So...Metaverse. Blah blah Neuromancer. Matthew Ball's Metaverse definition starts "A massively scaled and interoperable network of real-time rendered 3D virtual worlds...". I'm all about science fiction prototyping and using stories to imagine new worlds into reality, but have we picked the right horse to bet on?

Skeptimist, Strategist, Threatcaster, FWB.  Stories inspire futures.

EXACTLY! Are you seeing non-visually-biased 'metaverse' experiments/labs/collabs/risks that inspire you?

The metaverse really doesn’t need to be 3D. Presence and embodiment can be achieved without a lot of the things that people are trying to force onto their definition of the “metaverse”.

Having just reread the Sprawl trilogy, the “matrix” is mostly bad juju, filled with demons and vengeful gods and broken dreams. All the humanity is on the street, the Real.