Metaverse for Attorneys is yet another installment in a series to help busy executives take a dive into the new world of crypto in bite-sized chunks. Here is this week’s bulleted list of Metaverse for Attorneys:
- Facebook changed their parent company name to ‘Meta’ in anticipation of the mass adoption of the Metaverse. The Facebook product still remains the same. The change is similar to Google’s parent company now being called Alphabet.
- Metaverses are not new. World of Warcraft and Pokemon Go are examples of popular online metaverses that utilize alternate identities/avatars, maps, and proprietary in-app currencies. Second Life was the first of its kind to allow general gathering, living, partying and real estate without a game plot.
- Steven Spielberg’s 2018 film “Ready Player One” is the perfect example of what the general online community expects from the Metaverse. The film was adapted from a 2011 novel by the same name. I recommend watching it for insight into this culture.
- None of the above incorporate blockchain technology. However, Facebook and other global leaders infer their intention to do so.
- Sandbox and Decentraland are the two most popular blockchain-based metaverses. In fact, major brands like McDonald’s, Gucci and Panera have already spent millions of dollars investing in real estate there.
- There is no one Metaverse. There are, and will be, many. Just as there have been hundreds of Social Media startups, a few will eventually remain.
- Sales of real estate in the metaverse topped $500 million last year and could double this year, according to investors and analytics firms. In my experience, land grabs like this over the last two decades have not paid off. Who knows? This time might be the charm.
- Brands are racing to monetize NFT’s in this space, which will entail both digital items for in-game use and the redemption of physical goods IRL (in real life).
- Ethereum is the current blockchain on which many of these Metaverses exist. However, there are countless startups that are either competing, or plan to compete, in this space. Metaverses utilize their own currencies called ‘tokens’ which are sort of sub-currencies based on the parent blockchain.
Other articles include: Web3 for Attorneys, Blockchain for Attorneys, Crypto Wallets for Attorneys, NFT for Attorneys, and Crypto Mining for Attorneys.