LOOK MOM, IT’S ME!

One of the experiences that the metaverse will give us is for everyone to have a tiny “me” that exists in the Cloud and is known as an “avatar.” And no, before you ask, we’re not talking about the blue characters from James Cameron’s film, but rather about projections of ourselves in the virtual sphere, digital bodies that will be accompanied by our voices, our senses, and our heads. But… an avatar isn’t something that the metaverse is going to bring us on an exclusive basis.

These projections can be found everywhere, such as in RPGs (Role-Playing Games), video games in which one pretends to be someone inside a story. World of Warcraft, the recent and acclaimed Elden Ring, and Grand Theft Auto V, are clear examples of this. Haven’t you ever pretended to be a millionaire with a fast car who earns a living by robbing banks with his friends?

Social networks are another dimension where we’re able to project who we are through an account (or who we’d like to be when facing the world). Not to mention the fact that we can also project, online, someone who we aren’t – another trend that is popular thanks to those who are experts in castfish (pretending to be someone else) on Tinder.

But this is different. As Zuckerberg said at one time, “You’re part of the experience, not just seeing it from the outside.” Therefore, it’s much more immersive than the things mentioned above. Our avatar will be the representation of everything we are in real life, both good and bad.

DOES THE WITCH FROM SNOW WHITE HAVE INTERNET ACCESS?

Identity fraud is a phenomenon that has increased as technology has advanced. With each new platform created for the good of the whole world, new ways appear to deceive helpless victims (very creative ones, by the way), from accounts that posed as Mario Vaquerizo on Twitter, to a guy from Huelva who sends you a direct message saying that it’s Madonna, who needs a few euros because she’s lost on the streets of Beverly Hills.

A big factor to take into account is that of NFTs and cryptocurrencies, which, after becoming mainstream and opening up to the mass public in 2021, received investments amounting to more than 3 billion dollars, according to Fortune. As these are one of the currencies of the metaverse, crypto fraud could become the center of attention. Forbes talks about a phenomenon called “crypto influencer fraud”, in which they claim that impersonating someone to obtain a monetary benefit is commonplace. This is something that future users of the metaverse should be concerned about. Those who follow Elon Musk and Bill Gates have already experienced this type of fraud, as these individuals’ Twitter accounts were hacked, their followers being told that they had decided it was time to return the favor to them, so all payments made into their Bitcoin wallets would be doubled. This seems like something good old Elon and Bill would do, right?

SELECTIVE VISION

Another problem, in terms of identity and the metaverse, is caused by there being no connection between the avatar and the person behind it. The fact is that many people believe that what happens in the virtual world has nothing to do with reality. This is because in a world of pixels they can do everything that they wouldn’t in real life – like in the HBO series Westworld.

This is the case of hate speech on the Internet, spewed by people who hide behind an avatar. Hate speech, along with racist, homophobic, xenophobic, and anti-religious comments, cause problems that affect many people inside and outside the virtual world. The Cyberbullying Research Center states that this type of violence can occur in two ways in the metaverse. The first has to do with the avatar (and the person behind it, of course), which can fall victim to verbal or text-based insults because of the way they look, dress, or speak. The second way consists of more subtle – but no less important - actions, such as blackface (changing the skin color of the avatar to dehumanize another individual), or wearing clothes with offensive slogans that can hurt and even traumatize users.

There is also the case of Nina Jane Patel, a woman who was the victim of sexual abuse on Meta’s Horizon Worlds social network. She described how several male avatars groped, assaulted, and took photos of her without her consent in an experience that she categorized as “surreal” and like a “nightmare.” After sharing her experience, she says that many of the comments she received were of the same type, responding that it wasn’t real, that she just had to take off her headset to avoid it, and that she, basically, just wanted attention.

A VIRTUAL GLOW-UP

*While writing this point we realized that it seemed necessary to include non-binary people in our conversation, even if the written text does not follow conventional style rules.

Despite the aforementioned, if we look on the bright side, we can find several reasons to argue in favor of these technologies and, in this case, of having a virtual “mini-person” that answers for your physical self. One of them is acceptance of oneself. Sexual orientation and gender identity are one of the hottest topics lately – and not without reason, as more and more people feel free to express themselves just the way they are. One of the things that the online world can offer people who can’t find their way, don’t feel satisfied with their body, feel gender dysphoria, don’t have the freedom to be who they are (because of religion or politics), or just want to experience another feeling, is to enjoy being that person that they have always dreamed of being through an avatar. To be who they want to be without the barrier of a physical body. In fact, a study by the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health revealed that youth (ages 11-22) who do not identify with their assigned gender feel that using an avatar is beneficial and therapeutic for their mental health, since it is a way to test acceptance before going out in real life.

There are many companies that are very committed to making the online universe – and, specifically, the metaverse – an enjoyable experience for the people we just talked about. The Sims 4 even has an option to include gender pronouns with the characters! Daz 3D, with its “Non Fungible People” collection, and Nyx, with its Pride 2022 collection, are examples of this inclusive way of creating NFT avatars. Each helped create more than 8,000 avatars, which included female figures, non-binary figures, figures of different ethnicities, figures of different cultures, of different ages, and with different disabilities.

In addition, metaverse platforms don’t usually put limits on people’s creativity, so everyone is free to be who they really are through the screen, trying things they may never have tried in real life. It’s all about experimenting, right?

BEYOND A PHYSICAL BODY

The avatar is a way of giving a bit of mobility to all those people who suffer from complications in their daily lives. The fact is that sometimes age or disabilities can become factors that limit people when it comes to enjoying free movement. That’s where the metaverse comes in.

In the case of these groups, their avatar could take them to the doctor, to visit people they haven’t seen for years, to combat loneliness, to accompany them on trips that they couldn’t take due to the limitations of their physical bodies, to meet people with the same limitations, and even to find love and start a family. I mean, if you can have a virtual pet, you can also have a virtual partner, right?

IN SEARCH OF A DIVERSE (AND FREE) UNIVERSE

We can conclude that the learning of good manners plays a very important role in the establishment of identity in the metaverse. The fact is that we’re taught, ever since birth, not to insult people on the street, not to use unpleasant nicknames, and to feel a little empathy when someone is not feeling well or is different from others. Oh! And we’re also taught to not “ghost” people, which is important too.

Why does this change as soon as we touch an electronic device?

While Meta has begun to experiment with some safety prototypes, such as the Personal Boundary (other avatars can’t get closer than a certain distance) and Safe Zone (an area that will allow you to be alone and to mute, block, and flee from content), no measure will ever be enough if the people behind the avatar still don’t know how to relate to other people; people who, just like them, speak, take action, and, most importantly, feel. Every action has its consequence, and the consequences of all actions remain, even after one takes off their VR headset.

That’s why we have to learn to behave, to start from scratch again, as if we were a newborn. However, this time, instead of learning to say “Mommy” or “Daddy,” we must learn to treat others fairly, to show respect, to not commit cybercrimes, to inform ourselves before speaking, and, most importantly, to soar through cyberspace like we have always wanted to: with pride.

We should follow the path of our little “me” in search of that freedom that we long for.