The Web3D Consortium, which was formed to advance VRML and currently promotes X3D, a royalty-free open standards file format, recently weighed in on the Metaverse to offer its own definition [PDF].

“In our view, the ‘Metaverse’ will emerge as a property of the current primarily two-dimensional World Wide Web (WWW) with interconnection and interoperability between online, networked microcosmic ‘microverses’ created, as is the Web, by individuals, corporations and institutions. Interconnection between microverses will be provided by the Web itself.”
https://www.theregister.com/2022/10/14/metaverse_internet_failure/