"Metaverse" was the term on everyone's lips at this year's Mobile World Congress, which is the world's biggest mobile trade show.
It's a hazy concept, but "metaverse" is broadly used to describe vast digital worlds in which users can work, play games or even party.
And things seemed to get even less clear at MWC. But analysts believe it's here to stay.
BARCELONA — Mobile World Congress made a big comeback this year — but the term on everyone's lips wasn't "smartphones" or "5G."
The term has been the talk of the tech world ever since Facebook changed its name to Meta, a rebrand largely aimed at drumming up hype for Mark Zuckerberg's vision for the virtual universe.
And at MWC, the world's biggest trade show for the mobile phone industry, the word was repeatedly dropped into keynote speeches and splashed across exhibition stands.
"The metaverse is the buzzword of the moment," CCS Insight Chief Analyst Ben Wood told CNBC at the show, stressing that it's still quite a nebulous term.
Instead, it was the "metaverse," a vague concept used to describe vast digital worlds in which users can work, play games or even party.
