EVERYTHING YOU WANT TO KNOW ABOUT METAVERSE
2022 OCTOBER ISSUE
Written by Andrew Sia
Exactly what the metaverse meant is unclear. Billions have been invested, and it feels like a game. But try to think metaverse as a fourth era of computing and networking. It succeeds mainframes of the 1950s to 1970s, personal computers and the internet of 1980s to mid-2000s, and the mobile and cloud era that we are experiencing now. Changes are constantly evolving for those accessing computing and networking resources with their questions about the when, where, why and how. All the changes are profound; they are hard to be specific and even to predict.
Having said that, according to the US Securities and Exchange Commissions, in the first six months of 2022 the word metaverse appeared in regulatory filings for more than 1,100 times. It seemed every corporate executive must mention the metaverse and how it can fit into their company better than those of the competitors—even when its meaning remains unclear.
Facebook jumped into all of this and changed its name to Meta in 2021. It is now losing $10 billion each year on its metaverse initiatives. And six of the largest public companies in the world—Amazon, Apple, Google, Microsoft, Nvidia, Tencent—have also been busy preparing themselves for the metaverse.
For the average person, the work thus far is still invisible. There isn’t a metaverse product we can go and buy, or it could have come and gone. Crypto has crushed. Facebook’s market capitalization which was $900 billion when it changed its name to Meta, is now sitting around $450 billion. This year’s video-gaming sales have fallen by nearly 10%, due, in part, to the waning of the pandemic that forced people to stay inside for the previous two years.
To many of us, metaverse seems to be sputtering and we don’t want to be out of the action as the largest technical platforms have already taking shape and we are expecting its enormous influence of our lives, as well as the technologies, and the new business models for the modern economy. We are already facing problems from today’s connectivity of the internet. So why not we get ourselves ready to move to what Mark Zuckerberg calls the successor to it?
Whether we are ready or not, metaverse is taking over both the in-store or online experience. It is becoming the retail buzzword of 2022, allowing both to be done both at once and even while playing a virtual game or chatting to fellow avatars in the phygital—physical digital—space.
Already the potential of the metaverse is proving to be extremely attractive to big brands in the apparel industry including Nike, Gap, Adidas and Prada, who have bet their digital claims by delving into the world of non-fungible tokens (NFTs), which are digital assets that can represent real-world objects such as sports shoes, clothes, art, music and games.
Others are using the metaverse as a lucrative second income stream by giving consumers the chance to purchase digital-only products such as NFT artworks and digital-only fashion pieces with just a few clicks.
Denim brand G-Raw is using the metaverse to create an online community. Earlier this year, Italian clothing retailer United Colors of Benetton experimented with an immerse physical store in a bid to create a circular relationship between the physical and virtual world.
The apparel industry is also exploring the practical uses of NFTs. For example, NFTs can be used to prove the authenticity of a luxury fashion product via blockchain “digital ledger” that cannot be alerted and can keep customers’ body measurement data safe using algorithmic body measurement predicting technology.
If that wasn’t enough, manufacturing has reached another realm with 3D rendering provider Clo Virtual Fashion enabling its software to create 3D rendered designs for the apparel sectors.
In March 2021 design studio RTKFT designed NFTs in the form of sports shoes, and worked with digital artist FEWOCiOUS; they have sold 620 virtual pairs of virtual sports shoes. The promotion generated $3.1 million in less than five minutes. As the result, Nike acquired RTKFT for an undisclosed amount by the end of last year to try to get into the action.
Karl Lagerfeld launched a range of NFTs depicting the fashion design as a digital figurine, and the whole collection sold out in under 50 minutes. Dolce and Gabbana reportedly made $5.7 million from the sale of just nine NFT pieces.
Brands are already filing patents with the US Patent and Trademark Office to protect its names, logo, slogans, and some of its best-known products, to avoid the risk of intellectual property infringement within the metaverse.
Last year Nike filed seven patents, including its “Air Jorden”, using the same filing process for IP protection in the physical and virtual world. The copyright offices may respond and provide specific guidance for the metaverse.
Avatars would need the money to develop. But unlike real celebrities, they do not require a fee, and they are completely under the brands that created them in the first place. For the brands, there is no worries to the embarrassment or reputational damage that can occur with the “real world” celebrities and partnership with the influencers.
Many brands rely on celebrities and online influencers to promote their products in the real world; however the metaverse’s digital avatars could give brands the chance to create and control influencers as before.
The luxury and sportswear brands are at the forefront of exploring digital platforms, releasing virtual collections and opening metaverse stores with gaming platforms. Everyone is learning how to bridge the virtual and physical world with elements of physical clothing design and production with cutting-edge digital technologies. The result is a unique and interactive experience for the end-consumers that will continue to evolve.
My summary to my findings about the metaverse is that it is a virtual-reality space in which users can interact with a computer-generated environment with other online community. The use of non-fungible token (NFTs), to purchase the digital assets, which are virtual as well. In other words, nothing exchanged hands.
The idea of avatars just blows my mind as this concept within Hinduism, prompting me to think I’ll wait for my next life on Earth to solve this.
