Metaverse — Gateway to the Future, or Just a FAD?
How fancy can our internet-led encounters get? The canvas painted by sci-fi movies is vast, but how elaborative are our real digital capabilities. Certainly, innovations are compounding rapidly, unraveling new gateways to a more digitally-enabled future; perhaps we are on our way to a future that resembles the digital sophistication shown in movies.
One such gateway that everyone is talking about these days is Metaverse. Although the metaverse is not a new concept, it gained traction after Facebook changed its name to Meta and Mark Zuckerberg posted a video describing the metaverse they are creating.
Going by that video, we can visualize a future where everyone seating at home with a VR headset accessing the metaverse. However, at present, we don’t have a metaverse of that kind. But we have just scratched the surface. Metaverse projects are just in their infancy, and the possibilities are endless as we advance.
To start, we can understand metaverse as a platform for alternate digital realities, a platform that converges our real and virtual worlds. Metaverse is the simulation of the physical environment in the digital realm to virtually enable real-life-like interactions such as social networking, gaming, clubbing, work, entertainment, shopping, and more.
So, will we make it to the metaverse, or it’s just a buzz that will fade away eventually? Let’s introspect!
This article comprehends that metaverse can survive and thrive on the following considerations:
• Metaverse will be a decentralized ecosystem rather than a centralized entity.
• There will be multiple metaverses rather than a single universal metaverse.
• To present consumers with unified virtual experiences, several metaverses will require interoperability.
• Identity authentication must be used to prevent interoperability from becoming a vulnerability.
The Centralized vs Decentralized Metaverse
While we’re on the subject of the metaverse, we can’t forget that we’re approaching web 3.0, which is all about decentralization. We, as users, have had enough of an Internet that offers little in the way of user sovereignty and majorly serves the interests of powerful tech companies. The flaw here is the dominance of centralized systems. But with blockchain technology powering verticals like crypto, defi and even web 3.0, we are heading to a decentralized web that prioritizes user sovereignty and data security.
So, if web 3.0 is the way of the future, a centralized metaverse is not a sustainable idea. Metaverse needs to be a decentralized ecosystem, where there is an open economy providing equal opportunities for one and all.
Also, the idea of one unified metaverse doesn’t appear to be feasible. Will Decentraland and Axie Infinity ever merge as one platform? Possibilities are thin. Although they are just building up, the existing metaverse projects hint that we will have multiple metaverse projects in the future also.
The concern here is the siloed ecosystems of the contemporary metaverses. These projects are segregated platforms; you can’t simply hop from one metaverse to another. But metaverses as siloed spaces will not work because they fail to deliver unified experiences to the users. Siloed metaverse projects mean fragmented experiences.
Limitations of Siloed Metaverse Ecosystems
Metaverse projects as siloed ecosystems fail to provide users with a cohesive experience because users need to have multiple avatars or identities respective to each platform. Even the worth of their digital assets is restricted to a single metaverse. Also, they may require to keep track of several wallets or coins, depending on the platform’s compatibility.
Here, we need interoperability. Although a full-fledged interoperable metaverse is absent today, going forward, interoperability will drive force into the metaverse. The success of metaverse will demand interoperability across multiple verticals, be it avatars, in-game assets, tokens, identities or crypto assets.
Interoperability in Metaverse
Interoperability is a priority for decentralized metaverse platforms because it makes a metaverse project more relevant and purposeful for users. A metaverse project with interoperable capacities can interact with other metaverse projects, utilize their services and features, extend its own services to other metaverses, enable cross-platform social connecting, trading, and many other activities that are impossible in a siloed ecosystem.
With interoperability, users won’t require to manage multiple wallets; instead, they will be able to store currency and perform transactions across various projects with a single wallet.
Considering that there will be several interoperable metaverses, it’s easy to foresee consumers wanting to traverse between them. This brings us to the point of identity authentication. Identity is important when we travel from one city to another or from one country to another; the same will be true in the metaverse as people move from one platform to another.
Identity Authentication in the Metaverse
Verified and interoperable data will be crucial in the metaverse across multiple levels, be it the identity verification at the time of profile creation or verification at the time of transactions. Identity authentication will help establish trust in avatars, in-game items and profiles.
Blockchain-powered self-sovereign identities (SSIs) can facilitate identity authentication in the metaverse. SSIs are digital identities controlled by individuals themselves and can be accessed or used only on owners’ consent. SSI identities are verified using public-key cryptography anchored on a blockchain. These identities are verified by public identifiers of a decentralized network and not by any centralized third party.
Final Thoughts
Metaverse is certainly not a fad, but its prosperity will take time. From decentralization interoperability to identity authentication, there are many layers that metaverse development needs to take care of. Many technologies, including blockchain, IoT, AI, Digital Twins, AR and VR, will come into play in powering a metaverse. In creating a decentralized metaverse, blockchain technology can help regulate areas like digital proof of ownership, digital collectability of assets (such as NFTs), transfer of value through crypto, governance, interoperability, identity authentication and more.
We can anticipate that the cumulative power of new-age technologies will finally connect all the dots, resulting in metaverses capable of generating new types of digital possibilities, with user sovereignty at the forefront.
