„The idea of a “virtual reality” such as the Metaverse is by now widespread in the computer-graphics community and is being implemented in a number of different ways. The particular vision of the Metaverse as expressed in this novel originated from idle discussion between me and Jaime (Captain Bandwidth) Taaffe—which does not imply that blame for any of the unrealistic or tawdry aspects of the Metaverse should be placed on anyone but me. The words “avatar” (in the sense used here) and “Metaverse” are my inventions, which I came up with when I decided that existing words (such as “virtual reality”) were simply too awkward to use.
In thinking about how the Metaverse might be constructed, I was influenced by the Apple Human Interface Guidelines, which is a book that explains the philosophy behind the Macintosh. Again, this point is made only to acknowledge the beneficial influence of the people who compiled said document, not to link these poor innocents with its results.“

Neil Stephenson, Snow Crash, Acknowledgments

Source: My after‑hours blog on Tumblr Code & Canvas