serve as a digital representation of someone’s unique abilities, experiences, accomplishments, and ambitions,’ said Wezowski. ‘Knowledge Packs, plugged into your digital ME, could augment whatever tasks you’re performing and decisions you’re making. Instead of just translating a different language you’re hearing from a customer, the technology provides a cultural perspective to help you better understand and respond to their concerns in the moment. If protracted budget negotiations get frustrating, the technology offers conversational topics to move the discussion along faster.’”
Imagine, a world with a digital world where, as time progresses more and more of our time will need to be dedicated to doing things in the metaverse. The metaverse isn’t about language barriers and cultural understandings. It is about creating a world reminiscent of Ready Player One being ran by the machines of The Matrix. The Forbes piece wraps up with:
“Business metaverse could overcome consumer skepticism
“Emergence of the metaverse is five to 10 years out. However, unlike the first generation of the internet that began with consumers, the metaverse could be driven by post-pandemic work anywhere norms. While a Forrester survey found less than 30% of US and UK consumer respondents thought the metaverse would be good for society, one analyst blogged that ‘Metaverse-style experiences have a better chance of driving near-term value in the workplace….some employees who learn how to use metaverse-style experiences at work will want to use them at home too.’
“Indeed, Gartner analysts predicted 25% of people will spend at least one hour per day in the metaverse by 2026 for work, shopping, education, social and/or entertainment. Wezowski advised business leaders to start preparing now.
“‘In the first phase of the internet, people had to learn technology. The metaverse turns that around as technology will learn from people who are at the center of Web 3.0,’ he said. ‘People could be augmented to achieve their greatest creativity for themselves and the communities around them. Business networks would then act autonomously, fostering decentralized communities of innovation to their highest value. Now is the time to deploy your imagination department to envision your brand’s worth in this future environment.’”
Like I said, this isn’t about cultural understandings. It’s about getting us to voluntarily choose to live our lives in a digital gulag. When I say voluntary I mean that there will be two choices – play along and get your social credits for the day or don’t and starve to death in the real world. There is already so much that people don’t know how to do. I am no exemption to that criticism. I’m lousy at growing plants. I can’t identify poisonous versus non-poisonous plants which are good to eat. I don’t have solar panels. I can’t start a fire out of sticks and twigs. I think I need to start practicing these skills and become acquainted with them. While there are a lot of activities which I am not proficient at, I recognize where food and water comes from, how to build a shelter, and how to operate several varieties of weapons.
All of these things that I cannot adequately do will be things that don’t need to be done in the metaverse. Digital twins don’t need food and NFT’s don’t need to go to the bathroom. If we are supposed to reorganize society in order to live in the metaverse while we are still flesh and blood then where is the water going to come from and who is going to make sure it is up and running? How about the food? How about where we live? Well, those answers are all in the technological convergence between the Internet of Things, the Internet of People, artificial intelligence, bioengineering, the blockchain, robotics, digital currencies, and social credit scores. The metaverse is just the space which we will be allowed to occupy once this convergence takes place.
The metaverse could be regulated into utter uselessness before it begins to take over all of our lives. For instance, governments could just tell the businesses in their jurisdiction that the metaverse is not a legitimate place of business and everything that happens there is null and void. Likewise, governments could just ban humans making an NFT out of themselves by invalidating any legal right of an NFT. But those things need to happen sooner rather than later.
As for me, I will read my Bible. Before the wardens of the metaverse get too carried away, I think God will send His Son back to earth. We should all know what is going to happen when we hear the shofar around the globe – that’s it, time’s up, all the games are over. Now would be the time to read the Bible as well. Now is the time to pray for a reversal of current global events. If this is the run-up to the return of Jesus, those prayers won’t be heeded. If this is not the run-up to Jesus’ return, we need to take action to leave a real, physical world to hand over to our children. Blessing God; however, is a good start to getting written into the Book of Life, a great tool for teaching our children about the truth of this world, and, really, the only salvation anyone will ever find on this earth. We surely will not find any salvation in technological convergence nor in the metaverse. We need to individually reject it in our own lives and seek to get this piece of the technological hellhole being built around us outlawed.
Bless God and God bless.