Digital humans rise with the metaverse

“The era of digital humans has begun, and making of the AI powered human-like virtual beings will also become an industry in the metaverse world,” said Song Jiaji, a staffer at the Guosheng Securities Research Institute.

The word metaverse comes from Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson’s novel published in 1992. Metaverse, in short, is a shared virtual space, a highly immersive realm where people gather to socialize, play, and work.

2021 is called the first year of the metaverse, and it is the virtual digital humans that opened the door of the metaverse.

The first virtual singer came from the 1982 Japanese animation, The Super Dimension Fortress Macross. In the past 40 years, virtual humans have undergone several innovations, and their forms have become more diverse. More virtual humans are entering the public sight.

The late famous singer Teresa Teng and singer Zhou Shen played duet on the same stage on a 2021 Chinese TV show. And in another show, virtual Teresa Teng talked with the audience in real time.

In addition to actors, virtual digital humans are playing other social roles.

The virtual beauty blogger Liu Yexi showed on internet for the first time on October 31, 2021 and gained 3 million followers in a day. In a South Korean program, a mother "reunited" with her daughter by VR, who died of leukemia many years ago.

In recent years, enterprises have had digital employees for repetitive tasks, and banks have virtual employees too. At the 2021Shanghai International Import Expo, virtual person Shen Xiaoya was served as a TV news anchor.

“Will the robots replace real humans? It depends on the further development of AI, which I estimate will take at least several decades,” said Shen Yang, the professor at the School of Journalism at Tsinghua University.

Meanwhile, virtual human needs a lot of research and development investment. The investment of a 3D virtual idol can reach hundreds of thousands to millions of yuan.

According to incomplete statistics in 2021, there were 20 financing events on digital humans, raising over 2 billion yuan. It is estimated that by 2030, the overall market size of virtual humans in China will reach 270 billion yuan.

At present, brand endorsement is the most important commercial monetization method for idol-type virtual people. In the past four years, the global cooperation cases related to virtual characters have covered 100 luxury, fashion and beauty retailers.

Online virtual celebrities are also vying for virtual IPs, including American Youtuber Code Miko, Japanese model IMMA, and Chinese singer Luo Tianyi.

Taking the virtual bloggers of the Bilibili, the China’s YouTube, as an example, their total revenue in November 2021 reached 54.66 million yuan with 255,000 players. Among them, Jiale, the first-ranked virtual blogger, earned as much as 2.14 million yuan in a month.

With the help of technology, digital humans will help society operate more efficiently, maximize the interests of enterprises, and bring emotional comforts to human beings.

Source: CCTV; Trans-editing by Yang Xuan