The CEO of Pokemon Go maker Niantic Labs is not a fan of the so-called metaverse popularized in various science fiction properties like Ready Player One. Earlier this week, Niantic Labs co-founder John Hanke wrote a lengthy blogpost on Niantic’s webpage about the metaverse and how it represents the opposite of what Niantic is trying to build with its augmented reality games and projects. The metaverse is the idea of a virtual reality that users escape into through the use of avatars. Examples of the metaverse include the digital worlds seen in properties like Ready Player One or Sword Art Online. “I’m not denying that the metaverse is a cool concept from a technology point of view; it comes from one of my favorite sci-fi writers, Neal Stephenson, who coined the term in his 1992 novel, ‘Snow Crash,’” Hanke wrote. “A lot of people these days seem very interested in bringing this near-future vision of a virtual world to life, including some of the biggest names in technology and gaming. But in fact these novels served as warnings about a dystopian future of technology gone wrong.”
