Humanity closer toward the metaverse: Deloitte M&E outlook

The Deloitte 2022 Media & Entertainment Industry Outlook cites that “in 2021, the media & entertainment industry saw continued changes from technological progress, evolving generational behaviors, and ongoing impacts from the global pandemic. Amid recurring COVID-19 surges, people sought more media & entertainment at home, while often avoiding larger in-person events. Digital media engagement even remained strong over the healthier summer, evidence that the pandemic has only accelerated preexisting trends toward the digital world.”

The report highlights five key trends expected in the current year:

• Streaming video industry will mature as metrics evolve beyond subscriber counts to lifetime customer value, and existing business models expand to find greater profitability amid global competition.
• Live entertainment—and the businesses and venues that rely on it— will face greater pressure to go beyond simply bringing people out of their pandemic cocoons, by offering enhanced experiences that are different from those in the living room.
• Social media will find itself at a turning point, moving to build out the next generation of retail shopping.
• The sudden rise of NFTs and their success in bringing scarcity and exclusivity to digital goods will drive new models of customer engagement and loyalty. They’ll also lead to more digital product innovation, greater empowerment for their creators, and a fuller realisation of the grand ambitions for blockchain, cryptocurrency, and the decentralized web 

The Deloitte outlook is that “each of these trends is slowly marching humanity closer toward the metaverse (or metaverses), where people will spend more of their time in immersive, social, digital worlds, while the digital world will move further into the physical one.”

“Interactivity and immersion are competing with passive experiences. As the physical and digital worlds blur, the structural foundations of the internet are on the cusp of a massive reorganization—a sea change that will drive enormous opportunity and, with it, the potential for collateral damage,” states the report.