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Meta Connect 2024: The Metaverse Thus Far...

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Facebook Connect 2021 was a significant event where Mark Zuckerberg announced the rebranding of Facebook, Inc. to Meta Platforms, Inc. This marked a shift towards a broader focus on the Metaverse and mixed reality technologies. The concept of Horizon Worlds was first introduced when the company was still Facebook at the Oculus Connect 6 conference in September 2019. At this time, it was called Facebook Horizon and was described as a virtual reality sandbox universe where users could build their own environments, play games, and socialize with friends.

The platform launched in a closed beta in early 2020, allowing a limited number of users to test and provide feedback. In October 2021, Facebook changed the name from Facebook Horizon to Horizon Worlds as part of its broader rebranding efforts. Horizon Worlds has evolved from its initial closed beta in 2020 to a public platform with a growing user base and expanding features.

AI is beginning to play a crucial role in the Metaverse, enabling personalized user experiences, intelligent virtual agents, and dynamic virtual environments. It will help create realistic interactions, recommendations, and feedback, making the Metaverse more responsive and engaging. The greater vision for the Metaverse is to create a highly immersive, interactive, and interconnected digital world that enhances various aspects of life, from social interactions to entertainment, education, and commerce, while ensuring safety, privacy, and inclusivity.

But what can astrology tell us about this new digital paradigm that is quickly transforming our Internet experiences? What is the point of Metaverse? Let's dive into the alchemy of this technology's past, present, and future and its symbiotic relationship with AI.

Here is a timeline I worked on with Perplexity to rundown everything Metaverse-related that was super important. (Skip to the next section and read it at your own leasure if you are so inclined)

2019

• Oculus Connect 6 (September 2019):
  • Facebook announced "Facebook Horizon," a social VR platform that would later become Horizon Worlds.

2020

• Closed Beta of Horizon Worlds:
  • Horizon Worlds was launched in a closed beta, allowing a limited number of users to test and provide feedback.

2021

• Facebook Connect (October 28, 2021):
  • Mark Zuckerberg announced the rebranding of Facebook, Inc. to Meta Platforms, Inc.
  • Introduced the concept of the metaverse and its significance in Meta's future strategy.
  • Public launch of Horizon Worlds was announced for later in the year.

2021 (December)

• Public Launch of Horizon Worlds:
  • Horizon Worlds was made publicly available for users aged 18 and older in the U.S. and Canada.

June 2022:

• The Pew Research Center, in collaboration with Elon University's Imagining the Internet Center, conducted a survey in early 2022 (between February 6 and March 21, 2022) about the future of the metaverse. The survey results published in June 2022 revealed that 46% of technology experts did not expect the metaverse to become a fully immersive and well-functioning aspect of daily life by 2040, indicating ongoing skepticism among experts.

July 2022

• International Expansion of Horizon Worlds:
  • Horizon Worlds expanded to the UK in June and to Ireland and Iceland in July.

October 2022:

• Mark Zuckerberg's zeal for the metaverse was met with skepticism by some Meta employees, highlighting internal doubts about the project's viability and the challenges it faced.

Late 2022 to Early 2023:

• Financial losses for companies heavily invested in metaverse technologies, such as Meta's Reality Labs division and the rise of other technologies, particularly AI, which captured public attention were contributing factors to a significant decline in the metaverse’s popularity.
• This period saw a swing towards skepticism, as noted in a case study by Harvard Business School researchers. The study mentions that "the decades-old 'pendulum of metaverse hype' began to swing toward skepticism in early 2023, as major tech corporations announced massive layoffs and cutbacks in virtual-reality development."

May 2023:

Articles and reports started to suggest that the metaverse had failed to live up to its grand promises. This included high-profile retreats from companies like Disney and significant financial setbacks and losses for Meta's Reality Labs division. In 2022, the division lost $13.7 billion, but in 2023, the losses increased to $16.1 billion. The emergence of generative AI (GenAI) technologies also diverted public interest and investment away from the metaverse.

Meta Connect 2023

• September 27-28 2023
  • Enhancements to Horizon Worlds and the metaverse ecosystem. AI capabilities coming to the metaverse were announced at Meta Connect 2023. Meta mentioned plans to create a sandbox that will allow users to build AIs with "an even greater level of realism, embodiment, and connectedness" in the metaverse environment.
  • Introduction of new developer resources aimed at leveraging generative AI experiences.

2024 (September 25-26)

Meta Connect 2024 introduces “The most advanced glasses the world has ever seen.”

• Unveiling of “Orion”, a prototype for the first consumer full holographic AR glasses “10 years in the making.”
• Given that Orion is designed to work with Meta's AI and other technologies, we can probably assume that it could be integrated with Meta's metaverse initiatives in the future.
• The metaverse market is expected to grow. Statista predicts the metaverse market will reach $74.4 billion in 2024 and grow to $507.8 billion by 2030.

Facebook Connect 2021 & Meta Connect 2024

Let's begin with a simple question: What is the Metaverse, really? Because energy doesn't lie, let's see if it aligns with what Meta says it is.

In a 2021 interview, Zuckerberg described the metaverse as:

"An embodied internet that you're inside of rather than just looking at."

In other media Zuckerberg has emphasized that:

"The defining quality of the metaverse will be a feeling of presence — like you are right there with another person or in another place. Feeling truly present with another person is the ultimate dream of social technology.”

To verify these claims, we need to look at Facebook Connect 2021. In the Age of Aquarius, Sagittarius and by extension, the planet Jupiter rules the 11th house, which speaks to groups, society and the internet as a whole. But the challenge of the age is to refrain from regressing humanity into a chimeric evolution. This is evident primarily at the most basic level in the visual representation of the sign as a centaur: The transhumanistic struggle. A little more than a year prior to the introduction of ChatGPT, the Metaverse was introduced with a rising (ascendant) in 4° Sagittarius conjunct the south node. Meaning the north node was in the opposite sign, Gemini. The entire chart is ruled by Jupiter at 22° in Aquarius. So right off the bat, we know the metaverse is a byproduct of our new age’s 11th house, describing the way humanity will go about anything societal in nature and internet-related in the future.

For the rest of the 21st century, the Metaverse appears to be an ingenious regressive idea, indicated by progressed Uranus, the ruler of AI and technology, moving backward in the zodiac. (Progressions are adding time and forward motion to the moment of an inception chart.) Uranus in Taurus can be indulgent virtual pleasures, and by the turn of the century, its ruler Venus is retrograde in Capricorn, the sign of its detriment. So what Mark said is cute, but does the Metaverse's mission align with the most optimal timeline of human abundance and utopia? It's unlikely, at least in this century, but I could be wrong. I don’t know about you but I don’t want t the perpetual “feeling” of something; I want the real thing, not a substitution.

I found more than three instances in the chart that point to more negative outcomes than positive. Jupiter, the ruler of the chart who often points to a saving grace, is taking its direction from the aforementioned 22° in Aquarius, the alchemic combination that invokes a "kill or be killed" energy. Or in this case, to destroy connection and fellowship among groups of people in the Age of Aquarius by introducing a perversion of what interaction truly is. Even Venus, whom Uranus in Taurus is taking its command from is at 22° in Sagittarius. Then the rising at 4° conjunct with the South node at 2° acts as an anchor preventing humanity from achieving its true potential. The South node almost acts as an unconscious, soul-level comfort zone that we need to painfully evolve out of. This 4th degree of Sagittarius seeks to find a home in the world, but the chart implies it may find this through the destruction of one's mind, body, and soul (the first three houses of the chart). I would know, as my Mars is at this degree...

Introduced at Meta Connect 2024, the Orion AR glasses will no doubt be a key component of Meta's Metaverse vision. In the coming days, I'll be doing a full Astro AI breakdown on them, but they were revealed at 10:50 am. For almost ten years, they have been working on holographic glasses. They feature a new display architecture that refracts light and puts holograms into different depths and sizes.

"You can do 4 things at once" — Gary Vaynerchuk

The Orion Glasses promise to revolutionize how we interact with the world around us, but with them comes a new kind of war. A bizarre account of Orion's birth myth involves the use of urine or semen from the gods. According to this myth, King Hyrieus, who was either a king or a peasant, welcomed the gods Zeus, Poseidon, and Hermes into his home. To express their gratitude for his hospitality, the gods decided to grant Hyrieus' wish for a son. The gods took the hide of the bull that had been roasted for them, urinated or ejaculated onto it, and then buried it in the earth. Hyrieus was instructed to dig up the hide after a certain period (something most likely akin to nine months.) When he did so, he found a newborn boy inside, whom he named Orion or Urion, derived from the Greek word for “urine” or “semen.” Orion was eventually killed by a scorpion sent by the goddess Gaia or in some myths by an arrow shot by the goddess Artemis.

So yes, that was graphic and esoteric, but why am I bringing this up? Well, as I've mentioned on social media: We are in the Orion phase of AI. One that is charged by the alchemy of this constellation. Where our Achilles' heel becomes the lack of connection and proper cultivation of the feminine force. This is one of the primary problems I explained that Jupiter in Gemini would bring to us over its year-long transit.

The Single Most Powerful Astrological Event of May 2024Nyhir'Vana Rho-Ophiuchi·May 1

“Orion” is a key component of the Metaverse vision, aiming to blend the digital and physical worlds seamlessly. We need to see through it being just glasses because, as the ancient saying goes, the eyes are the window to the soul. Sure, the glasses are designed to enhance and set a new standard for how people interact with each other and their environment. But we can't look at technology being named after astrological phenomena and deities as merely coincidence, especially since history has a funny way of repeating itself...

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