The Metaverse Diaries, A History of the Future — Part 2
Chapter Two: June 2026. How we made Earth 2 ‘sticky’.
In the earliest days of the metaverse, it was found that the projects with the greatest chance of success were not necessarily those who were first to market, or with the best graphics, the biggest backers, or even the largest number of celebrities buying land. The ones that gained the most traction were those where casual visitors were made to feel welcome, where there were plenty of reasons to come back, and where there were experiences and activities to appeal to everyone. In a word, they were ‘sticky’.
Back in 2022/3 one of Earth 2’s (E2’s) European Megacities, ‘MC1’ had a very active community, a strong democratic structure and a charismatic leader in the shape of Mayor Maria, who believed passionately in E2 as a force for good on a global scale. She had proposed the creation of a membership organisation, #HelpingEveryone (#HE), a way to help everyone in the megacity, from the largest landowners to the very smallest, who had maybe just one or two 19m x 19m plots, or ’tiles’. She knew that MC1 could be the ‘stickiest’ of E2’s megacities if everyone joined her scheme. At this stage, there was only the EcoSim, an economy simulator where megacity landowners collected and transported essence and resources with the objective being to build the economy for the city. Under the #HE scheme, larger players would help smaller players to set up their EcoSim buildings, and smaller players helped the larger players with larger projects, like setting up logistics, warehousing and protection systems for the city.
Since the launch of Phase 3 v1, the first draft full 3D and VR enabled version of E2 in 2025, the number of independent businesses had really taken off. Now people were running bars, night clubs, casinos, music venues, restaurants, racetracks, esports arenas, art galleries, various ‘VR experiences’ and retail outlets from small street markets to megamalls. In #HelpingEveryone’s earliest form, membership was limited to local landowners, who would commit to supporting fellow members by turning up to planned events arranged around a central city calendar. It worked very well for the smaller landowners, but the bigger players weren’t always content with a dozen or so extra members turning up to larger events, like the music festivals arranged monthly at the city’s MC1 Stadium.
New to trading? Try crypto trading bots or copy trading
At that time, all first-time visitors to E2 were directed to a Megacity of the Month, a title awarded to the winner of the regular E2-wide ‘Co-op Energy’ competitions. These were awards granted to the locations with the best record of collaboration toward a common goal. On arrival at MC1, visitors would be greeted by a representative of #HelpingEveryone, sometimes one or two of the landowners, but usually a very personable and intelligent bot, and introduced to a list of the city’s top 100 EPLs. An Earth 2 Property Locator (EPL) is like a transportation portal, allowing teleportation to anywhere in E2. For first-time visitors, EPLs like #GoAnywhere, #DoAnything, #MyMusic, #MyExperiences, #Mytours and #BeSomeoneElse had all proved very popular. With a view to boosting the #HelpingEveryone scheme, Mayor Maria then took a bold step, offering visitors token payments to attend one of three daily events (365 days per year) planned in MC1. Many visitors to E2 had already visited other metaverse projects like The Sandbox and Decentraland, but had been underwhelmed by the low quality voxel graphics, high purchase cost of property, and lack of any sense of community or welcome. These visitors weren’t necessarily planning to be major investors in E2, but they’d heard that property was cheap, there was a welcoming atmosphere and a growing list of intriguing locations to visit, thanks to the 1:1 relationship with the Earth.
One of the early flyers posted to new visitors’ E2 social media app read as follows, “Are you new to the most exciting metaverse project in the world today? Do you want to have a good time, along with other new arrivals, meet people and make friends…. and get paid for it? Find out about new business launches and get free drinks, free samples, launch day discounts and exclusive memberships. Join #Rentacrowd at no cost, visit one of our events of the day and stay for an hour to claim your free Sence. (100 Earth2 Sence = 1 Essence)”
In those days, the events were usually one shopping (local daytime), one VRE (Virtual Reality Experience) daytime and/or evening, and one bar/club/casino at night. Payments were only 3 to 5 Sence, but a flexible and committed visitor, paying three visits a day could rack up a whole Essence in less than a week. With the recent release of Tier 3 properties (fewer benefits, but lowest cost) from 10 Sence per tile, the established landowners had been building apartment blocks as fast as the EcoSim could produce the building blocks, and the city was going highrise in a big way.
#HelpingEveryone and #Rentacrowd (#RC) were both non-profit organisations. #HE annual membership fees (1% of Essence held) contributed the Sence paid out to #RC members, and those #RC members who decided to stay with E2 and put down roots, around 80%, ended up either paying rent to the landowners or becoming landowners themselves, joining #HE and paying their membership. It was a virtuous circle. Only around 1% of the Sence paid out to #RC members found its way out of E2 and onto the exchanges.
As #Rentacrowd grew, it was found that being able to request specific demographics became attractive to both #HE and #RC members. #RC members had provided feedback to #HE, saying that they would like to make more use of their special skills or social preferences, and that they were keen to role play too. Within a year #HE members were able to specify their preference for the following :-
Age groups from U18 to over 70
Nationalities (but not race)
Well-behaved and chic
‘Lively’
Clubbers
Gamblers
Academics, broken down by arts and sciences
Shoppers
Punks
Steampunk
Heavy Metal / Bikers
Ultrachic/ Designer Fashion/ Supermodels
Hippies
Beachwear
Generic Meat*
Huggers
Intellectuals
Conversationalists
Philosophers/ Psychologists
Anime and other Cosplayers
Role-playing gamers
Ironic Hipsters**
Vikings
Pirates
Furries
Sub/Dom
Horror characters
Short Notice Distractions***
Sea Shanty Lovers
Elvis Impersonators
Celebrities (with entourage)
Press Photographers
Pub/ folk singers/ instrumentalists
PvPers
Human avatars only
Non-human avatars only
*The cheapest tier of #Rentacrowd. No dress code or activity required, not required to interact, just there to ‘make the place look busy’
** Nobody wanted real hipsters
*** “A neighbour’s customers or other crowds blocking access to your premises? Call HE Support for a Short Notice Distraction. Options include unicyclists, jugglers, fire eaters, fake bank robbery (with or without police car chase), beachwear flashmob, domestic disputes and the premium option, Sence cannons”.
#Rentacrowd went from strength to strength and was copied in other megacities in E2. One blatant copy, #Rentaparty, with simpler structure, reduced rewards, but only one demographic choice, described as “Party Animals Only” was so popular that they were bought out by #HE and retained as an option for dedicated hedonists.
Earth 2 had launched in October 2020 and, after phenomenal growth, sold their 100 millionth tile after only 20 months, in June 2022. The second hundred million came in a similar timeframe in February 2024. It seems that #HelpingEveryone played a significant part in bringing the 300 millionth tile after another 18 months in August 2025 . The fourth 100 million looks to be upon us very soon, just over a year since the last. It was recently announced that, due to Mayor Maria’s commitment, vision and success in bringing E2 to the wider public, MC1 would be granted a whole year status as Gateway to Earth 2. The rest of E2 has now adopted #HE and #RC with over 90% take-up of #HE by landowners. #RC has taken credit for bringing over 4 million new players to E2 of which over 2 million were previously unbanked and have been lifted out of property and given financial independence.
“This is what we meant by ’diversification of global wealth.’” — Mayor Maria
Coming Soon: Chapter Three: April 2027. Artificial Intelligence in E2, “Pint of the usual, Jeff?”, Swimming With Dolphins, “Holidays in the Species of Your Choice” (Surgery Optional)
