34. Into the Metaverse

In July 2021 Mark Zuckerberg declared that the future of Facebook is the metaverse, but as a concept it’s not new, having first been coined in the 1992 sci-fi novel, Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson. It now yields nearly 6m results in Google Search, though it's far from universally defined. At WGSN we introduced the concept of the metaverse in Future Innovations 2022, calling it a shared virtual space that can be roamed widely. We then published a Research Radar, exploring its potential as a successor to the internet, poised to become the future of all digital media and commerce. In this episode we’ll be discussing the signs that brands and consumers are moving towards this future immersive phygital world. We explain how brands can enter it and look at the parties transforming it and the potential it holds for the future.