In his monthly column on crypto, Israeli serial entrepreneur Ariel Shapira covers emerging technologies within the cryptocurrency space, decentralized finance (DeFi), and blockchain, as well as their role in shaping the 21st century economy. .
What’s in a name? Quite a metaverse is what one might believe when seeing the rumor about the recent transformation of Facebook into Meta. In reality, the new name is much more than that: there is also the whistleblower scandal, along with previous controversies that tarnish the image of the company, as well as the invasion of rival social media platforms that are more popular with the youths.
But, if the Facebook makeover is easy for skeptics to dismiss as a PR stunt, the same is not true of the metaverse, simply because getting into it requires more than just a public announcement. In addition to Facebook’s intention to invest $ 10 billion in metaverse-related projects this year, Microsoft is building its own metaverse and rolling out 3D avatars for teams. In early April, Epic Games, the gaming giant behind teen favorite Fortnite, raised $ 1 billion for its metaverse efforts. Many great players are revving their engines to race towards the metaverse, and money tends to make things happen.
For now, however, it is not clear what exactly money can do in this particular case, because it does not seem to be clear what the metaverse will actually look like. Most commentators envision it as a VR / AR interface for online interactions with other people and online services, the sleek futuristic technology we see in movies like Ready Player One, where users navigated the world online with 3D avatars. By building a virtual universe in which anything can happen, Facebook and Microsoft must have put their creativity to good use with those 3D business meetings, right?
But let’s imagine, if only for the sake of argument, that this will actually be something worthwhile: a human-machine interface made up of a whole series of stacks of technology to change the way we interact with the universe of connected devices. . We put on our augmented reality (AR) glasses, Facebook has already introduced a pair, not unlike the ones Google had to ditch, and our home is transformed into a tropical island hub where we can hang out with friends from all over. the world and access not just websites but entire experiences and work in the same virtual space as the AI-enabled tools that help us get the job done. Our virtual avatar can also travel the real world, projected on the glasses of other users depending on the location we establish. In this way, we enjoy the live broadcasts of the available cameras or even have a more or less good point of view projection calculated based on it.
Does all this represent a full-blown technological revolution? Even with our imaginations in full swing, it’s hard to tell. Would you rather read this article from a virtual sheet of paper that you can fold into an origami crane or place on the wall of your virtual house, and not from a computer or mobile screen? If not, the so-called metaverse may not be as shocking as its architects hope. But then who knows. Ten years from now, the metaverse may be as ubiquitous as mobile phones today.
What is certain is that there is a colossal work to be done to put it into practice. The future inhabitants of the metaverse need virtual reality and augmented reality solutions to enter it, and new platforms and protocols must emerge to unite the disjointed fragments of the metaverse into a seamless experience. AND, I’m pretty sure that unless we want the metaverse to be as stuck and guarded as the internet today, the metaverse must live and breathe decentralization.
The blocks that hold up the world
The blockchain is, first and foremost, a database. Databases are not necessarily interesting in themselves, but what is interesting is what can be built around them. Ethereum is the best example of this, since it works fundamentally for an expanding ecosystem that incorporates gaming, finance, digital art and many other spheres. There is no central authority, governance is community driven and there is no oversight either, in the sense that a cryptocurrency wallet is anonymous even though the transactions are auditable on the blockchain.
It’s crucial to make sure the same principles are at the foundation of the Metaverse, simply because without that, a new space will open up for the same questionable business practices that we see today. Here’s an example: You used to own CDs with movie copies, but you don’t own the shows on Netflix. Imagine that you are not the owner of your avatar, your representation in the Happy world. Why not use the NFTs as a token that proves your ownership of a specific virtual mask in a database that is not owned by anyone?
NFTs could be used for other purposes in the metaverse, as their main function is to authenticate and prove ownership of digital assets, which can be of (almost) real value. For example, OVR, a VR / AR NFT project, uses NFT to grant users control of augmented reality in specific geographic areas after leveraging cryptocurrencies to incentivize thousands of people to take photos of various locations for mapping. virtual world. Sandbox, a startup building its own metaverse, takes a similar approach, allowing users to build their virtual world and monetize their creations. In today’s Internet, the user hardly owns anything. In a metaverse powered by NFT, you will be a shareholder.
Here’s another example of how the metaverse could power existing predatory practices. It’s no secret that many digital industries, from mobile games to e-commerce websites, sell visitor data to third parties for marketing purposes. Now imagine shopping at an RV e-store, a 3D rendering of a regular store with “Add to Cart” buttons floating above the products on the shelves. Remember that all this is seen through virtual reality glasses. In other words, the system knows where you were looking at all times. Imagine the marketing potential this has. If we add an AI to the mix, we get a system that tailors the e-store layout and ad placement for each visitor, at the expense of privacy, of course. If this data is stored locally – not in the data centers of large companies – and only its hash is sent to the blockchain, users will be free to choose whether they want to monetize it or keep it for themselves.
The cryptocurrency is also set to become an important payment option for the metaverse. In the same way that the metaverse is supposed to make the world smaller by bringing it into your VR / AR glasses, the crypto space is by definition transnational. It pioneered the principles of decentralization and anonymity, and these principles will be key to the Internet of tomorrow, hopefully more respectful of privacy than it is today. In addition, the established market capitalization and the number of users it currently has make it an exchange medium that can become universal across all metaverse platforms and protocols. The alternative is to use fiat, which would immediately bring national state borders and fiscal policies to a world they don’t belong to, or have each platform issue its own isolated digital pseudo-currencies, resulting in a segregated virtual space. .
Fundamentally, if the metaverse were to exist as an interface that defines our interactions with machines, centralization would leave it in the hands of a single company, the singular gatekeeper among users and everything new that technology could bring (again, although only be it for the argument). The guardian will be able to dictate the norms and policies not only to the users, but also to the developers, consolidating itself as the dominant actor in the field. By now, we should have learned the lesson that monopolies, like oligopolies, only work for the one actor in charge, while stifling innovation and taking a toll on the user experience. The blockchain and decentralization are contrary to these problems, and that is why they must be at the center of the Multiverse.
This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, readers should do their own research when making a decision.
The views, thoughts and opinions expressed here belong solely to the author and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.
Ariel shapira He is a father, entrepreneur, speaker, cyclist and is the founder and CEO of Social-Wisdom, a consulting agency that works with Israeli startups and helps them establish connections with international markets.