Zuck dives deeper into the metaverse, dragging Snoop Dogg along for ride Not content to live off the fat of its advertising empire, Meta is still trying to make the metaverse a thing. CEO Mark Zuckerberg took to the stage for Meta Connect at Menlo Park yesterday to reel off a number of product announcements, ranging from new VR goggles to AI-equipped Ray-Bans, and appropriating the likenesses of …
Considering, for all intents and purposes, VR headsets have only been around for a few years, claiming something is the best selling of all time isn't really saying much. If I start selling a product tomorrow in a market that doesn't even exist today, I could claim it's the best selling whatever of all time if I've only sold a single unit. As long as no one else ever enters the market with a competing product, I could continue to claim it's the best selling model of all time if I only ever sell that single unit to some poor bastard.
Next up, let's pour one out for all those companies who were hoping to capitalize on the Metaverse, only to have Facebook to effectively abandon the entire idea.
Finally, if they have a Snoop inspired AI D&D Dungeon Master, that could be kind of interesting. Snoop as just another player seems like a waste of potential.
>>Yet Zuck seems to think we're ready to go through all that [Google Glass] again.
Sadly, I think they may be right: in the decade since Glass, a generation accustomed to have their whole life online and their nose glued to a phone screen, reached adulthood.
I'm afraid for them having cameras pointed at them all the time, and all their data beamed instantly to Facebook, won't seem as onerous a to us old farts.
Icon: yes, that's me, yelling at a cloud
One of the benefits of being an "old fart" is that embarrassing photos of us probably only exist in physical form in some dusty photo album book. So, once the parents die, you can destroy them and they're gone forever; or if you're like one of my siblings you can covertly go through them and remove any you don't want to ever see the light of day again.
Was reading some article somewhere or other not too long ago about how kids who were born after Facebook and Youtube were a thing are now coming of age, and all those photos and videos their parents posted on Facebook/Youtube/whathaveyou, of them as kids are forever available to anyone. Future love interests, employers, and anyone else can all find these things and make judgements about them based on it.
ISTR that at least one of the Roman emperors employed a slave to stand next to him at state functions and whisper into his ear “Remember, thou art mortal”, as a guard against the adulation of his hangers-on making him too complacent.
Perhaps a modern equivalent for Zuck, Musk, and their ilk.
“Remember, thou art a clueless cockwomble etc…”
least one of the Roman emperors employed a slave to stand next to him at state functions and whisper into his ear “Remember, thou art mortal”
When a Roman General was awarded an official Triumph [1] they were accompanied in the ceremonial chariot by someone doing just that. Of course, when Rome became the Empire and the emperors gained executive and judicial powers they often awarded themselves a triumph and usually did away with the pesky slave.. Especially as most of the early emperors (pre-Constantine) regarded themselves as divine (and were usually deified after death [2] if power passed peacefully).
[1] There were fairly stringent requirements - one of which was that the General had to have had a successful campaign, returned victorious and provided plenty of loot and captives. The Senate were, at that point, the only body that could declare a Triumph. They could be anything from a simple procession where the general was dressed in a purple and gold toga (the colour of kingship and the colours of Jupiter) to a multi-day festival with arena games and feasting - paid for (mostly) by the general. In practice, a powerful and wealthy general was *far* more likely to be given a Triumph through back-room deals and bribery. Not much changes eh?
[2] The Empire had two rules in their conquered territories - they didn't care what the local religion was as long as it a) didn't practice human sacrifice [3] and b) was happy with the establishment and maintenance of local temples to worship deified emperors. Needless to say that Judea thoroughly trashed the second of those ideas.. And, with Christianity being formed, some of the outlier Romans saw the bread and wine as a ceremonial human sacrifice..
[3] The Druids being a prime example. They also, in the eyes of the Romans, committed two sins - human sacrifice and rallying the British against the Roman invaders.
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