# Into the Metaverse By [jubilantTortoise2](https://paragraph.com/@jubilanttortoise2) · 2022-04-04 --- Is the digital world just a trend or does it represent a transition point for humanity? Written by Theo Papageorge Back in high school, I remember going back and forth with people about the “singularity,” the theoretical moment where technological growth goes exponential and humanity is never the same again. It was something to ponder during late nights of young-person introspection, ideally while gazing up at the stars. What would this moment look like? Would robots take over the world, Terminator style? Is this new existence a utopia or a living nightmare? Is this what happened in the rumored city of Atlantis, and why it fell victim to itself? It was a conversation for young wannabe philosophers then and Joe Rogan listeners now, an unsolvable riddle about where all of our frantic human innovation is leading us. Technically, the singularity is defined to be the moment where AI passes the Turing Test and becomes indistinguishable from human life. It seems that we still have a long way to go before this is realized, if it ever is. (Can robots have a soul? A topic for another time, perhaps.) However, to me, a similar framework can be applied to the idea of a virtual world. If a virtual world becomes indistinguishable from the real world, does that not represent the same type of merge? The metaverse While we are not there yet, either, it is undeniable that the topic of the metaverse has a cultural significance that seems to be growing greater every day. Land in decentralized metaverses like Decentraland has been getting bought up at jaw-dropping prices, with JP Morgan being the most recent mainstream entrant onto the platform. On the centralized side, Facebook announced their rebrand to Meta last October, indicating their plans to focus their efforts on this new iteration of virtual reality. Digital worlds have been around for a while now, with the Second Life platform launching all the way back in 2003. Even before that, RPG games like Everquest and World of Warcraft have provided players with open worlds to play in and explore, forming communities and real relationships behind digital avatars. Minecraft has shown its immense popularity as essentially a game for destroying and rebuilding virtual worlds. Additionally, in the years preceding the explosion of the metaverse concept, Fortnite and even simple Facebook games like Farmville gave users the ability to use real money to purchase in-game assets. In the broadest sense, even a Zoom call constitutes a type of metaverse, a digital meeting held on the centralized Zoom platform. Users have the ability to modify their background and image, with Zoom’s simple AR filters changing the context of what we perceive a job interview to be. Through the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent increase of remote work, our reliance on these platforms has grown rapidly. At this point, meeting in some type of central virtual location, such as a boardroom or an event center, feels like a small step away from what we’re already used to. Whether used for fun or for play, the metaverse can be seen as simply a more tactile, entertaining environment to host our virtual communication. In a viral Twitter thread, investor and entrepreneur Shaan Puri described the metaverse as not a literal place, but rather “the moment where our virtual life becomes more important than our digital life.” In this framework, it is easy to see how the way we live, work, and meet has been progressing towards the moment he describes. As a vast amount of desirable jobs become fully and permanently remote, is the metaverse a more important job market than one’s home city and immediate, real surroundings? This priority shift doesn’t necessitate living in a fully virtual world; it simply manifests as technological possibilities create alternate realities that are directly integrated into what we have historically considered as “real.” Blockchain’s differentiator While integrating payments into virtual worlds is not new, the real unlock is being able to cash them out. When a user buys a skin or a weapon in a traditional video game, their investment stays within the confines of that platform, unless they are able to somehow swap it through an agreement with another player. However, the proof of ownership provided by the blockchain and thriving market for trading digital currencies have provided real-world value for metaverse assets. Last year, Axie Infinity, a blockchain game where users collect and battle creatures, exploded onto the scene. This game popularized the “play-to-earn” model that allows players to gain real-life utility from their time spent within the game. As the Axie creatures exist as NFTs, it is possible to resell them on the secondary market and create real money from in-game earnings. Therefore, Axie exists as a metaverse game with real-world value, an innovation new to the blockchain. Likewise, in decentralized metaverse platforms like Decentraland, users are able to speculate on NFT real estate, see their property values go up, and then resell their land. Metaverse real estate agencies are even becoming popular, where, just like in the real world, large investors buy up plots of land and then rent them out to clients. With an influx of crypto-native and even traditional companies that are integrating virtual office space into their strategy, we are on the verge of “metaverse real estate agent” being a viable career path. Beyond real estate investments, it is possible to use land to build exclusive communities within the decentralized metaverse. Since NFTs prove ownership and hold unique data, a developer can create a metaverse building that only allows in holders of a certain collection, for example. This can even be segmented further into VIP areas and other types of special access sections. A company has the ability to hold a metaverse event that is free for certain NFT holders and charge a cover for others, rewarding their community and most loyal customers. Through this application with real-world value propositions, metaverse ownership does become, to some, as important as a person’s real-world assets. These worlds, in effect, can act as a testing ground for how to run a real-world decentralized community. With the ability to incorporate people from all over the world and build structures in much less time than would be needed in our 3D reality, users can try out new collaborative paradigms and see what types of interactions are mutually beneficial. In the same way that crypto constantly tests new DeFi protocols, expanding the idea of community by applying game theory to financial mechanics, we can practice creating the world we want to see in this more flexible, instantaneously-manifested metaverse. The Big Tech side of the digital world While blockchain allows for decentralized communities to prove involvement and see real-world financial gains from their metaverse activities, Meta, Microsoft, and other large Web 1 and 2 companies are also investing big money into creating their versions of the digital world. Aside from the name change, Meta acquired the VR company Oculus in 2014, showing that their interest in an integrative digital reality has been brewing for a long while. In January, Microsoft purchased the legendary gaming company Blizzard, with their chairman and CEO Satya Nadella specifically mentioning metaverse platforms as a prime motivation for the deal. While these companies have been massively successful in providing the world with useful hardware and communication channels, the idea of a centralized metaverse run by billion-dollar interests has some worrying aspects to it. The way that Meta and other Web 2 social media platforms give themselves the ability to act as judge, jury, and executioner in determining appropriate content and censoring opposing voices has even higher stakes in a virtual world setting. It is not this article’s intent to debate social media platform content curation obligations, but simply to consider the version of the digital world we want to see. If we take these companies’ past financial and cultural successes as indicators that they should rule our digital worlds, we have the choice to give our energy to those platforms. However, if the decentralization, flexibility, and real-life ownership enabled by the blockchain appeals, that opportunity is available–and thriving. Interoperability in the metaverse Currently, metaverses exist within their own microcosms. A structure in Decentraland does not exist in and cannot be ported over to the Sandbox (another leading platform), for example. Builders must decide which metaverse they would like to focus on, as learning the mechanics of each protocol comes with a significant amount of work attached to it. As the blockchain space grows to prioritize interoperability, it stands to reason that the metaverse would develop to allow each platform its own unique characteristics while also facilitating interaction. In this sense, just as it is currently possible to bridge assets between two different chains, users could transport their avatars and NFT outfits from an ETH-based metaverse to Portals on Solana, for example. This would create something like a digital multiverse of parallel realities, where one’s singular character can benefit from the creations of developers and entrepreneurs no matter their chosen platform. Supporting this, however, requires a bridging network with the ability to support the transport of an ever-more-complex system of smart contracts and NFT data. TON’s multi-chain protocol and its ability to create as many workchains and shardchains as it needs to perform the network’s operations give it the capability to connect these various digital worlds. Besides providing the ability for this bridge, we continue to explore the ideal way to enter the metaverse space, intrigued by the popularity and thriving communities present in these immersive virtual worlds. In essence, our goal is to provide the most flexible and technologically-advanced base layer for creators to build their digital world offerings upon. In a sense, the metaverse is simply the base layer for a new world of entrepreneurship and creativity, given life through what its participants decide to build upon it. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed on this site are those of the authors who may be associated persons of the TON Community and who do not represent the views, opinions, and positions of the TON Foundation. Information is provided for general education purposes only and is not investment advice. --- *Originally published on [jubilantTortoise2](https://paragraph.com/@jubilanttortoise2/into-the-metaverse)*