By Michiel Willems
The novel Snow Crash has had the privilege of coining a term that would later become one of the most important words of the 21st century: metaverse.
Google search trend data for the term shows an explosion from relative obscurity with a search volume score of 4/100 in early October 2021, to an all-time global high by search volume at 100/100 just two weeks later.
Ever since, interest has remained consistent if not grown even further, with everything from crowdfunded startups to tech giants, to any other business really, aiming to get in on the action,
City A.M. sat down with Lincoln Wallen, a former chief technology officer at DreamWorks and these days CTO of London metaverse tech firm Improbable.
Wallen zooms in on how the word “metaverse” entered common usage in just a few months and it’s going from niche to mainstream, with a peak after Facebook rebranded.
“The business case is sound and already now it is clear that the metaverse is more than a frontier of digital commerce – branded digital objects for one’s avatar or digital storefronts,” he said.
“A true metaverse requires an economy to function within it, just as we have in the real world with individuals able to buy, own and trade assets taking them where they want to go within different environments.”
“The NFT craze stands testament to that, the incentive to buy is insufficient if you can’t own it forever, and transport it everywhere, whenever you choose.”
Enabling commerce so that consumers can own and control their own digital lives is paramount, so too is ownership and privacy of identity.
With this interconnected universe, we can expect new challenges and risks and privacy needs to be carefully considered and protected both by users and companies.
Companies building their own metaverses or looking to operate in one must ensure that privacy controls or safety features are appropriate to these new technologies.
“All of this together will go a long way towards building a safe, privacy-sensitive, and regulated metaverse for users,” states Wallen.
Investments
Investment into what may broadly be named the “metaverse category” — including gaming, virtual worlds, and augmented reality — had a record year in 2021, and that trend is likely to continue into 2022. Research estimates the metaverse to be a trillion-dollar revenue opportunity.
“So far, investment has been led by tech giants such as Roblox, Tencent, Microsoft, Epic Games and also Improbable,” Wallen said.
Over $10bn was injected into companies in the category as recently as November of 2021.
Meta recently invested $50m towards the creation of 10,000 jobs in the EU to “ensure the metaverse is built responsibly”.
And if you build it, they will come — digital real estate sales exceeded $500m in 2021, and some investors and analysts believe that figure could be as much as double this year.
“Most investment is concentrated around four companies — Sandbox, Decentraland, Cryptovoxels and Somnium — two of whose underlying crypto tokens SAND and MANA are among the recommended investments even by mainstream sources like Bloomberg Wealth,” said Wallen.
Privacy issues
Wallen continued: “They say that life imitates art, and the other way around, too. It follows that the metaverse will undoubtedly be a reflection of our physical world, for the most part, including our digital representations of ourselves , ‘avatars’.”
“But apart from making sure your digital self has the coolest (NF)T-shirt, there are legitimate concerns over how personal data and “possessions” might be controlled in the metaverse with privacy a intensely debated topic,” he pointed out.
One aspect of the metaverse that raises privacy concerns is the vast amount of personal data that may be collected on participating individuals.
“Compared to traditional social media, metaverse platforms can track individuals in a much more intimate manner.”
“Privacy laws surrounding individual consent and the collection and transfer of data to properly protect personal information will have to evolve in this digital space,” explained Wallen.
Concerns are not just limited to users, there are many examples of how large brands and fashion houses are using the metaverse to expand their marketing efforts as it creates a world of infinite possibilities for brands.
Marketers have to also be prepared for this cultural revolution and the challenges it could pose.
“The metaverse’s development could mirror the web’s development in significant ways so they should actively take learnings from the internet and apply these to the work they are doing in the virtual world,” Wallen argued.
Despite these challenges the metaverse presents an opportunity to be a breakthrough in privacy-compliant digital marketing.
“Although the metaverse poses complex questions that most likely require the amending of existing laws and regulations, having appropriate legal and technological measures in place will help mitigate risk and will of course provide some degree of protection for metaverse users,” he noted.
Building the metaverse
Finally, Wallen said technological progress on the project “won’t wait.”
There are innovators out there, not just brand marketers, building the metaverse today and the infrastructure for it “to become a virtual world unlike any other we’ve known before.”
He stressed that “luckily, most also agree that privacy, security and ownership are as inalienable in the virtual world as they are in the real one.”
The next iteration of metaverse experiences will have security built into the fabric, first, and then, worlds for millions of people to inhabit at once, enabled by increasingly powerful computers.
“Consumer ownership and privacy is the default expectation, not a privilege, of identity,” he said.
“Long term thinking on the metaverse not only sees its future as equitable and safe, but understands why it’s downright exciting beyond the headline,” concluded Wallen.
The post Deep dive with DreamWorks’ former CTO: ‘Forget social media, the Metaverse tracks people much more intimately’ appeared first on CityAM.
