Gates Package — page 1117

I'm particularly excited to see how metaverse technologies will enable more spontaneity with remote work. This is the biggest thing you lose when you're not in the office. Working from your living room isn't exactly conducive to having an unplanned discussion with your manager about your last meeting or starting a casual conversation with your new coworker about last night's baseball game. But if you're all working together remotely in a virtual space, you'll be able to see when someone is free and approach them to chat. We're nearing a threshold where the technology is beginning to truly replicate the experience of being in the office. The changes we've seen in the workplace are precursors to changes that I think we'll eventually see in many areas. We're moving toward a future where we will all spend more time around and within digital spaces. The metaverse may feel like a novel concept now, but as technology gets better, it will evolve into what feels more like an extension of our physical world. *** There are, of course, huge sectors of the economy where workplaces won't change as much or will shift in different ways from what I'm describing here. If you're a flight attendant, your job has probably evolved a lot in recent years but not because of increased digitization. If you're a server in a restaurant, your customers might now use a QR code menu to decide what they want before placing orders through their phones. And if you work on a factory floor, technology has been changing your job since long before the pandemic*. Digitization will eventually transform all of our lives in one way or another, though. Consider how the way you take care of your health may have changed since 2020. Have any of * In addition to the rise of automation, augmented reality is catching on so that workers can be trained in complex tasks and quickly see the status of a piece of equipment with just a glance.