14. Role of Metaverse in the Fourth Industrial Revolution for Providing Customer Experiences

The ongoing digital revolution is poised to bring many changes to the culture, society, and economies of nations to elevate human standards by providing advanced digital products and services. The Metaverse is a vision shared by many industries based on the fourth industrial revolution, which predicts that the next stage of computer interaction will be on the internet in a single, shared, immersive, and persistent 3D virtual space where humans interact as avatars in real-time to perform experiential activities and develop mutual relationships. Metaverse activities could include watching movies, attending concerts, working in offices, conducting collaborative meetings in halls, shopping, traveling to tourist places, and undergoing advanced training by cognitively experimenting with risky driving, etc. All of this could be made possible by integrating different technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, Big Data Analytics, Blockchain Technology, Crypto-Currencies, Distributed Ledger Technology, Internet of Things, and Machine Learning, along with Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality to benefit Metaverse as a platform business model. However, while offering these innovative customer experiences, building the Metaverse has to address many challenges related to security, privacy, and legal issues. The objective of this paper is to explore the concepts of 4IR, Metaverse, and Digital Twin primarily as a part of the smart city development phenomenon so that governments can have command and control of the human universe while providing innovative user experiences in the Metaverse.