Citation: Mystakidis, S. Metaverse.
Encyclopedia 2022, 2, 486–497.
https://doi.org/10.3390/
encyclopedia2010031
Academic Editors: Ahmad
Taher Azar and Raffaele Barretta
Received: 28 December 2021
Accepted: 9 February 2022
Published: 10 February 2022
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Entry
Metaverse
Stylianos Mystakidis
1,2
1
School of Natural Sciences, University of Patras, 26504 Patras, Greece; smyst@upatras.gr
2
School of Humanities, Hellenic Open University, 26335 Patras, Greece
Definition:
DefinitionThe Metaverse is the post-reality universe, a perpetual and persistent multiuser
environment merging physical reality with digital virtuality. It is based on the convergence of tech-
nologies that enable multisensory interactions with virtual environments, digital objects and people
such as virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR). Hence, the Metaverse is an interconnected
web of social, networked immersive environments in persistent multiuser platforms. It enables
seamless embodied user communication in real-time and dynamic interactions with digital artifacts.
Its first iteration was a web of virtual worlds where avatars were able to teleport among them. The
contemporary iteration of the Metaverse features social, immersive VR platforms compatible with
massive multiplayer online video games, open game worlds and AR collaborative spaces.
Keywords:
metaverse; mixed reality; virtual reality; augmented reality; extended reality; virtual
worlds; multiuser virtual environments
1. Introduction
Computer Science innovations play a major role in everyday life as they change and
enrich human interaction, communication and social transactions. From the standpoint of
end users, three major technological innovation waves have been recorded centered around
the introduction of personal computers, the Internet and mobile devices, respectively. Cur-
rently, the fourth wave of computing innovation is unfolding around spatial, immersive
technologies such as Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) [
1
]. This wave is ex-
pected to form the next ubiquitous computing paradigm that has the potential to transform
(online) education, business, remote work and entertainment. This new paradigm is the
Metaverse. The word Metaverse is a closed compound word with two components: Meta
(Greek prefix meaning post, after or beyond) and universe. In other words, the Metaverse is
a post-reality universe, a perpetual and persistent multiuser environment merging physical
reality with digital virtuality. Regarding online distance education, Metaverse has the
potential to remedy the fundamental limitations of web-based 2D e-learning tools.
Education is one crucial field for society and economy where core implementation
methods remain unchanged and orbiting around content transmission, classrooms and
textbooks despite numerous technological innovations [
2
]. Currently, there is an intense
race to construct the infrastructure, protocols and standards that will govern the Metaverse.
Large corporations are striving to construct their closed, proprietary hardware and software
ecosystems so as to attract users and become the de facto Metaverse destination. Different
systemic approaches and diverging strategies collide around concepts such as openness
and privacy. The outcome of this race will determine the level of users’ privacy rights
as well as whether the Metaverse will be inclusive to students and school pupils. Both
issues have important implications for education as they will determine if the Metaverse
can become mainstream in e-learning. The aim of this article is to raise awareness about
the origin and the affordances of the Metaverse, so as to formulate a unified vision for
meta-education, Metaverse-powered online distance education.
For this purpose, this article is structured as follows: Definitions of the key concepts
are presented in Section 2. The limitations of two-dimensional learning environments are
Encyclopedia 2022, 2, 486–497. https://doi.org/10.3390/encyclopedia2010031 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/encyclopedia
