How to build an open source metaverse | Opensource.com
If I told you that all content and software you need to build the metaverse is already available and completely free, would you do it?
Cyberpunk authors of the 20th century like Gibson and Stephenson imagined virtual reality-enabled internet, and in his novel Snow Crash, Stephenson called it Metaverse. With the growing availability of virtual reality (VR) devices and apps, Metaverse became a buzzword, especially since Mark Zuckerberg announced employing 10,000 workers to build it and changed the Facebook company name to Meta. Matthew Ball wrote a serious analysis of the topic that ends with the conclusion—Building together: "And in truth, it's most likely the Metaverse emerges from a network of different platforms, bodies, and technologies working together (however reluctantly) and embracing interoperability."
Like web servers on the internet, you need VR servers. But worry not, I wrote one, and an article about it was published right here about a year ago. Then, of course, you need VR-enabled web browsers, but web browsers already do support video/audio streaming (WebRTC) and VR and AR both (WebXR). Furthermore, you need a bunch of 3D content, preferably in open source standard glTF format. And luckily, Sketchfab hosts 500,000+ free 3D models, published under Creative Commons licenses by a huge number of authors. Sketchfab isn't the only company doing that, but they provide REST API to search and download any of these models.
