I told my husband that I was going to the metaverse and he was on his own. On a Friday, I put on Meta's virtual-reality headset: the Quest 2, a bulky, white visor loaded with all manner of cameras, mics, speakers, eye displays and sensors.
The sounds of a gentle breeze and birds chirp replace the cries of "I want Mama to do bed time" when I power it up. I am on a mountain. I look at a river and a sky filled with hot-air balloons. This breathtaking spot is a lobby where I can load an app.
At least 300,000 people hang out as cartoon versions of themselves on Meta's V.R.-based social network, where they build virtual mansions, nightclubs, gardens and theaters.
A world with a comedy club under the stars is what I chose. The man in the gray hoodie came up to me. I said hello. He looks at me in reply.
There is another person approaching me. He has a beard and a man bun, and wears a shirt that doesn't have a button on it. He read the white card above my head. Is it possible to speak French?
"I don't speak French," I said. He is floating away.
A person wearing a baseball cap picks up the microphone. He asked if he could hear a story about his school, suggesting a tale of sixth- grade troubles. I'm alone in my office and someone who sounds like he's standing to my left says "I do not want to hear this"
The executive in charge of "the spatial co-present version of the internet" that the company formerly known as Facebook has staked its future on, said that the company's future lies in the metaverse. Meta has changed the way nearly three billion users share information and waste time.
More than 15 million metaverse-enabled headsets have been sold, but people still don't believe in an internet that's real. The company's stock price has plummeted since last year, when the CEO announced that he would spend billions of dollars to bring the metaverse to the rest of the world.
Skeptics mock Meta's plans but how many of them have actually experienced the metaverse? I decided to try it out and define it as the metaverse, a virtual platform for events, business meetings and user-constructed spaces.
My goal was to visit every hour of the day and night, all 24 of them at least once, to learn about the ebb and flow of the metaverse. Over the past few months, I've given up television, books and a lot of sleep to become an animated, floating, legless version of myself.
I wanted to know if the rest of us would ever join them.
One Saturday morning, my dog woke me up so I could go outside. The rest of the family was sound asleep, so I pulled my headset on with my hands that were out-of-control itchy.
I went to the Plaza, the social network's brightly colored, central gathering place, where one can shoot hoops on a basketball court, climb treehouses, throw paper airplanes and play a floor piano.
The sound of other people complaining about being made to eat, or someone coughing, made me flinch even though the real-world germs were very real, because I am not a video game player.
I used my hand controller to control my movements. I almost fell over the first time I did this. The metaverse was the best place to sit down because of its games and exercise apps.
I talked to some people who had just joined. In December of last year, Meta released its social network in the US and Canada and is slowly rolling it out to the rest of the world. I met Shy Boogie, a single mom from Southern California, who was part of a large group of parents who had once enjoyed going out but were now stuck at home with their children.
In January, she got her headset, and since then, she says, she's met "cool people." She said the problem is the number of children who disrupt her time with other adults. The characters with childish voices interrupted us. One agreed to use his mom's headset.
Users were uncomfortable by being asked too much information about their lives.
She asked the 17-year-old where he came from.
He paused and said "Oregon."
She wanted to know what town it was.
Many people choose to look as they do in real life, but pseudonymity is still part of the appeal.
I told people that I was a New York Times reporter when I used my real name. The P.O.V. camera didn't let others know when it was turned on. People would shout "She's a fed!" when I told them I was recording.
I realized that my itch had vanished when she floated off for a private tte--tte with a man. Virtual reality therapy has been used to treat some serious conditions. The metaverse was more powerful than hydrocortisone cream.
Sam Ferrer is an illustrator based in the New York metropolitan area. She said that the metaverse helped her through a tough time.
She said that she might be dead if she hadn't picked up a V.R. headset.
She moved to where she had no friends at the beginning of the Pandemic after graduating from college. She walked into an Amazon 4-star store in December of 2020 and purchased a Quest 2. She began social networking in virtual reality on the apps AltSpace and vTime.
She likes when the metaverse is at its peak. She rests under a weighted blanket in her bed with a snack and a drink. She plugs her headset into a wall outlet to make sure the battery doesn't run out when she's tired.
The pattern is common among the metaverse's early adopters who don't want to be limited to two hours by the headset's built-in battery According to the World Health Organization, there is no health risk from the fields emitted by electronic devices. While plugged in, the headset was safe to use.
I had the most interesting conversations with artists and technologists from all over the world when I went to the metaverse in the wee hours. They were there for many hours at a time. I Love My Cat is a beret wearing person who is concerned about how long people wear their headsets. She was a community guide who was hired by Meta to hang out in the Plaza and answer questions. During her eight hour shift, she took a break every hour or so.
She said that she was talking to someone who had been on for more than a day. I don't understand how they do it.
It is easy to misplace time in the program. There isn't a clock on the walls. She said it was what she did now that was different.
Ms. Ferrer likes the simplicity of the graphics. A meeting of the minds is offered by Horizon, which allows users to focus on the things that matter.
She said it was refreshing to be seen for who she is rather than what she looks like. I don't want to make my life about it. I still go out to bars and meet people, but I always have this to return to.
I was reminded of the AOL chat rooms from my earliest days on the internet, but here I was making eye contact with the people I had met.
I read a product safety manual in its entirety, or at least from the front to the spot where it moved into French, when I got my Quest 2.
I was warned about possible side effects. I was told to set up a safe play space away from walls, furniture, televisions, ceiling fans, stairs and windows, because once a user puts the headset on, it's time to use it.
Children under the age of 13 shouldn't use the headset, and those over the age of 13 shouldn't use it for long periods.
I thought I looked like a failed version of the future, but my child was fascinated. She wanted to use my goggles. She was allowed to play a game in which she cared for a baby alien. She ran away from me after I tried to take the headset away. She was all right.
I always ran into children when I went into the metaverse. On my first visit to the Plaza, a guy in a gray blazer excitedly told me that he had joined the company the day before and had been there for eight hours. I was invited to play a zombie-shooting game. I exclaimed, "They're little kids!" when they appeared.
He said that he was as well.
He told me that he was in the camp of people with more brain damage than the zombies. There are a lot of people running around. This means that the company finally has a product that appeals to the generation that has largely rejected social networking sites. Community guides told me that only users younger than 13 were kicked out of the app.
I badeDustin and the other players farewell because my headset battery was low. One asked, "Why don't you play?" I didn't like the expression that was used for the behavior. I didn't want my headset to be plugged in while it was on my head.
I wondered if the young man would understand the allusion to a 1999 science-fiction movie about pale humans encased in goo and plugged into a simulation machine.
During my 20th hour in the metaverse, I got a shock to the system. A group of men are playing on a piano in the Plaza. A guy warned me.
He advised against going over there. They don't seem right, bro. Trust me.
I floated over to three people shooting hoops.
Four men came over and attacked me.
One with a popped collar asked what was up. A hairy guy in glasses hit me five times. There was a person throwing paper airplanes at me. They all jumped and talked at the same time. Two people are humping each other. It wasn't threatening but it was unpleasant.
There is explicit language in the following clip.
The metaverse is a new place to troll. While surrounded by kids in the Plaza, a popular YouTuber namedEthan Klein tried to be as explicit as possible. He was kicked out and banned for two hours.
Andrew Bosworth, Meta's chief technology officer, said the company wants " almost Disney levels of safety." A personal boundary, a "safe mode" that allows a user to escape into a solitary confinement cell, and a polling function are some of the user tools designed to deter virtual assaults.
The users are asked if they want their audio recorded. They can't talk in Horizon if they refuse. Audio can only be sent to Meta if someone files a report about harassment, for example. The captured conversations can be used to ban users for a few hours or a month.
I laughed off their behavior and told them that I was a reporter, not just their audio, instead of heading into safe mode. The civilizing effect was achieved by this.
I went to the Soapstone Comedy Club after the Plaza encounter because a woman was slurring her words. A man in a suit and a red hat asked if anyone wanted to hear jokes about race. The crowd groaned, and hisavatar went into sleep mode, potentially being kicked out of the club for violating house rules.
Unemployed Alcoholic is the creator of the Soapstone Comedy Club. Mr. Sorrels quit his marketing job to become a comedian. He was adrift until he heard that Mr. Facebook was spending billions on the metaverse.
Mr Sorrels said that now is the time to get involved. He bought three headsets to beam in comedians, but found that building a world for amateur comedians was more successful.
The club now gets over 12,000 visitors a week. He accepts donations from supporters, who get access to a private lounge, and he is one of a few creators who Meta allows to monetize their worlds. The Soapstone has millions more listens than the last confirmed tally of hundreds of thousands of users. Mr. Sorrels said he was now running a cartoon comedy club full time.
I chatted with a man named Malefic, who had a goatee and earrings, but his real-world self was not. He had been playing video games with friends for six hours. When they went to sleep, he came toHorizon, his headset plugged into the wall, to relax and have a good time. It's like skiing at a bar.
When the birds chirp, you know you are in trouble, said Mr. Cronin. You don't have to get up and dress yourself up. You place your headset on. Right now, I'm legit in pajamas.
People started gathering around us to talk about the metaverse. A guy in a beanie said it was fun to party here. He said it was difficult to smoke a bowl with this headset on.
Despite Meta's warnings against using the headset under the influence, many people are drinking, dancing and having a good time at the clubs.
The parties can't get too crazy. Only a couple dozen people can fit in each of the more than 10,000 worlds that have been created. Computational power is required to create a virtual shared space. You will end up in an overflow room if a world fills up.
I got a notification from my headset that Mr. Cronin wanted to do it. He told an extended joke about how having children changes you because of the way they look at you. It cracked up the people assembled in a virtual room on a Sunday. You had to be there.
It was difficult to find the time to go into the metaverse. I wore a headset while working out on a bike. I was breathing heavily and my eye display was fogged up, but I was able to manage it for 40 minutes. I did not want to sleep in the headset.
I am that person. One night in the Soapstone, Sam, a redheaded man in a blazer, said he slept in his headset. Imagine waking up in the most amazing place in the world.
She insisted that she was serious, even though she thought she was joking. What do you think your room looks like? She wanted to know if you want to live the rest of your life there.
I told her that I liked my room. She asked if she wanted to die at that location.
I said that I didn't want to die soon, but that I liked my bedroom.
She thought that was depressing. You should strive to be better.
The term "metaverse" was used in Neal Stephenson's 1992 science-fiction novel, "Snow Crash", to describe a digital space where people could escape their gloomy realities. Hiro is a pizza delivery man who lives in a storage unit with his roommate. He is a warrior in the computer-generated world, and he wears goggles.
Matthew Ball, a techentrepreneur who wrote a book about how the metaverse would change everything, said that the metaverse has been unfolding over decades. He said it was not something that would change our lives this decade.
The view of hot-air balloons from Mr. Ball's villa was the same as mine. He doesn't use the headset a lot, but he does speak at public speaking events. He likes to play online games on his consoles such as the PS or XBOX.
Mr. Ball spoke about the technological constraints that kept the Quest 2 small. A less cartoony metaverse is1-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-6556 is1-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-6556 He said a high-powered V.R. headset called the Varjo Aero had more impressive graphics than the Apple headset. The cost of the Varjo Aero is more than $2,000.
Who can afford technology is often the determining factor in early adoption. I met people from all over the world in my time in the metaverse. It is not possible to know if anavatar reflects a person's real-verse appearance or not. Regardless of whether or not entering the metaverse is a wise way to spend one's time, Meta's headset is available to anyone with $400 for a vacation from reality.
I woke up full of energy after I fell asleep and put my kids to bed. I had to break my rule because I didn't charge the headset when I went into the metaverse. I plugged in and played the game.
The internet was slow so I moved to my husband's office. He had a lot of weights for his workouts. There was only one outlet on the floor. The room was not warm. I hid under a blanket on the floor, with a computer on my head, trying to avoid hitting my hand on a dumbbell.
It was a low point in the real world, but in the metaverse, I was Iron Man, zooming around a popular world where users assume their powers. I wondered how Disney could have not yet blasted this world out of existence with a copyrighted-infringement cannon. I cried out in pain as I whacked my hand against the coffee table.
I had injured myself before. I hit a TV, a bed, a desk and my 2-year-old's head with my controllers. I was surprised to find only one report of a serious incident involving the Quest 2, which was a woman who cut her mouth on a console table. People from 6 years old to 66 years old were the ones who had developed a rash on their face.
I encountered a user for the first time in more than a day and a half when Malefic appeared in a mask. An 11-year-old cursed and began attacking everyone with a hammer around 3 a.m. The kid was taken out of the room by someone.
Malefic said that the adults should play with the superhero toys. In the metaverse, comedy is popular.
There is a sign at the club that says not to be easily offended and not to be racist. A man smoking a digital blunt cornered me to talk about the woman he liked. I left quickly.
I met Elite, a bouncer with a Fu Manchu and white hair, inside the club. Elite, a New York City-based engineer who is of Portuguese and African descent, likes to watch kung fu movies. I look completely different than this.
For privacy reasons, Elite has established himself as a "world breaker." He is paid to look for bugs and glitch. A group of entrepreneurs are trying to make money in the metaverse. Tannless had close-cropped blond hair just like his real-world self and he was in the club.
Mr. Rulli said that networking in the metaverse is normal.
I was taken to a virtual furniture store, where world creators could buy intricate lamps and tables for as much as $40.
There aren't a lot of options for people to make money in here, but it's my passion.
There was a woman with a nose ring in the comedy club.
She asked if he was a moderation. You aren't doing what you're supposed to be doing.
Some guys in the club are being racist.
He fell down on his job.
My friends and family all asked the same question when I told them about my experiment. Do you think it's fun?
I didn't like putting on the headset, but once I started chatting, I was happy and didn't want to leave. I like meeting people on the street.
It feels like explaining the metaverse through the lens ofHorizon feels like unpacking the potential of the web in the 1990s. The V.R. social network is part of a larger technological shift.
The headset offers experiences other than chatting with strangers that will keep me coming back to it, even though it won't be my job anymore. Beat Saber is a game in which players swing a lightsaber at blocks to the beat of electronic music. It requires a lot of physical activity to be considered exercise.
Surrounded is a comedy show that was filmed at the Montreal festival in July. Pete and Nicole Byer were two of the seven comedians who performed in the center of a small audience. It is possible to attend real world events in the metaverse.
My husband said that he had never heard me laugh so hard.
Making the headset lighter is one of the things that the companies pushing the metaverse need to do. I tried to get my colleagues to meet me when I was working on this story, but they didn't. It wasn't hard to zoom.
I met with the vice-president of Meta at the end of my experiment. The Meta employees who arranged the meeting were relieved when we arrived. Mr. Shah said that the company wanted to make the headset more comfortable but also to allow people to visit the metaverse without one.
Mr. Shah told me how often he wore his headset. He said it would take a couple of hours to do work and then a couple of hours for fun. I can only do things in a headset.
The fruition of Meta's very expensive gamble on this technology seemed promising. Mr. Shah told a story about a team meeting in which Meta employees shared stories from vacations.
He was going to say that his employees had captured their trips around the world with V.R. cameras and that everyone had jumped from the virtual conference table into the best moments of their travels.
It was not a big deal.
It is awkward if you have been on a big call with a bunch of faces. We were all in a work room. I said my story. I looked in the opposite direction. The person left. Head nod and acknowledgement followed. We continued to go around the room.
It didn't seem like a great use case. The internet coming to surround us, accessible at the snap of a finger, is one of the things Mark Zuckerberg talks about when he waxes poetic about the metaverse. One of the things that I like to do is think about how few physical things we have in the world.
The company is constrained by the physical world and the fact that most people, apart from those currently in the metaverse, don't want to spend hours and hours of their day in the plastic.
Meta is working on making its headsets more appealing, and is expected to announce a new model at a virtual event it will host next week called Connect. If you find something to smile about in the metaverse, your digital character will smile along with you, because the new headset has more sensors aimed at the face.
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