Neal Stephenson didn’t invent the virtual reality headset. But Meta certainly knows his name – in 1992, his seminal cyberpunk novel Snow Crash coined the phrase „Metaverse“ to describe a virtual reality world experienced through VR goggles. It inspired many key VR developers – and in 2021, Facebook decided to rename its entire company to Meta to chase that metaverse dream.
Now, Stephenson says he no longer believes face-worn computing is the future. He thinks Meta’s glasses are creepy: „People don’t like wearing things on their faces and don’t trust those who do.“ He thinks goggles are no longer the future in a world in a world filled with …