Meta Platforms Inc., says that the metaverse will summon more opportunities for businesses across digital goods and immersive shopping, as it presented a video showing holographic fencing and playing basketball.

In October, Facebook, which makes the majority of its money from digital advertising, changed its name to Meta to represent its new bet on the metaverse, a future concept of a network of virtual spaces accessed through various devices where users may work, interact, and play.

A fireside conversation with Neal Stephenson, the science-fiction author who introduced the term ‘metaverse’ in his 1992 dystopian novel ‘Snow Crash’, is on the schedule for the advertising conference later this week. On the same day, Stephenson will talk on a panel with the marketing vice president of Unilever Plc and the head of global media investment at Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co.

Meta, which believes the metaverse will be the next big thing after the mobile internet, has put a lot of money into virtual and augmented reality. It has not said anything about how brands will make money in the metaverse.

Shah, who said the Foo Fighters would perform a concert in its virtual reality events app Horizon Venues after the Super Bowl on Sunday, cited the company's partnership with the National Football League, which allows users to outfit their virtual avatars with team jerseys as a digital goods experiment.

Meta saw its stock plummet this week after announcing sluggish user growth and a lower-than-expected revenue forecast, which it attributed in part to Apple Inc.'s privacy restrictions, which have made it more difficult for brands to target and assess advertisements on Facebook and Instagram.

Before the metaverse is completely realized - which may take a decade, according to Shah - businesses should continue to leverage Facebook and Instagram's commerce channels, and advertisers should try constructing augmented reality commercials.

In the words of Shah, “everything you're doing now across our apps will benefit you in this metaverse future”.

“Without the physical limitations that exist today that put pressure on businesses' bottom line, things like real estate, supply chain and geographical reach, the metaverse will open up more opportunities for businesses to make money”, adds Shah.