Metaverse applications with government involvement

This section examines some current and predicted applications of metaverse technologies that may involve the NSW Government. Being general-purpose, metaverse technologies may be applied in many different domains relevant to the government, including health, education, justice and infrastructure. Different applications will also involve the government in different roles, including those of a user, developer and regulator.

Roles of the NSW Government

The NSW Government may adopt metaverse technology to provide services directly to the public or to facilitate peoples' day-to-day activities. It may wish to provide support for third-parties building metaverse applications, and it may be required to engage with third-party applications as a regulator. The following paragraphs enumerate key roles the government may have in different metaverse applications.

Application user: The Government has identified internal activities it conducts that may benefit from metaverse technologies in the near-term. This could be done through internal application development, the commissioning of an application from a third party, or by using an application that is commercially available. In some cases, the NSW Government already has VR applications deployed internally, which may become more 'metaverse-like' through augmentation with support for multi-user shared presence and persistent virtual worlds.

Application provider: Some NSW Government services may be provided to the public through metaverse applications created or commissioned by the NSW Government in the future. In some instances, such as primary and secondary education, the government is already providing virtual reality applications to students as learning tools.

Service provider: Some metaverse applications, whilst being developed and run by private entities, may benefit from NSW Government infrastructure or services like digital identity.

Platform provider: In circumstances where the NSW Government needs to retain a greater degree of control over user experience (such as in education), it could provide a platform that hosts approved metaverse applications.

Regulator: As the metaverse expands, private metaverse applications accessible to NSW residents may pose risks that require regulatory intervention from the NSW Government.

Application classes

For each application, we examine the

• potential benefits and harms of applying metaverse technologies
• alternatives to the use of metaverse technologies
• differing ways in which the NSW Government may be involved.

Though some of these considerations are unique to a particular application, we have identified departments of similarity in application classes. Each of the five classes captures a reason for using metaverse technologies common across many applications. These classes are:

1. Bringing people together
   
   e.g. VR meetings
2. Assisting people with contextual information about their activities
   
   e.g. AR schematic overlay for maintenance worker
3. Providing people a model of the real world
   
   e.g. VR emergency and disaster response planning tool
4. Giving people experiences
   
   e.g. virtual art gallery
5. Transporting people out of their environment
   
   e.g. virtual outdoor worlds for people stuck in confined spaces

Of course, these classes are neither exclusive nor exhaustive: some applications may fit into multiple classes and others won't fit well into any class. However, we believe they capture and differentiate between the applications most relevant to the NSW Government.

Illustrative examples

A set of illustrative example applications accompany the analysis of each application class. We chose the examples that appear because they are relevant to NSW Government and

• have been proposed or implemented by the NSW Government
• have been proposed or implemented by third parties
• might reasonably be proposed or implemented.

Note that an application appearing as an example should not be taken as a recommendation or suggestion for the NSW Government to implement it. Many applications have significant or unknown risks of harm, and can also be addressed with other approaches. As Recommendations for building understanding and expertise and Recommendations for developing governance indicate, we believe the onus is on those advocating for metaverse technologies to demonstrate their effectiveness and safety compared to established alternatives.

The table below provides a summary of the application examples and their associated class: