Sir Elton John has stated he plans to ditch real-world shows in favour of “the metaverse”.
Last month, Sir Elton John put on a virtual concert in the popular game Roblox and it gave him an epiphany: the metaverse is the ‘perfect’ next step for his career.
In a statement, Sir Elton said that “throughout my career, I’ve always been interested in finding new ways to connect with my fans worldwide. As I finish touring, Roblox and the metaverse are perfect for this next stage of my life; it’s a new, innovative way for me to express my love of music, fashion, and the limitless creativity that comes from both.”
The metaverse is one of those things that everyone has their own definition of because it doesn’t technically exist yet (and may never exist). To really get in that “futuristic dystopia” mood, I’ve asked artificial intelligence engine ChatGPT for its definition of the metaverse, here’s what our future AI overlord had to say:
The metaverse is a collective virtual shared space, created by the convergence of the physical and the digital.
It is a hypothetical future internet that merges the real and virtual worlds, allowing people to interact with both real and virtual objects in a seemingly real way.
Some have described the metaverse as a massive multiplayer online game or a virtual reality platform, but it is more than just that. It is a new way of experiencing the world, where people can communicate, learn, and create together in a virtual space.
That’s an optimistic definition, but not an untrue one. In reality, if the metaverse does ever get off the ground it’ll most likely be a dystopian hellscape where you have to buy everything as an NFT, kinda like GTA Online except you can’t blow stuff up and have to pay real-world money in much larger sums to own even the most basic of virtual items like clothes, fun!
The “metaverse” Sir Elton has in mind is most likely the simpler “metaverse-adjacent” virtual worlds that already exist: like Fortnite, VR Chat, Second Life, Horizon Worlds, and of course, Roblox.
In fairness to Sir Elton that does make sense for him. The singer was planning on retiring from real-world touring anyway, a rest that is well-earned after such a long and demanding career of touring. If these online games give him a way to continue to share his music and creativity with fans into the future then that’s a fantastic thing.
Anyway, here’s the Roblox oof sound effect.
