From the Webaverse #002 Oct. 3 - CRDTs hypercentralizations, $15M in Youtube Game Development
Exclusively curated bites of tech trends directly from the Webaverse community
#webdev
Google Wave engineer admits modern CRDT beats OT.
In distributed computing, a conflict-free replicated data type (CRDT, not to confuse with cryptodaily token) is a data structure which can be replicated across multiple computers in a network, where the replicas can be updated independently and concurrently without coordination between the replicas, and where it is always mathematically possible to resolve inconsistencies that might come up
Conflict-Free Replicated Data Types or CRDT vs Operational Transforms (OT) are some of the big acronyms you will see popping left and right during the collaboration era. The untold hero of the multi-user edits history and merging.
Used by Figma, Whimsical, and a lot of collaborative software.
I recommend implementing them for the fun of it. But don't put anything you write into production until you can leave a randomized test suite running overnight without errors.
Concurrency is a really broad problem space with a million applications, but not real-time editing of an indeterminate data object. Concurrent modification of a row in a database is a perfect example of a deeply complex problem that 99% of us don't really need to understand beyond how to use the API. If you know how to commit a transaction, you don't need to read the thousands of dissertations on how to process them optimally.
Links: Intro to CRDT with Figma CRDT vs OT The JS CRDT framework CRDT & Serverless at Edge , Youtube (CRDT for Mortals)
Webaverse, sure, but first the premises of the metaverse.
The Metaverse is a collective virtual shared space, created by the convergence of virtually enhanced physical reality and physically persistent virtual space, including the sum of all virtual worlds, augmented reality, and the internet.
HTTP encourages hypercentralization & centralized servers disconnect people. It’s expensive to scale content. This needs to change if we want to have a fighting chance of keeping the internet open and free.
Control: Large companies build walled gardens that require developers to submit a complete version of their VR app for approval to be listed in the app store. Governments and corporations alike exploit the centralized model for spying on us, monetizing our data, and blocking access to any content that represents a threat to them.
Dead links: Locations are centralized servers that can go down. The older a site is the more likely it is to eventually 404.
Lack of Interoperability: VR is exploding but applications still need a standard that can let them talk to each other.
Can and will use the CRDT from above
Links: Metaverse keypoints Metaverse Layers
#gaming
Genshin Impact: Breath of the Waifu.
What a cross-platform VRM world with nice shaders could be.
Beautiful OSTs and free to play gameplay: Your account and characters cannot play cross regions (EU->US). PS4 is locked in while PC and Android are swappable to continue your game.
The reddit memes are worth riding the early wave.
Links: Mihoyo
Epic leads a funding round of $15 million in Core
Core is a new platform aiming to be the YouTube of game development, with a total of $60M of funding.
Continuing after the acquisition of superawesome.
In just a few weeks, more than 150 games were released, totaling hundreds of hours of D&D gameplay for players to enjoy. Presented at last week’s PAX Online, presented by a celebrity panel of D&D legends.
(Manti)Core also recently announced an early $1 Million Creator Payouts Pilot Program as part of a plan to build a new creative economy for creators. ($3 per daily player). For a creator that has 500 unique users log into their games every day (they do not need to be the same players) the creator could receive $1,500 after the end of the month. If the average is 1,000 users, the creator could receive $3,000.
Links: The Verge D&D Contest 3$ Per player Don’t forget roblox(1) Don’t forget roblox (2)
#development
Is it the last phase of the desktops wars?
Fascinating insight about how Desktop is becoming Linux, maybe Monado will make a lot of sense soon
The article mentions “PC volume sales continue to fall off” which seems to be backed by a 45% drop in 10years is forecasted (also experimented the google results duality when I searched for it [1]
New Windows is mostly a Linux kernel
There’s an old-Windows emulation over it, but Edge and the rest of the Windows user-land utilities don’t use the emulation.
The emulation layer is there for games and other legacy third-party software.
[1] “As we all know reality depends on your google history” @Avaer
Links: iBiblio
#design
#memeology
Link: explainer
#events
Festival of International Virtual and Augmented Reality Stories. October 7th – November 2nd 2020
Link: Fivars.net
#entrepreneurship
Don’t expect balance from very talented people. People who are exceptionally good at one thing tend to be exceptionally bad at another, due to overconfidence and mental bandwidth taken up by the exceptional skill. Skills also have two sides: No one should be shocked when people who think about the world in unique ways you like also think about the world in unique ways you don’t like.
Link: Collaborativefund.com
First hires and the engineering gene pool. Steve Jobs has a saying that A players hire A players; B players hire C. players; and C players hire D players. It doesn't take long to get to Z. players. Long article, I suggest skimming through.
Successful startups seldom follow their original plans. The early team not only determines how the usual risks are handled but also evolves the plans to better utilize their opportunities and to address and redefine their risks continuously
Do not become an echo chamber
Links: Khoslaventures.com
Venture Capitalists and tech genders. That’s the one of the topics Alex Kantrowitz tackles.
“Oh, but if we do that we’d lose every deal to Sequoia.”
He introduces the notion of Tech Paradigm. One example of that is that we in tech are the attackers. “It’s more fun to be a pirate than to be in the navy.” But what do you when the pirates run the most valuable companies in the world and have more power than the navy does? Well, then all of a sudden, you’re the admiral.
On the internet, nobody knows you’re a dog. And that’s the indifference norms things. And I think that’s why tech has been so blind about sexism and racism and all other forms of discrimination because it just doesn’t compute. It’s like, “Well, aren’t that person’s fingers typing on the keyboard the same as mine?”
And so, there’s this great complexity when you just open up the aperture and look. And so I wish that I felt that more from the leadership of the social media companies and they’ve created something so big and so complex that it’s not Zuck knows the answer. It’s not like it’s like, “Oh, just do X and he can figure it out.” It’s hard. We don’t know as a society how to deal with this new tornado that we’ve unleashed.
Also goes in hand with reputation riding from CollaborativeFund above
Links: Medium (Skip first half)
#m3
M3 thinks about buying a cryptovoxel parcel for friends and visitors. [Link]
When they will ask where the M3 satellite originated. [Link]
Estimate your visible traversable space from a video feed [Link]
WebXR<->GPUBindings Proposal [Link]
The MetaFactory gives M3 a shoutout [Link]
This newsletter is carefully picked from the content of Webaverse community on Discord and Twitter. Join our Discord server to share and discuss the future of spatial applications or follow @webmixedreality on Twitter.