Why have Metaverse and NFT become one of the hottest items globally?
The metaverse and NFT are one of the hottest business items around the world recently. Facebook has changed its company name to Meta to announce that facilitating the creation of the Metaverse is its most important business area. Hence, many companies and even governments around the world are very interested and investing in Metaverse. Why has the Metaverse become one of the hottest areas globally? Moreover, why has NFT also become popular among people around the world? Today, I would like to talk about it.
- What is the Metaverse and NFT?
First, we need to know about what the Metaverse and NFT are. When we are search their meanings on the internet, there are exists various types of answers. In my opinion, I feel that the Metaverse is a technology that exists to connect real life and virtual life seamlessly. According to the explanations of Metaverse from various companies like Meta (Facebook), Microsoft and Google, we can do many things in the Metaverse such as having a business meeting with colleagues, hanging out with friends, buying and selling products, participating in a music concert, and so on.
NFT stands for non-fungible token. It is a digital asset that represents a real objects like art piece, a video or social media post. Its concept is similar to that of Intellectual Property. When someone produces or finds something in the virtual world, he or she will have full ownership of that items under the NFT system. The reason why NFT games are so popular globally is that players can exchange NFTs for real money on NFT or cryptocurrency exchanges. This feature has attracted many gamers around the world. If it is possible to earn money playing games, I’m sure most gamers will be willing to hop right in.
NFT is a great way for people to have ownership over their digitally created things. Beside, it has more potential use cases, but as of now, people are only thinking about earning money from it.
2. What is the meaning of Metaverse and NFT to us?
Actually, until now, Metaverse and NFT don’t close to many people. In my opinion, only people who are working in crypto and blockchain industry know exactly what they are meant to do. These people are the ones who are invested to see the Metaverse and NFTs become a success. Certainly, some game players are involved in NFT adopted games. However, I think that they are playing the games to earn money, and not interested or passionate in NFTs.
I’m so curious about what Metaverse and NFT will change our lives. One of the reasons why Metaverse and NFT have been so popular around the world is due to the Coronavirus Pandemic. During the pandemic, many employees work from home, and can’t visit many places due to the restrictions in places. Therefore, many people tend to find alternative way to meet their colleagues and friends. The Metaverse looks like a good alternative way to meet the demand of these people. i.e. meeting their colleagues and friends in virtual space, having a business meeting or hanging out.
However, will people prefer to meet their colleagues and friends in virtual space instead of face to face after the Coronavirus pandemic? No, I think that people will still prefer to meet with their colleagues and friends face to face. There is still not enough technology for use to intuitively use the Metaverse, because many of current metaverse services are just like online games or video games. As of now, people have to wear goggles to immerse themselves in the virtual world. As you might know, wearing goggles for long bring fatigue to our eyes, and we can’t be aware of our surroundings while wearing goggles. This may cause dangerous situations.
NFT have a lot of challenges to be solved for people will embrace it. This is because the concept of NFT is still quite conceptual. Of course, so many people around the world are so passionate about NFTs as they wonder how an NFTs has garnered so much real value from trading at high prices. I think that owning an NFT is very similar to Intellectual Property. Currently, the Intellectual Property system is working fine, so I still find it difficult to understand the use case of NFTs. Probably, NFTs are greatly linked to the Web3.0 concept and many people are excited to welcome the new era of the internet.
“why do big platform companies like Facebook, Instagram and Google earn so much money based on our content? I strongly believe that We have a right to obtain some of the profits these platform companies are gaining. An NFT represents the user’s ownership and it brings along the opportunity to earn money.
3. Is Metaverse just a technological development or revolution on its own?
Recently, in South Korea, I see many companies announcing that they have started to develop or launch the related-Metaverse products or services. However, when I review these products or services, it is hard to understand what purpose or plan they have? When I ask these companies on why they decided to start their project or their competitie advantage, I usually receive replies saying that Metaverse is one of the hottest items nowadays. The easiest way to persuade investors these days is to talk about developing the Metaverse. Is the right answer? Is it the right way? I disagree. In my opinion, for a business to succeed, the most important thing is to have a clear plan, strategy and goal. Otherwise, the business is likely to fall.
I don’t know exactly how will Metaverse will be like in the future. Metaverse seems like a great technology that can improve our quality of life and eliminate inequality in our world. When we go back to around 1995 to 2001 (Dot-com bubble), there were so many companies that tried to develop and launch their products and services using dot-com technology. However, we can’t remember almost all of thosecompanies except the ones that survive in bubble such as Amazon and Google. Likewise, I think that we can expect to see some giant companies in the Metaverse area in future. It may just take quite a bit of time, a decade or more.
So, I would like to think that the Metaverse technology is both a revolution and an evolution of today’s modern Internet. This is because it is certainly revolutionary technology, but it needs more time to be applied into some real-world use cases.
