Metaversing: Freedom

tags: m3 raribledao

If there was a word that best describes what many web3 and metaverse folks seek it’s “freedom”.

I notice that word is valued differently between XR and web3 folks.

Freedom of self expression (custom avatars)
Freedom through ownership (Digital property rights)

This short documentary offers a window into the journey of a VRChat creator and the freedom aspects of the platform (maximum self expression / sandbox for creativity): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVWlgh8QP5s

point of contention: digital scarcity vs abundance

Finding a balance between absolute self-expression while maintaining the concept of ownership will be the defining Q at the intersection of web3/XR - @asafaryann

could crypto land make the space more centralized? limit the freedom?
we build open metaverse, with digital scarcity can limit amt ppl own land and enter the metaverse

although artificial scarcity does indeed do something for open metaverse in terms of supporting projects building on open file formats / standards

in order for general public to adopt / contribute to open metaverse need incentives

do we run risk of introducing centralization with land though?

Decentraland biggest crypto-native metaverse project, absorbing attention / enormous resources, drying up liquidity and focus in other areas?

DCL team is mostly crypto-native background and that also reflects in the product

switching costs are typically very cheap
platform / vendor lockin for this stuff

Note: Is that true for DCL? If someone invested a ton of time into building on DCL, which I know many who have, I'm pretty sure it's very hard for them to switch.

barrier to entry shouldn't be land
it should be community / culture
especially when switching costs are low

when you have land on street, bakery in corner, draw audience, bonus effect

once audiences build spaces they wanna interact with
pedestrian traffic can walk by another thing
serendipity

network effects -> lend traffic / popularity

want people to make NFT (like glTF)
make world, share, boom
not space limited
make cool spot

decentraland subreddit mostly talking about price action
not really about building the open metaverse

artists feel psychologically / feeling priced out of metaverse
7k entry price is out of reach for new artists

headsets only cost $300, spending more on land is hard to convince artists with

ethos of crypto isn't about money but when you go to some metaverse project subreddits it looks like it is

How to shift culture / ethos back to decentralization and freedom?

Instead of preaching to choir hosting crypto events in crypto-native platforms, host more in non-crypto native platforms

Shoutout to https://twitter.com/themetafactory for going about pushing interop through culture / avatar wearables.

Trojan horse decentralization through art. Cryptoart transforming from 2D -> 3D metaversey things like avatars, pets, wearables weapons, etc

Ways to change the conversation from price action to open metaversing:

• accessible asset pipelines
  • how to find stuff to populate land with?
• art shows in places like VRChat or art walks throughout cryptovoxels has worked for jin to red pill newcomers

https://twitter.com/dankvr/status/1464357652998275081

freedom -> accessibility
creative people with novel ideas need tooling, asset pipelines, and distribution thats accessible
pick stuff up without substantial technical lift / pre-req
without it, creates exclusionary layer
technical side, far too complicated

Freedom, generally, is having the ability to act or change without constraint. Something is “free” if it can change easily and is not constrained in its present state." - Wikipedia

Meta keynote with Carmack:
at some point in time need to draw polygons on screen
3D geoemtry needs to be made / drawn
collision meshes
hard problems ppl struggle with
how to teleport, stick, drop players, physics engines

Shoutout to https://twitter.com/open_metaverse community for technical spec writing on interop standards

artist agnostic pipeline: for example: unreal nanite can handle oodles of geometry

makes things more accessible since artists don't need to learn about how to optimize and lightmap very complicated scenes, spend more time on the art instead

good tool: drop gltf -> collision mesh

interop between platforms relating to freedom: ability to bring stuff across, not be locked-in

people who are gunna build metaverse from artistic start