For our Christmas Eve edition, we thought we’d do something lighthearted, fun and a little out-of-the-box.

We asked readers a few weeks ago to write in with their best definitions of the metaverse, and we received plenty of lively feedback. This morning, we’re giving readers the floor…

“Definition of metaverse: A make-believe place where billionaires who don’t live in the real world would like regular people to waste their time and money.”

So… sorta exactly like Facebook? (We kid.) Our next reader agrees 100%.

“Hi, I'm a 68-year old baby boomer. I do not care one hoot about Facebook (Meta). I do not participate in the platform at all. But the price of its stock is singing.”

FB has been choppy recently; the one year total return clocks in at 20.6%. Not bad. But still below the S&P 500’s total return at the time of writing: 26%.

Read on for more readers’ metaverse opinions, definitions and more…

Send your opinions to, TheRundownFeedback@StPaulResearch.com

Your Rundown for Friday, December 24, 2021...

Meta Missives (Continued)

“Have you seen that Keanu Reeves movie?” says another reader. “I think it just got a reboot… Oh yeah, The Matrix! I'll stay here in the real world, thank you.”

Another reader agrees: “Old-fashioned here. [Metaverse is] kind of a make-believe world for those who can't live in the real world. Why actually put yourself out there when you can hide in the metaverse?”

Then there’s this bit of intrigue: “Your comment on renaming Facebook to Meta as an homage to the metaverse was interesting and probably correct.

“But is it a smokescreen? You missed another important allusion: metadata. The data that describes data is where I think it’s really at (pardon the vernacular).

“For example, you have a face, a name, etc. But you have other data attached to you: DOB, age, gender, preferences… keep going? That has stored value, especially with connected metadata.

“The name ‘Meta’ is generic, like Alphabet (Google). And what else? Metaphysics, metagender, metaconsciousness, metawork? I might be making this up as I write…metatruth. Or I might not.

“Reality is somewhere in all this rebranding.”

Our reader might be onto something, particularly if you think of Facebook as less a social media company and more a data-collection firm.

That said, after reading our issue earlier this month, we hope we persuaded you the metaverse is more than Zuckerberg’s silly simplification. And there are numerous ways to invest beyond FB. More on that in coming weeks…

Until next time, warm wishes for a Merry Christmas!

For The Rundown,

Matt Insley
Publisher, The Rundown
TheRundownFeedback@StPaulResearch.com