Posibilidades y limitaciones de los medios de comunicación en el metaverso: posicionamiento estratégico, exploración narrativa e inmersión

This research explores the possibilities that the metaverse currently provides for the media, as well as the limitations or obstacles that condition or slow down its development and implementation in the coming years. To this end, semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with 15 global technology experts specialising in virtual reality and the metaverse, who agreed that the first wave of journalism in the metaverse will be based mainly on immersive entertainment, gamified and experimental content. They also stress that the integration of the metaverse into news routines will be limited and conditioned by the optimisation of VR technology, the democratisation in the acquisition of devices, the progressive migration of the audience to virtual environments for the daily consumption of information, and the establishment and maturation of virtual communities, regulatory frameworks and social norms. It is concluded that this process will be slow and gradual, composed of two phases: a first phase of mass adoption of solutions and familiarisation with the systems; and a second phase that will be characterised by practices and developments of solutions in specific fields, such as those linked to journalistic narrative.