Despite the fact that the word “metaverse” itself appeared at the end of the last century, it burst into the mainstream only in 2021.
Billions of people heard it from Mark Zuckerberg, who set out to build a metaverse and even renamed Facebook for it. In this endeavor, he is not alone – his sworn rivals, the Winklevoss brothers, are already preparing to oppose the development of Meta with their alternative.
In the crypto industry, interest in the topic has fueled the growth of the GameFi sector – people around the world quit their jobs and plunge into gaming virtual worlds in order to farm money.
In a futuristic interview with Cryplogger Chief Editor Nikita Steringard, Distributed Lab founder Pavel Kravchenko spoke about what awaits us in the metauniverses of the future, about the barriers to their creation and the risks associated with them. (Spoiler alert: all this cannot be avoided, so you need to prepare and figure it out already).
Cryplogger: Hello Pasha! You have been on your social networks lately you give a lot of attention to the metauniverses. Zuckerberg also fueled interest in the topic. What social and monetary concepts will emerge in the metaverse? And will cryptocurrencies play a role?
Pavel Kravchenko: Hey! I think that all possible will appear – we already guess about some, but others can take us by surprise. To expand horizons for the future (probably distant), I advise you to read “An Inessential Detail” by Ian Banks [Surface Detail, Iain Banks — здесь и далее примечание редактора]… As soon as consciousness can be transplanted into the virtual world – and I believe that this will happen – both heaven and hell will appear in it.
As for the near future – 10-20 years – I think we will see a metaverse filled with worlds with different social systems, between which characters can move. But for the money. Obviously, this money will be issued on the blockchain of a particular world. Whether there will be a single mandatory currency for the metaverse is not yet ready to guess. I hope not.
As for the role of blockchain. If a company has created a game, then there is little point in going to the public blockchain today, because you have to pump someone else’s token. Why not fork a blockchain that is suitable in terms of parameters and run the game on it? This, by the way, is what the market leaders do – the same Axie infinity…
On the one hand, from the forks to the main blockchain, it is neither cold nor hot, but the bridges [кроссчейн-мосты] it is easier to build between them, that is, in practice, there is a gain for the ecosystem. This is one of the reasons why Polkadot is betting on such a future, but requires the use of its currency for certain operations – such a mandatory currency for the metaverse. Again, I repeat, I hope that this concept will not win, but we will see the financial Internet, where there is no obligatory currency (pay what you want).
Cryplogger: Now the property in virtual worlds is “lands”, “palaces”, “characters” and other game artifacts. Already familiar to us NFT. How else and in what forms will private property penetrate the metaverse?
Pavel Kravchenko: Reputation. I think that at stake for the players will be not only property that can be exchanged for money (and then for food and a new hard model), but the reputation accumulated over the years. If you consider that games can “erase” it, essentially consigning the character to oblivion, then this is a good way to keep players in the chosen model of the world.
For example, a character can lose in a virtual casino and go to farm worlds “for food” for a year. But it would still be better than giving up and developing a new character from scratch for five years. In the real world, there are human rights and all that.
I think that virtual worlds will write completely different rules (so far no one is watching them).
Cryplogger: By the way, about the rules. Some politicians have already gathered protect our avatars… How fast do you think regulation will penetrate virtual worlds? Will there be legislation governing what an avatar can and cannot do?
Pavel Kravchenko: Where there are people, there is media, where there is media, there is “public opinion” and, therefore, manipulation. Sooner or later, someone will be more influential for the game as a whole (as it happens in the real world). They will dictate the rules. And according to current statements – I think this is still at the stage of PR.
Cryplogger: Over the past 10 years, there has been a trend towards moving from the web to centralized applications. Why will this change and the trend will turn towards open source? The network effect of some applications is extremely difficult to break, most of the decentralized solutions have not yet really succeeded in gaining any significant audience – the same social networks.
Pavel Kravchenko: Every technology, when it becomes available to the masses, begins to develop rapidly. Roughly speaking, “affordability” is defined as whether one person can do something new in a few years. In order for this to be possible, bricks of the appropriate size are needed – standard protocols, libraries, modules, so as not to assemble a building from atoms, but to write the game in assembler… As soon as the source code of the stable building blocks becomes publicly available, thousands of people start creating.
Now is the time when one enthusiast can create a game or platform himself. In 20 years, technology will allow one person to create a VR world. Corporations are always one step ahead because they can hire thousands of people and buy licenses for cutting-edge software. But the ideological inspiration of a project is almost always done in units, so when the tools become available, the strength of one person becomes comparable to the strength of a corporation.
Cryplogger: What do you think in this context about the prospect of the reincarnation of browser games due to banned in many app stores?
Pavel Kravchenko: I think quite. Browser capabilities are far ahead of what they were 10 years ago. Yes, platforms will be banned, for them this is a loss of income. But banning for a long time will not work.
Cryplogger: How much money does it take to launch a browser game? Projects collect millions now, but there are doubts that these are adequate estimates.
Pavel Kravchenko: $ 100 thousand for the first version is enough for the head.
Cryplogger: It is already clear that NFTs will play a role in the birth of the metaverse, but there are also questions about this. Building an NFT-based game and achieving sustainability in the domestic economy are different things, you yourself recently wrote about this.
Pavel Kravchenko: There is no point in explaining NFT and play-to-earn. It is clear that if the creator of the game disappears or the game is closed, then all NFTs are practically useless (like chips of a bankrupt casino).
It seems to me that there are three barriers to the creation of the metaverse:
- The domestic economy should be inclusive (this is the simplest). This is a question of a year or two.
- Items from one world should somehow be used in others, and ideally create unexpected combinations of properties – different magic. To do this, the worlds will have to somehow agree on a common DNA. This is a 10+ year question.
- Making games that can’t be shut down, where every player can effectively maintain a full node [полную ноду] – the complete state of the game at any given time. This is already the level of the metaverse Ready Player One. This is already a horizon of ~ 20 years.
Someday, fortunately or unfortunately, we will get to the level of the metaverse from Surface Detail.
Cryplogger: There is opinionthat play-to-earn and play-to-win models as a result destroy in-game balance, since the desire of the majority for value is highly volatile. Do you agree with this?
Pavel Kravchenko: It is hard to say. All games are about the production of dopamine and the involvement of the player in another world. But the ways to achieve these goals may be different.
It is clear that in games where there is multiplayer and an open world that is not tied to “passing”, private property and reputation will be in demand.
Cryplogger: What are the consequences of the virtual world for society and the real world? Will it not become a permanent “place of residence” for those disadvantaged, whom AI will deprive of jobs?
Pavel Kravchenko: Interest Ask. Technically, millions of jobs have already been lost because there is no need for so many postmen, cabbies, miners and many other professions. But it was not AI that replaced them, but ordinary automation. And no one talks about the disadvantaged – everyone rejoices in the increased comfort. Even in a world where robots do all the physical work, there will be plenty to do – after all, people provide services to people.
And the fact that the virtual world will become a permanent place of work for the majority is 100% sure, just like the Internet has become it. In the virtual world (or augmented reality), it is much faster to implement changes. It will also allow transferring all work in 3D, which will greatly improve the quality of teaching, design in all areas and, of course, entertainment.
Subscribe to Cryplogger news on Telegram: Cryplogger Feed – the entire news feed, Cryplogger – the most important news, infographics and opinions.
Found a mistake in the text? Select it and press CTRL + ENTER
Despite the fact that the word “metaverse” itself appeared at the end of the last century, it burst into the mainstream only in 2021.
Billions of people heard it from Mark Zuckerberg, who set out to build a metaverse and even renamed Facebook for it. In this endeavor, he is not alone – his sworn rivals, the Winklevoss brothers, are already preparing to oppose the development of Meta with their alternative.
In the crypto industry, interest in the topic has fueled the growth of the GameFi sector – people around the world quit their jobs and plunge into gaming virtual worlds in order to farm money.
In a futuristic interview with Cryplogger Chief Editor Nikita Steringard, Distributed Lab founder Pavel Kravchenko spoke about what awaits us in the metauniverses of the future, about the barriers to their creation and the risks associated with them. (Spoiler alert: all this cannot be avoided, so you need to prepare and figure it out already).
Cryplogger: Hello Pasha! You have been on your social networks lately you give a lot of attention to the metauniverses. Zuckerberg also fueled interest in the topic. What social and monetary concepts will emerge in the metaverse? And will cryptocurrencies play a role?
Pavel Kravchenko: Hey! I think that all possible will appear – we already guess about some, but others can take us by surprise. To expand horizons for the future (probably distant), I advise you to read “An Inessential Detail” by Ian Banks [Surface Detail, Iain Banks — здесь и далее примечание редактора]… As soon as consciousness can be transplanted into the virtual world – and I believe that this will happen – both heaven and hell will appear in it.
As for the near future – 10-20 years – I think we will see a metaverse filled with worlds with different social systems, between which characters can move. But for the money. Obviously, this money will be issued on the blockchain of a particular world. Whether there will be a single mandatory currency for the metaverse is not yet ready to guess. I hope not.
As for the role of blockchain. If a company has created a game, then there is little point in going to the public blockchain today, because you have to pump someone else’s token. Why not fork a blockchain that is suitable in terms of parameters and run the game on it? This, by the way, is what the market leaders do – the same Axie infinity…
On the one hand, from the forks to the main blockchain, it is neither cold nor hot, but the bridges [кроссчейн-мосты] it is easier to build between them, that is, in practice, there is a gain for the ecosystem. This is one of the reasons why Polkadot is betting on such a future, but requires the use of its currency for certain operations – such a mandatory currency for the metaverse. Again, I repeat, I hope that this concept will not win, but we will see the financial Internet, where there is no obligatory currency (pay what you want).
Cryplogger: Now the property in virtual worlds is “lands”, “palaces”, “characters” and other game artifacts. Already familiar to us NFT. How else and in what forms will private property penetrate the metaverse?
Pavel Kravchenko: Reputation. I think that at stake for the players will be not only property that can be exchanged for money (and then for food and a new hard model), but the reputation accumulated over the years. If you consider that games can “erase” it, essentially consigning the character to oblivion, then this is a good way to keep players in the chosen model of the world.
For example, a character can lose in a virtual casino and go to farm worlds “for food” for a year. But it would still be better than giving up and developing a new character from scratch for five years. In the real world, there are human rights and all that.
I think that virtual worlds will write completely different rules (so far no one is watching them).
Cryplogger: By the way, about the rules. Some politicians have already gathered protect our avatars… How fast do you think regulation will penetrate virtual worlds? Will there be legislation governing what an avatar can and cannot do?
Pavel Kravchenko: Where there are people, there is media, where there is media, there is “public opinion” and, therefore, manipulation. Sooner or later, someone will be more influential for the game as a whole (as it happens in the real world). They will dictate the rules. And according to current statements – I think this is still at the stage of PR.
Cryplogger: Over the past 10 years, there has been a trend towards moving from the web to centralized applications. Why will this change and the trend will turn towards open source? The network effect of some applications is extremely difficult to break, most of the decentralized solutions have not yet really succeeded in gaining any significant audience – the same social networks.
Pavel Kravchenko: Every technology, when it becomes available to the masses, begins to develop rapidly. Roughly speaking, “affordability” is defined as whether one person can do something new in a few years. In order for this to be possible, bricks of the appropriate size are needed – standard protocols, libraries, modules, so as not to assemble a building from atoms, but to write the game in assembler… As soon as the source code of the stable building blocks becomes publicly available, thousands of people start creating.
Now is the time when one enthusiast can create a game or platform himself. In 20 years, technology will allow one person to create a VR world. Corporations are always one step ahead because they can hire thousands of people and buy licenses for cutting-edge software. But the ideological inspiration of a project is almost always done in units, so when the tools become available, the strength of one person becomes comparable to the strength of a corporation.
Cryplogger: What do you think in this context about the prospect of the reincarnation of browser games due to banned in many app stores?
Pavel Kravchenko: I think quite. Browser capabilities are far ahead of what they were 10 years ago. Yes, platforms will be banned, for them this is a loss of income. But banning for a long time will not work.
Cryplogger: How much money does it take to launch a browser game? Projects collect millions now, but there are doubts that these are adequate estimates.
Pavel Kravchenko: $ 100 thousand for the first version is enough for the head.
Cryplogger: It is already clear that NFTs will play a role in the birth of the metaverse, but there are also questions about this. Building an NFT-based game and achieving sustainability in the domestic economy are different things, you yourself recently wrote about this.
Pavel Kravchenko: There is no point in explaining NFT and play-to-earn. It is clear that if the creator of the game disappears or the game is closed, then all NFTs are practically useless (like chips of a bankrupt casino).
It seems to me that there are three barriers to the creation of the metaverse:
- The domestic economy should be inclusive (this is the simplest). This is a question of a year or two.
- Items from one world should somehow be used in others, and ideally create unexpected combinations of properties – different magic. To do this, the worlds will have to somehow agree on a common DNA. This is a 10+ year question.
- Making games that can’t be shut down, where every player can effectively maintain a full node [полную ноду] – the complete state of the game at any given time. This is already the level of the metaverse Ready Player One. This is already a horizon of ~ 20 years.
Someday, fortunately or unfortunately, we will get to the level of the metaverse from Surface Detail.
Cryplogger: There is opinionthat play-to-earn and play-to-win models as a result destroy in-game balance, since the desire of the majority for value is highly volatile. Do you agree with this?
Pavel Kravchenko: It is hard to say. All games are about the production of dopamine and the involvement of the player in another world. But the ways to achieve these goals may be different.
It is clear that in games where there is multiplayer and an open world that is not tied to “passing”, private property and reputation will be in demand.
Cryplogger: What are the consequences of the virtual world for society and the real world? Will it not become a permanent “place of residence” for those disadvantaged, whom AI will deprive of jobs?
Pavel Kravchenko: Interest Ask. Technically, millions of jobs have already been lost because there is no need for so many postmen, cabbies, miners and many other professions. But it was not AI that replaced them, but ordinary automation. And no one talks about the disadvantaged – everyone rejoices in the increased comfort. Even in a world where robots do all the physical work, there will be plenty to do – after all, people provide services to people.
And the fact that the virtual world will become a permanent place of work for the majority is 100% sure, just like the Internet has become it. In the virtual world (or augmented reality), it is much faster to implement changes. It will also allow transferring all work in 3D, which will greatly improve the quality of teaching, design in all areas and, of course, entertainment.
Subscribe to Cryplogger news on Telegram: Cryplogger Feed – the entire news feed, Cryplogger – the most important news, infographics and opinions.
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