Women Shaping the Future of Metaverse

By WTM Team, GDSC VIT Bhopal

Women who are working in the field of technology, generally have to build their area of the network very carefully, fight for a place at the table, and demand to be included in what is still quite a male-dominated sector.

Statistics depict that in 2020, women made up only 20% of Microsoft tech jobs, and 23% of tech jobs at Facebook, Google, and Apple. There are a lot of women in the immersive tech community, but the culture is still very masculine. Its development is very much driven by the gaming industry, which is notoriously male-centric, and this can harm the industry.

The tech industry has fewer visible women role models and mentors than it does men. This, plus persistent stereotypes about women and technology, often discourages girls from pursuing a career in the sector. It’s the small things — for example, a third of young female gamers report receiving gender-based abuse on online gaming platforms. On the hardware front, women are more susceptible to cybersickness than men when using VR headsets. Most VR equipment is designed for male users.

When using VR headsets, people are twice as likely to experience cyber-sickness if they’re female, since most hardware was created with male users in mind. In pursuing tech, women have to be prepared to enter an industry not built for them.

As women in tech, we need to take up space, be visible, and demand to take part in the building of the metaverse. We need to fight for it to be a safe space for women and girls, to ensure that options for correct-sized VR headsets are available for all shapes and sizes, and to demand that XR (Extended Reality) opportunities be given to women on the same level as they are given to men.

To ensure a healthy and equal representation in the metaverse and beyond, we need to make immersive tech an attractive career prospect for a new generation of men and women. To be able to carry through this, we need not only talk but also take the necessary actions. Ladies who help other ladies succeed by nominating them as board members and achieving success themselves. It’s not enough to be just sitting at the table; once there, we have to actively use that position for the good upliftment of our peers which in turn creates a major positive impact.

The metaverse can prove to be a real and actual equalizer and be a force of good. But, for this to come to life, we need to ensure that this virtual world caters to the needs and desires of everyone, and not just a specific group of people. The early adopters of new technologies are generally men and younger people, but women who dare to claim their place in the metaverse will find they have a golden opportunity to shape it to their liking. We can encourage more underrepresented groups to get involved in technology and its creation — men and women of all ages and backgrounds — and build a rich and colorful virtual world that will benefit and suit us all.

HOW WOMEN ARE MODIFYING THE FUTURE OF METAVERSE: MEET THEM

1. Allyson Downey

Allyson Downey is one of the Meta Angels co-founders, an NFT community that “harnesses metaverse relationships to uncover real-life opportunity.”

She told Yahoo Finance UK that there is still time to establish the groundwork for fair female representation in web3.

However, in addition to seeking opportunities to promote women for the sake of equity alone, the reality is that companies with women at their helm have historically outperformed their peers. Investing in expanding the ecosystem to include more women-driven businesses is economically prudent.

She explained that because the industry is still in its infancy, “women who are coming into web3 with experience in creating and expanding businesses will be able to truly flourish.” Downey believes there will be a much closer connection between offline life and web3 in ten years. “The user experience will be so much better and more intuitive,” she said, “enabling people to utilize web3 in their daily life as effortlessly as they do now with a credit card or contactless payment.”

2. Ariana Waller

Ariana Waller is a full-stack software engineer with experience in the blockchain space dating back to 2017. She is the founder of Mueshi, a marketplace for buying, selling, and fractionally purchasing fine art NFTs, which she characterizes as “a marketplace for buying, selling, and fractionally purchasing fine art NFTs.” The founder of a web3 startup in the United States is passionate about encouraging more women to pursue careers in the field. “We need you in this area,” she says to the women. “You may be the only one,” she told female web3 founders, “but there will be many more women building, investing, and creating in this field shortly.” To be inspired to be in this space, someone needs to hear your path, your specific voice.

Future of Women and the Metaverse: A Conclusion

According to researchers, increasing the number of women in STEM professions will significantly expand our country’s pool of skilled employees.

Increased female presence in technology will add a whole new dimension to the project’s scope. This opens the door to whole new solutions to previously unsolved issues.

Diversity improves our intelligence, according to decades of studies. It is preferable to bring together people from various backgrounds to tackle a complicated problem. As a result, all of these people will be able to collaborate to provide various points of view and ultimately solve the problem.

Just like the future of women in technology/STEM, the future of the metaverse also includes the notion of running openly, nearly without interruption from a single community or corporation, as more companies seek to build outlets on the larger metaverse, much as they do on the internet today.