A Brief History of the Metaverse

As technology continues to develop, so does our understanding of what the Metaverse is and how it works. What began as an abstract idea about “binocular vision” has become fully developed ways to experience an entirely new virtual reality.

The Metaverse that we know of today, a fully immersive internet, isn’t the same Metaverse originally thought of back in the 1800s. Unlike today’s web 3.0 technology, the Metaverse’s beginnings can be traced back to a man named Sir Charles Wheatstone who created an outline for a concept where two imagines, one for each eye, can make a singular 3D image.

In this guide, we’re going to outline the extensive history behind the Metaverse. From where it began to the Metaverse future, we’ve got you covered.

The Beginning of the Metaverse

The beginning of the Metaverse is often attributed to the work of scientist Sir Charles Wheatstone. Although Wheatstone is known for his inventions of the Concertina instrument and the Playfair cipher, his contribution to the metaverse comes from his concept of binocular vision.

This concept allowed him to invent the stereoscope, a device that allows you to observe 3D pictures by utilising depth of field. The stereoscope is a common technology still used today in things like X-Rays and aerial photographs. Along with that, the technology from stereoscopes is also used in modern VR headsets.

The development of this technology helped inspire the 1930s science-fiction author, Stanley Weinbaum, to publish his novel by the title of Pygmalion’s Spectacles. In this literary work, the main character gets to explore and experience a fictional world by using a pair of goggles. Those goggles allowed the main character to use all five senses to experience the world around him.

Around two decades after Weinbaum’s novel was published, Morton Heilig created the Sensorama. The Sensorama was a machine that simulated what it would look and feel like to ride a motorcycle in Brooklyn.

The invention combined the 3D video with audio, visual, smell, and vibrational cues to give the user a fully immersive experience. A few years later, in 1960, Heilig patented the first head-mounted VR display. This type of display works by combining stereoscopic 3D images with stereo sound.

During the 70s, MIT came up with the Aspen Movie Map. This VR experience enabled users to take a virtual tour of Aspen, Colorado, therefore bringing in the idea of transporting people to new places.

How the Metaverse Continues to Grow

It wasn’t until 1982 when Neil Stevenson’s novel, Snow Crash, first introduced the term “metaverse.” In this literary work, the metaverse referred to an alternate reality that people could go to in order to escape the totalitarian regime they live in.

The early 90s saw the development of VR arcade machines and in 1998, Sportvision was the first to broadcast a live NFL game with a yellow field marker. It didn’t take long for the idea of overlaying frames on top of live footage to spread among other sports channels and forms of media.

In just over another decade, we saw the development and launch of the Oculus Rift VR headset by 18-year-old entrepreneur, Palmer Lucky. With the rift, we were introduced to a 90-degree field of vision and the use of computer processing power.

In 2014, Facebook purchased the Oculus Rift and shortly after, Sony and Samsung announced plans to follow suit on VR development. With Facebook changing its name to Meta in 2021, it’s safe to say that its focus has shifted to shaping the future of Metaverse as a whole.

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