On meta and verses

free to be Web3 and me

I actually like social media. I want to stay connected to my network of people from old jobs, and years past, and stages of life that have long gone by. Am I going to need to do it while wearing goggles that I pull on like a pair of sunglasses?

It’s Friday, late afternoon on Thanksgiving weekend, and I’ve just unloaded three more boxes from the basement onto the dining table. I’ve been at it all day, pacing the wood floor in my socks, and unwrapping a hundred shiny trinkets of all shapes and sizes. The wood stove is roaring, but I’m hot now, so I throw open the sliding glass door to a blast of cold air tinged with the scent of wet oak leaves and a white sky beyond the branches, foreboding snow.

I’ve been slowly decorating for hours, still in my pajamas, carrying one ornament at a time, and placing each object in a dark space not occupied by a brilliant white light.

My pre-lit fake tree largely gave up on its one job to illuminate. Every year, I think that this will be the one when I bring home a real tree again. I even saved the tree stand, the kind that needs to be checked every day by dipping one finger inside to touch the tepid water, sticky with sap.

I’m not interested in the significance of my actual ornaments, either. I only want to perform this geometric task by myself, bending the pipe-cleaner-like branches upwards, pushing the tangled wires toward the center. I’m hoping that later, when it’s finished, nobody will see the string of 300 additional mini lights wrapped on top of the unlit ones already there.

I think I put up the Christmas tree alone as a kind of meditation, and each time I decide to keep the fake one, giving in fully to its meta message. I’ve got real trees outside, after all. And this is just a decoration, right? Just a blast of light in a dark corner of the house, in a dark time of the year—in a dark time in the world, even.

I read something in Time a couple weeks ago when I was trying to wrap my head around the next iteration of social media. In his article, “The Metaverse Has Already Arrived. Here’s What That Actually Means,” author Peter Allen Clarke says:

“At its core, the metaverse (also known to many as “web3”) is an evolution of our current Internet. Whether in virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) or simply on a screen, the promise of the metaverse is to allow a greater overlap of our digital and physical lives in wealth, socialization, productivity, shopping and entertainment.

I sent a friend of mine a message on FB this morning telling him that I was grateful to be looking at his post of family photos. I spend so much time scrolling past ad after ad after ad, I barely see anything resembling true connection anymore. I’m close to giving up on the platform entirely, and maybe I’m not alone here. Where are all my friends online?

“Looking good,” says my spouse Janyce passing through the living room on her way to the kitchen. “I’m going out to get some exercise, you want to come?”

“No,” I say. “But could you change Spotify first. The flute solo is about to play again in the Brandenburg Concertos that have been looping all afternoon.”

I actually like social media. I want to stay connected to my network of people from old jobs, and years past, and stages of life that have long gone by. Am I going to need to do it while wearing goggles that I pull on like a pair of sunglasses? “You’re walking by a restaurant, you look at it, the menu pops up. What your friends have said about it pops up,” says Clarke.

I wonder about what it means for us humans to be headed into the metaverse, further embedded each year into the digital worlds of Discord, Fortnite, and Roblox.

Makes me think of a poem I like by Anna M. Evans

“The Non-Euclidean Universe”

A line that looks dead straight can be an arc

like the horizon when you’re out at sea.

True distance is deceptive: in the dark

it can’t be measured. Yes, you made a mark

or two, in fact, but you can barely see.

A line that should be straight becomes an arc,

the path that’s traveled by a welder’s spark

when danger’s just a matter of degree.

Since distance can’t be measured in the dark

most people turn the light on. And the stark

divisions blind them with geometry.

A line that isn’t straight is called an arc—

no! Think outside the box! Perhaps a quark

moves like a knight in chess, a hop-two-three.

(True distance is deceptive.) In the dark

all rules break down completely. What a lark!

The future’s coming at you in 4D.

A line that should be straight looks like an arc.

True distance can deceive you in the dark.