Reuters today selected the top 12 technology hot words of 2021

Reuters today selected the top 12 technology hot words of 2021, including Meta Universe, Web 3, NFT, and Voice Social. 2021 is about to pass. If you still don’t know much about this year’s technology development trends, you can take a look at this shortlist of technology hot words:

Meta universe: Metaverse broadly refers to a shared, immersive digital environment. People can move in these environments and can also access them through virtual reality (VR) or augmented reality (AR) helmets or computer screens.

Some CEOs in the technology industry believe that it will become the successor to the mobile Internet. This term was coined in the dystopian novel "Snow Crash" thirty years ago. This year, from Microsoft to Match, many CEOs of technology companies have discussed their role in building the meta-universe. In October of this year, Facebook also changed its name to "Meta" to highlight its new business focus.

Web 3: Web 3 is used to describe the potential next stage of the Internet: a "decentralized" Internet running on "blockchain" technology.

Web 3 will be different from today's Internet, the so-called "Web 2". In the Web 2 mode, several big technology giants such as Facebook and Google control the platform. In the Web 3 mode, users will have ownership of the platform and applications.

Voice social: This year, technology companies praised the "Voice Live" dialogue tool. During the new crown pneumonia epidemic, the voice chat application Clubhouse, which adopted the "invitation mode", became popular overnight, and then technology companies scrambled to release their own similar products.

NFT: NFT (Non-Homogeneous Token) is very popular this year. It is a digital asset that exists on the blockchain and a transaction record stored on a networked computer.

In March of this year, a work by American artist Beeple was sold at Christie’s auction house for nearly $70 million. This was the first time a large art auction house was auctioned in non-physical form.

Decentralized: This year, decentralizing, the transfer of power and operations from central institutions such as companies or governments to users, has become a key theme in the technology industry.

This change may affect all aspects of society, such as the organization of industries and markets, as well as the content review of some platforms. For example, Twitter is investing in a project called "Bluesky" that aims to establish a decentralized common standard for social networks.

Decentralized: "Decentralized Autonomous Organization" (DAO) is an Internet community owned by its members and running on blockchain technology. DAO uses "smart contracts", which are code snippets that establish the rules of the organization and automatically execute decisions.

In recent months, the decentralized autonomous organization ConstitutionDAO tried to buy a rare copy of the U.S. Constitution at an auction held at Sotheby's, but failed.

Stonks: Deliberately misspelled the word "stocks" with humor and sarcasm. When online traders gathered on forums such as Reddit pushed up the prices of stocks such as GameStop and AMC, the term quickly became popular on the Internet to lament the crazy trend of these stocks.

GAMEFI: GameFi is a broad term that refers to the trend of gamers earning cryptocurrency by playing video games. During this period, players can make money through some mechanisms, such as winning battles in the popular game "Axie Infinity" to get money tokens.

ALTCOIN: This term covers all digital cryptocurrencies other than Bitcoin, including Ethereum, and the "Dogecoin" (Dogecoin) promoted by Tesla CEO Elon Musk.

FSD BETA: Tesla this year released a beta version of its upgraded "Fully Automated Driving" (FSD) software, which is open to the wider public.

But the name of this software has been controversial. Regulators and users said that it misrepresented its functions because it still requires drivers to pay attention to road conditions.

FABS: "Fabs", short for semiconductor processing plants, has become a buzzword this year because the global shortage of products ranging from automobiles to electronic products is blamed on the shortage of chips in these factories.

NET ZERO: This year, as a result of the COP26 United Nations climate negotiations in Glasgow, the term "net-zero" has gained popularity. It refers to a country, company, or product that does not cause greenhouse gas emissions. This is usually achieved by reducing emissions and using carbon absorption efforts (such as tree planting) to balance the remaining emissions. But critics believe that any emissions are unacceptable.