Wagner James Au / New World Notes
Author, strategist, virtual world reporter
recent posts
- Welcome to New World Notes’ 2006-2025 Archive!
- Virtual World Usage Stats from S&P Global Market Intelligence — Plus VRChat & Second Life Specifics!
- Top Five Posts Including: Huge Rec Room Layoff & Meta Boots Neal Stephenson Off Facebook (Briefly)
- Four Glorious Second Life Sims to Explore — After Watching Sabina Valeska’s Machinima Tributes to Them!
- Virtual World Usage Stats from S&P Global Market Intelligence — Plus VRChat & Second Life Specifics!
about
Category: Making the Metaverse
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Above: A Horizon Creator Community jam that Diaz managed Is Horizon Worlds a more powerful platform than we give it credit for? Social scientist Dr. Ruth Diaz, who was formerly a Community Design Developer for Meta, recently shared some user-made Horizon Worlds builds with me (above), arguing that the platform has several features which do…
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Above: Experience offered on the Meta Horizons page Meta Connect is happening next week, and longtime New World Notes reader Martin K, an executive who works in XR, recently sent me some intriguing thoughts around Meta’s Horizon Worlds. On the surface, it’s an also-ran metaverse platform that has such a tiny user base, it barely…
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Why the Metaverse is Beating Gen AI https://t.co/0CegcGDiSk — Open Metaverse Interoperability Group (@open_metaverse) September 6, 2024 https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js Thanks to everyone from the Open Metaverse Interoperability Group especially host @jimmy6DOF for the fun and spicy conversation last Friday — you can listen to the whole thing above (starting around 4 minutes in), with some particular…
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My in-depth interview with Gizem Mishi Akin of Blueberry fame is coming soon, but meantime, I've posted an excerpt of Gizem's incredible Second Life story from my book Making a Metaverse That Matters on my Patreon, free for all members: Once upon a time, a girl sitting by herself in an ancient city traveled through…
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Join Wagner James Au @slhamlet with us on Friday! Open House & Talking all things Metaverse — what it was — what it is — what it could be — and why he thinks it's beating GenAI !!! Here on X starting :11AM(PST) 2PM(EST) 6PM(UTC) pic.twitter.com/3OQTiPIAzO — Open Metaverse Interoperability Group (@open_metaverse) September 4, 2024…
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The growth of leading metaverse platforms in 2024 is now nearly 700 million active users — increasing by 140 million people since Making a Metaverse That Matters came out last year. (See chart.) But why are platforms like Roblox and Fortnite — or for that matter, Second Life — so successful? Plainly put: Because the Metaverse, more…
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In case you missed it from my online Afterword, here's the current metaverse platform leaders tracked in Making a Metaverse That Matters. Overall, total monthly metaverse platform active user growth tracked in this chat increased by 140 million people, for a total global audience of roughly 690 million in 2024. This is very much a…
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Matt Ball has a must-read post on the paradoxical phenomena of Roblox: In terms of active users, it's both the most popular metaverse platform by far and most popular online game in the world, but somehow continues to be unprofitable. (Second Life, despite a tiny user base compared to Roblox, makes an estimated $20-30 million…
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It’s a bit more than a year since Making a Metaverse That Matters reached bookshelves in June 2023. Barbenheimer be damned, my awesome wife Brooke even thoughtfully placed it above American Prometheus (the basis of Chris Nola’s biopic) in our local Barnes & Noble. Much about the Metaverse has changed since then, while much has remained constant.…
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The new edition of Matthew Ball's landmark book, The Metaverse, is out today, and boasts a new subtitle: Where the original 2022 version was And How It Will Revolutionize Everything, this greatly expanded edition arrives with the more modest and targeted subtitle, Building the Spatial Internet. "I never liked the [original] subtitle," Matt tells me.…
Wagner James Au / New World Notes 