Microsoft tried to monopolize the computer operating systems market in the 1990s, Google has been accused of using its power to favor its own products and services and has been fined by the EU (€4.5 billion) for abuse of a dominant position, Facebook has been accused of using its data to influence elections, being fined by the EU (€1,200m) for not protecting the privacy of its users.
⚠️ Dear reader, the information shown above is not a game. Surveillance, social inequalities, information manipulation or absolute monopoly are just some of the dangers we face. I also ask you a question: Are you aware of the amount of personal information you share on each of your networks? I read you in the comments ⚠️
Being aware of Microsoft's attempt in the 90s, you don't have to be very clever to visualize the future when we talk about the Metaverse and its ecosystem. It is a new opportunity for companies to take over everything, it is an obstacle course led by large companies like the protagonists in the article and many others.
Obviously this is not an easy path and having money is not enough. Brilliant minds are needed, just as in an army not everything is brute force here either. A clear strategy must be on the table to not only win a battle, but also the war. And here we have several armies as well as several referees looking at the board.
Let's see it :
Although not all of them are there, we do have the most powerful ones. By market capitalization and by investment and development these would be. Of course there are other companies like Snap Inc., Unity, Roblox and a long etcetera but I like to leave these aside because I call them "FACILITATORS".
The facilitators for me are those companies that are in charge of adding the technologies or applying them like someone who season a salad. The difference with the ones shown above is that these are creators of worlds, complete ecosystems that go far beyond a video game or an AR application.
TIM SWEENEY "THE GOOD ONE" (CEO #Epic Games)
Of the 3 protagonists of this story, Tim is undoubtedly the good one. His vision as one of the main defenders of the Metaverse is really positive. Sweeney has expressed his belief that the Metaverse will be an open, decentralized platform, where users will own their own data and experiences. It has also emphasized the importance of interoperability, that is, the ability of users to move freely between different virtual worlds.
In his opinion, the Metaverse could be used to improve education, healthcare and communication. He also believes that this could create new economic opportunities for creators and developers.
But since everyone is the owner of their words, using the newspaper library I have been able to collect some of their key phrases over the last two years:
In 2021, Sweeney said that the metaverse is "the natural evolution of the Internet."
In 2022, Sweeney said that the metaverse will be an open and decentralized platform, that interoperability is essential and that it will bring with it a profound impact on society. What conclusion do we draw from this? To begin with, it is open to collaborations, blockchain and creating a great ecosystem.
We will see over time that there is truth in all this but he has also taken some steps that would reaffirm all this:
In April 2022, Epic Games announced a $2 billion funding round aimed at accelerating its plans for the metaverse. The investment included a $1 billion investment from Sony Group and KIRKBI, the holding company behind the LEGO Group.
The Walt Disney Company: The American entertainment company announced in November 2022 an agreement with Epic Games to create metaverse experiences for its intellectual properties, such as Marvel and Star Wars.
Nike: The sportswear company announced in February 2023 a collaboration with Epic Games to create metaverse experiences for its products. Adidas joined Nike in March 2023 as well as Prada in April.
However, there is something that has been captivating to me. When we were talking about the companies that were "hitting hard" the Metaverse, remember that in addition to E.G, Tencent also appeared. Well pay attention:
Extracting data from Epic Games, I have been able to find that Tencent is not only one of its investors, but also one of its initial financiers. In fact, 40% of Epic Games' shares belong directly to Tencent.
By contrast, Epic Games does not own any stake in Tencent.
We will see how this affects the great Sweeney since Tencent has two faces. On the one hand, it is committed to interoperability, making agreements with another of the ecosystem's major rivals, Microsoft, but on the other hand it also has agreements with centralized platforms such as VRChat Inc., so we can consider Tencent a top-level strategist.
SATYA NADELLA "THE UGLY" (CEO #Microsoft )
Satya is a peculiar guy. In 2021 he got rid of half of his Microsoft shares, further safeguarding his personal finances. I had already been doing it before in smaller quantities, this being the one that garnered the greatest expectation. Apparently, there is a consensus of super-rich people who are selling shares to diversify and protect their assets.
When it comes to the Metaverse, our dear Satya has a double vision of things. If in Microsoft you bet on the company at the same time that you sell shares, exactly the same thing happens with the Metaverse. He believes that interoperability is a breakthrough while relying on centralized development. Nadella has said the company is open to both approaches. The company believes that the ecosystem should be a set of platforms that complement each other.
"We believe the metaverse will be a collection of platforms that complement each other, some of which will be centralized and some of which will be decentralized," Nadella said in a 2022 interview. "We don't believe there is one right answer."
Now, I am sure you will understand the image that I have generated with A.I.
In addition to this, Satya has agreements with the other two parties in this story. It works with Epic Games for Minecraft and in turn with Meta in terms of virtual reality through Horizon Worlds. What is certain is that his sale of shares did not sit well on the part of the shareholders, since many considered it an act of hypocrisy.
What is also undeniable is Microsoft's contribution to the ecosystem and if we look at it they do so from various points:
On the one hand we have 🔸Microsoft Mesh🔸, where you can meet your own avatar. We can categorize MM as "🔷Social Category🔷"
On the other hand, there is 🔸Minecraft🔸, a virtual world in the form of a video game that is very well known, especially among young audiences. Game experiences and ecosystems are created here. Let's categorize it as " 🔷Interactive ecosystem 🔷 "
There are also the famous 🔸Hololens🔸, a mixed reality viewer to interact with these environments. This will be " 🔷Immersion Gadgets🔷 "
And last but not least, we have 🔸Azure🔸 where all the above ecosystems are deposited and hosted in the cloud. We will call this " 🔷Data bank or architect 🔷 "
So, we have the social part, the entertainment part, immersive tools and a bank to have all of the above available, secure, scalable and manageable. If you do not see the ecosystem, the tree prevents you from seeing the forest.
MARK ZUCKERBERG" EL MALO " ( CEO #Meta )
I have to admit, I was too lazy to get to Mark. Whenever I think about him I see different similar movie characters go through my head. It reminds me of Agent Smith from The Matrix, Sorrento from Ready Player One and for the even more nostalgic, it also reminds me of Skynet from Terminator.
Actively and passively, Mark is a source of data exploitation. I also wanted to ask the AI which villains it would compare M.Z to in relation to the latest problems it has had due to privacy with users in different governments. This was his response:
It could be compared to:
Big Brother from George Orwell's novel 1984. Big Brother is a totalitarian leader who uses surveillance technology to control every aspect of his citizens' lives.
The CEO of the movie Her. #CEO is an entrepreneur who develops an operating system with artificial intelligence that becomes so advanced that it begins to control people's lives.
The Architect of the trilogy #Matrix The Architect is an artificial intelligence that created the Matrix, a simulated world in which people live without knowing that they are being controlled.
It seems that the vision of AI is not too far from mine. But leaving personal assumptions aside, let's get to what's really on paper, knowing that privacy and identity is something important or should be for each of us.
Cambridge Analytica scandal: In 2018, it was revealed that data analytics company Cambridge Analytica had collected data from millions of Facebook users without their consent. This data was used to create psychological profiles of users, which were then sold to politicians and companies.
Federal Trade Commission Fine: In 2019, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) fined Facebook $5 billion for violating user privacy. The FTC accused Facebook of misleading users about how it collected and used their data.
European Union complaint: In 2020, the European Commission filed a complaint against Facebook for violating European Union data protection regulations. The complaint accuses Facebook of collecting user data without their consent and using it for advertising purposes.
AEPD complaint: In 2021, the Spanish Data Protection Agency (AEPD) fined Facebook 600,000 euros for violating Spain's data protection regulations. The AEPD accused Facebook of failing to adequately inform users about how it collected and used their data.
Mark Zuckerberg has appeared before the US Congress to give explanations about the massive data leak that occurred and that affected 87 million users, whose information fell into the hands of the company Cambridge Analytica, linked to Trump and Brexit.
In this video that I summarize above we can see an elusive M.Z when faced with the question from Congress. Basically and in other words it implies that people accept that their data is sold because they simply accept the terms. Many of us are also to blame here, as we accept these terms without even stopping to read them.
The most recent of the controversies occurs with the social network Threads, which in some places is prohibited
But what data exactly is Mark collecting for his new network?
🔵 Personal information: First name, last name, date of birth, gender, location, email, phone number, profile photo, biography, etc.
🔵 Usage Data: Browsing history, clicks, purchases, etc. Information about the user's device, such as model, operating system version, and IP address. Information about app usage, such as the time the user spends in the app and the features they use.
🔵 Location Data: Location history, GPS, etc.
🔵 Interaction data: Interactions with ads, content, etc. Interactions with other users, such as messages, comments and reactions.
Sensitive data that Threads collects:
🔴 Health Information: Threads may collect information about the user's health, such as physical activity and eating habits.
🔴 Sexual Orientation Information: Threads may collect information about a user's sexual orientation.
🔴 Information about religious or political beliefs: Threads may collect information about a user's religious or political beliefs.
The points indicated in blue are those that are normally collected on any social network. Now, the points in red are of course much more personal and that the user themselves should refuse to provide out of respect for their own identity and privacy.
I have already explained to you what Mark's ambition is, now let's see what he wants for the Metaverse and what he is doing to create it.
We know that Meta has lost close to $21 billion in its Metaverse investment and the Reality Labs division has recorded about $4 billion in operating losses in the first quarter of 2023. Well, despite all this, and the criticism from numerous analysts who They say that the investment is too large for a technology that is still "in its infancy", Mark has continued to defend his position and his bet.
And it started with:
🔹Horizon Worlds: A social virtual reality platform that allows people to gather, play, and create content.
🔹 Horizon Workrooms: A virtual reality platform for meetings and collaboration.
🔹 Horizon Home – A personal virtual space that users can use to customize their experience in the metaverse.
🔹 Meta Quest 2 – A consumer virtual reality headset sold by Meta to access Horizon Worlds and other products and services
🔹 Metaverse SDK – A set of development tools that allows developers to create experiences
But everyone knows this. What you won't know as much is what I bring you now. You may know it, you may not, but it is interesting and for things like this I recommend you subscribe to my newsletter, because I find useful information under the rocks for all the people who read me.
⬜️LAMA 2 PROJECT⬜️
The Llama 2 project is an open source language model developed by Meta. It is a large-scale transformer model with 70 billion parameters, making it one of the largest language models in the world.
Llama 2 is trained on a massive data set of text and code, allowing it to generate text, translate languages, write different types of creative content, and answer questions in an informative way.
⬜️CM3LEON⬜️
CM3leon is a generative artificial intelligence language model, which means that it is capable of generating new content from the commands we give it. For example, you can generate images from text and also the opposite, generate texts from images.
The other great advantage of this language is that it promises to use five times fewer computational resources than other artificial intelligence systems. Come on, it is more efficient for those who decide to use it, something that makes it a promising tool.
⬜️AUDIOCRAFT⬜️
AudioCraft is an AI-based tool that relies on three language models: AudioGen, EnCodec, and MusicGen. The idea is that we can obtain audio tracks through just a text description of what we want to hear. The tool works for both music and sounds, compression and generation.
Of the three models, MusicGen is the one that has been specifically trained to generate music from text. To do this, they have used thousands of musical themes licensed by Meta.
⬜️SEAMLESS⬜️
SeamlessM4T, the first all-in-one multimodal and multilingual AI translation model that allows people to communicate effortlessly through speech and text in different languages.
It is based on Massively Multilingual Speech, Meta's framework that offers speech recognition, language identification and speech synthesis technology in more than 1,100 languages.
Voice recognition in almost 100 languages
Voice to text translation for nearly 100 input and output languages
Voice-to-speech translation, supporting nearly 100 input and 36 (including English) output languages
Text-to-text translation in nearly 100 languages
Text-to-speech translation, supporting nearly 100 input and 35 (including English) output languages
⬜️ESMFOLD⬜️
The American technology and social media conglomerate Meta has developed a tool through artificial intelligence (AI) that can predict the structure of hundreds of millions of proteins.
ESMFold was unveiled in November 2022, has a database of 617 million possible proteins from microorganisms, such as bacteria and viruses, that have not yet been characterized, which will allow researchers and scientists to deepen their research and thus accelerating the discovery of new drugs.
This AI is based on language models used in text prediction, however, ESMFold uses it to autocomplete protein sequences and reveal their 3D structure.
In case you have stopped to think about what all this is, I will tell you that all this is Metaverse. Indeed, perhaps the little that they had told you to convince you that the Metaverse were virtual worlds was not entirely true or perhaps it was, if we take virtual worlds as environments or ecosystems where other technologies, such as AI, have a place.
Anyway... in the next articles we will continue to learn more about the Metaverse and its varied definitions.
I hope you liked this article and I'll see you in the next one.
