In this episode, we discuss Niantic making an augmented reality location-based basketball game called NBA All World, Newzoo releasing its 2022 Trend Report that provides insights into the metaverse market, and so much more!

Episode 32 Keywords: Niantic, augmented reality, basketball game, NBA All World, Newzoo, 2022 Trend Report, metaverse market

Welcome to the metaphysics podcast. The

Metaverse and web three are bringing about the biggest

revolution since the internet itself. With your hosts Paul the

prophet Dawalibi And Jeff the juice Cohen. We will be bringing

you the latest Metaverse, business news and insight into

what it all means. The meta business podcast starts now.

From the

boardroom to the metaverse. This is the meta

business podcast. I am Paul the Prophet Dawalibi. I'm joined

today by my friend and co host, Jeff the juice Cohen. For those

of you who are new here, welcome to the official podcast in the

metaverse what we do is we cover the most pressing, Metaverse,

news and topics of the week. But we look at all of it through a

business and C suite lens, we dissect, we analyze the business

implications of everything happening in this industry. For

our regular listeners. Thank you guys for tuning in every week.

Thank you for all the love the five star ratings and reviews if

you haven't left a review, go leave one if you haven't shared

the podcast, Go share it. We read all the reviews. We

appreciate all the love. Please, if you love the content, share,

leave some kind words. It helps other people to find the podcast

and we appreciate it. Jeff, how you doing this week?

I'm doing good. Doing good. PSA. Yeah, ma fizzy.

I'm actually closing on a house tomorrow in the real world.

Yeah, I was gonna say is it Metaverse house or is

it real?

House in the real world in New Jersey today? Oh,

that's way less of an interesting investment

than Metaverse real estate but

probably a little less volatile. Hopefully, I

think not likely to 100x but hopefully not likely to go to

zero.

Is the question is your Is it near Snoop Dogg's

house because that seems

very far from keep dogs is unfortunately, what will

hurt the value of the things that we're excited about it but

it is probably very far from

meta versus any corollary i This may be a poor

investment, I don't know. But it seems proximity to Snoop Dogg's

house is the primary determinant of value in real estate is what

we've learned. Now we've got so much to talk about. So let's

jump into it. We have actually only a couple of stories today

but they're a bit a bit one. As usual. We start with something a

little bit fun and light, and that's me and chicken loser

Niantic. However you want to pronounce it and call it a

Pokemon Go style game, which is not surprising. That's what they

do. But this one with a connection to professional

basketball, NBA basketball. And so the headline here is Niantic

NBA and the NBA which I think is the National Basketball players

association. Team up for NBA all world. NBA all world is a first

of its kind. It's not on the screen here. NBA all world is a

first of its kind game that will place NBA fans into the real

world metaverse. So Niantic announced a partnership with the

NBA to create this original augmented reality game where

it's free to play. Players can find challenge and compete

against today's says NBA ballers in their neighborhoods, then

recruit them to their team before proving themselves on the

court. So it really sounds like Pokemon Go except instead of

catching Pokemon you're catching NBA ballers, you're recruiting

them. And I guess you duel other trainers like you wouldn't poke

him on? I mean, Niantic had, has not I'm trying to think other

than Pokemon Go has not really produced a massive hit recently.

Is it sort of are they at the point where it's about white

labeling and re skinning their existing, you know, franchises

and, and this is AR You know, we cover mostly Metaverse stuff

here, Jeff, but like does this fit into sort of way they

phrased it in your mind where it says it'll place NBA fans into

the real world. metaverse. Like, what do you think of that

specific nomenclature?

It's interesting. I mean, they you make a great

point Niantic has tried to follow up their smash success

PokemonGo with a number of other games. Most notably, a Harry

Potter, who was called wizards unite, were actually ended up

failing, which is surprising is Harry Potter is a great IP.

Because they haven't been able to repeat the success of

PokemonGo. They have invested a lot into this AR engine. So

they've really kind of bet the company on this like AR quote

unquote, real world metaverse. And here recall we did the story

a few months back where they got a really big raise a big

valuation from coke to big tech. So yeah, I mean, I think It'll

be interesting to follow this one I think people, some people

who aren't maybe in the know on the data, forget people remember

PokemonGo was massive back in the summer of 2016. And you'll

hear about it that much now. But it's actually generating like

over a billion dollars of revenue, still annually. So it's

not like this company is struggling and starving and they

need a hit. They obviously want growth and they're looking to

replicate the success of Pokemon Go is still a very nice piece of

business, it'd be interesting to see what they do with the NBA

license. eBay is clearly a very international game. It's

probably the sport besides soccer that it does have the

biggest international presence. It's a sport that's done well

with video games, both on console PC as well as of course,

mobile with certain titles. Even in like the crypto metaphors

type world, the NBA Top Shot has had kind of a moment in the sun.

I don't believe this game to lose our knowledge or consent.

The article has any real crypto elements to it. But it does have

that collectible kind of metaphor. It has the metaverse

piece to it with the AR and it has the collectible piece with

capturing players. My prediction is that this probably won't be a

smash, it will definitely not be PokemonGo. But it probably will

be better than Harry Potter. And the reason why I say that is I

think with the Harry Potter universe, you just didn't have

that many characters to collect. But there's there's only like 10

major characters in Harry Potter. And that's probably

stretching it by like five characters. I understand.

There's a lot of lore, there's, there's hundreds of characters

in the universe that like let's be honest, there's 10 that

matter. Whereas at the NBA, there's already a massive

culture of people playing fantasy sports. That was the

Collectible Card angle, like you have a much bigger university

players collect. So I think that leads a little bit to more depth

in the game. Yeah, I think I think it will be moderately

successful, clearly not the next PokemonGo. But I think it will

do better than that. Because along with

no, I mean, I can't disagree with any of it.

where I want it to take this is just in the article. And I don't

know if this is Niantic. I don't know if this is the journalist

who wrote this. I don't know if it's a PR person who did a press

release and use this. But I take serious issue with this this

term. Real world metaverse. It's like calling something a for

profit charity. Read like a real world meme. Like in my Am I

wrong to say this doesn't exist. Like

my definition is exactly what we debated about

when the when they did the race because that's like their big

buzzword. I hate it.

I hate it. I like it. It's so cheap. And I it

doesn't make sense. Right? Like I get what they're trying to do.

They're trying to cram their little AR game into something

that's Metaverse, which is much sexier than like little AR game.

But it's disingenuous, it's really disingenuous. I do think

AR has the potential to create meta versus small n. Right?

Like, if you have if you have AR that's just so incredibly

immersive and layers on top of the real world, a completely

alternate universe that you can interact with. That's one thing,

but like staring down at your phone and seeing a little

basketball guy like you know what I mean? Like this is, this

is a bit of a stretch to call this real world Metaverse,

right? Like it lacks basically all the elements of the

metaverse. So interesting story NBA, at least they're trying

things gotta give them credit to your point that, you know, they

have tried a number of things in gaming and metaverse. And, you

know, they're they're better than most of the traditional

sports leagues, the Meet sports leads, in terms of trying

things. So kudos to them on that. But I struggled. I don't

think this is going to be a success. But I mean, I'm not a

basketball fan. So it has no appeal to me. And I think the

people that disappeared like my antics audience, I think trends

younger than they expect or think. And I suspect that's why

Harry Potter didn't work because even Harry Potter is sort of

like 1314 Plus, right?

I think it's like 30 rolls.

That's actually true. And, I mean, the average

age of even an NBA fan is like high 40s or low 50s, something

like that. So I don't know if they want to walk around with

their phones collecting players. But we'll see. All right, let's

I want to get to the meat and potatoes. And it's really this

one article that I think we're going to spend a little bit of

time on here. And this was a report that came out from

Newzoo. And the title of the report was the metaverse,

Blockchain gaming and NF T's nav gaiting the internet's uncharted

waters. And I think what would be fun Jeff is to go through

the, they have an executive summary with 10 big takeaways.

And they call this the key global trends that are currently

shaping the metaverse, Blockchain gaming and NFT space.

And I think it would be fun to go through each one of these.

And you and I see if we agree or disagree on on this being one of

the key global trends or how they've articulated it, right.

It could be we disagree that this is a trend altogether, or

it could be that we disagree that maybe they got the details

wrong. So let me start with the first one here, which says big

tech and brand involvement. That's the headline. And it says

consumers spend increasingly more time in virtual worlds, and

successful brands follow them. As a result, consumer facing

companies will be forced to develop a Metaverse strategy to

stay connected with their future customers and remain relevant.

Since there's no single right approach to tackling the

metaverse. Different brands have approached it in different ways

in distinct ways. Now, these can range from IP activations inside

virtual worlds and acquiring virtual land NF T's to outright

m&a S. What do you think of big tech and brand involvement?

Cheek level truth?

I definitely. It has been a trend and I also

understand that new to you know, this is their audiences.

They're, you know, they sell data to these brands, so I

understand why they're pitching this. However, I'll disagree in

the sense that I think the most interesting companies in

Metaverse in the future will be Metaverse first companies,

similar to how the biggest companies on the internet or

largest companies that were formed internet first it like I

think it's not going to like the biggest retailer in the

metaverse will be someone like Nike who comes into the

metaverse and is selling you know, using their brand from

real world from the physical world in the metaverse. It will

be Metaverse first. So that's my rebuttal, if you want to call

it.

It's an interesting take like there are

there are counter examples in the web to Dotto world, right

like Walmart did very well post internet to go online and sell

online, you could argue it's because they bought jet.com And

like they made acquisitions that I agree with Newzoo that this is

a key trend, right? brands will need to go where attention is

going. But I agree with you that, first of all, not all the

traditional brands are going to do it right. And I think they

are at a disadvantage if they don't free themselves from the

trappings of real world kind of strategies, constraints etc.

Like I do think there needs to be a rethink, in terms of

engagement in terms of attention in terms of commerce in in a

capital and metaverse. So I don't know if this means we

agree or disagree with the statement. It's a little bit of

a put I'll give it one of these like, you know, mostly agree.

But there's some subtlety that I think Newzoo has missed here.

All right, let's go to number two Roblox a peek into the

future of virtual worlds. So it says here, gaming has

transitioned towards multilayered experience viewing,

playing socializing. That's what they call multiplayer, Roblox,

one of the most popular games. And what they're saying is by

analyzing the success of Roblox, they can draw important lessons

and basically draw conclusions on the direction of virtual

worlds. So what they're saying is Roblox only allows developers

to retain 25% of the revenue they generate. And they think

these pay structures will evolve and it's something to pay

attention to, considering that meta got a bunch of bad

publicity for their 50% Take rate and Roblox take 75% So, is

Roblox really kind of the canary in the coal mine that I'm

paraphrasing, you know, what they're saying? Do you agree or

disagree with this, Jeff?

Well, again, I agree that I think there's there's

definitely nuance I mean, Roblox has been it early. One of the

early best examples of the metaverse, I think particularly

did what they do, right is the user generated content piece

that could both agree that the future at the metal like the

future capital, and Metaverse is going to have a large amount of

user generated content? Because frankly, that's how the real

world the real physical world operates. It's user generated,

right? If I walk outside and throw a rock and you know, break

a car window, it is it is I've done that now.

Crime is now user generated content I want to hear

from real world lawyer use this as a defense.

I think it's an important part for the capital

and Metaverse and it's user generated because that's how the

real world is It's not like I walk outside, there's a bunch of

NPCs walking around with no autonomy, but that's not our

physical presence is so that to get to the metaverse that can't

be paced. All this part about the take rates. I'm not sure how

relevant that is to the future of the metaverse. I do think

partake rates will come down because, you know, people people

react to incentives. And I think those will eventually, if the

metaverse becomes such a singularity that everyone's in

one place, the owner of that platform isn't going to need to

take anything more than a minuscule minuscule fee off that

each transaction because they're basically getting a small

percentage of the entire world. So you wouldn't need a mascot.

Yeah,

this one is like, I agree with the headline,

Roblox is definitely a peek into the future of virtual worlds,

that they're doing better than just about anyone else. Where I

then this article, or this research report completely loses

me is like, take crates, like who cares? Who cares? I hate

when people minimize, like, how hard it is to build these kinds

of platforms. And the billions of dollars required, you know,

to distribute a developer third party developers work and put it

out to the universe and get it noticed. And they'll charge what

they want to charge if you don't like it. Go develop for another

platform. Oh, wait, there is none so like, so sorry that we

live in a capitalist society. But this is just the way of the

world and and eventually I think to your point, all of this gets

solved you get more competition as the gets more users and the

more competition leads to lower prices right eventually all of

this gets priced down to a point that's reasonable because you

have so many competitors in the market and focusing on that as

some kind of like hey, we got to watch this Roblox is the

bellwether here like, is just missing the point entirely.

ROBLOX is the poster child for how big M Metaverse will evolve

from Little M Metaverse, I think and if the best starting point

we've got today. So who cares about the take rate. I'll get

this one kind of a disagree at least for me. Let's go down to

the next one here. The next one here is the other key global

trend the future of music and entertainment. What they're

saying they start here by saying artists can't go on tour

couldn't go on tour during COVID. So a lot of music events

happened in fortnight and Roblox and now music NF Ts are a way

for artists to earn a living. Basically, they can sell their

singles or albums as NF T's to their loyal fans. And also, it's

not mentioned here but when these NF T's get resold, they're

still royalties and things that go back to the artists. That's

one of the things they like about it. What do you think of

meta verses are one of the key trends here is future of music

and entertainment and NF T's in that context?

Well, I think again, these are trends, I think, I

think where I continue finding myself, I don't want to say

disagree, but finding nuances that they're pointing out a lot

of these trends that have already happened in the past,

like, clearly Music Entertainment has been a big

early trend in the metaverse, we've seen concerts and Roblox

concerts and fortnight. Various different events that have

become very popular. Where I think I disagree is that I don't

think that in the capitalist Metaverse, they're going to be

as important as they are currently. And I think if

anything, the more time that people start spending in the

metaverse on a daily basis, the more likely they are for these

big tentpole type events or sorry, entertainment events to

go actually into you. I'm spending 10 hours a day in the

metaverse, I may actually want to go to a concert interact with

people in the real world, because it's like the one time I

actually do that a week or something that hypothetical

future. So yeah, I think it will be less prevalent than it is

today. Actually,

I didn't think that's where you were going to

take that I thought you were gonna say that people just

become numb to it. Or it's like, it loses the novelty a little

bit, and therefore, it's a special. I mean, starting with

the NFT one I'm like, again, it's one of those where I'm like

sort of who cares, like Spotify is the better solution no matter

what. So like, buying some artists album as an NFT is a

pipe dream, because 99% of people are still just going to

stream the music on Spotify. So like, I don't see how NFT solve

any of the existing problem or change any of the existing

behavior because that better for the end user. It's just not like

I don't care that I don't own the music on Spotify. I just

want to listen to what I want to listen to. And, and so I really,

I think virtual worlds, you know, swallowing music and

swallowing concerts. I buy that maybe more than you do, Jeff

because I think there is some potential for like, well Every

one can have the best seat in the house, everyone can go

backstage and meet the artists, right? You could, you can't

crowd 10,000 people around an artist in a virtual space, but

you could in a virtual space and in a real world space versus a

virtual space, right like so. There's things you can do in

meta versus that make music potentially like an interesting

subset of the whole of the whole sort of virtual world plush

gaming. But the second part about NF T's I'm total and total

disagreement like this, this desperate like hope that music

will go back to people buying, like the album, just because

we've turned it into an NFT Not gonna happen. Mixed Bag, but

sort of disagree on that one. All right, let's look at the

last of the last one on this page, your future of fashion and

luxury brands. And this is it says as time spent in virtual

worlds increases, like our identity, our representation

becomes more important. Therefore things like engaging

skins virtual garments become more important. And you get this

direct to Avatar business model, which they're calling

potentially the future of E commerce. So consumers gonna

want to shop and immersive online environments

photorealistic representations of physical garments, and people

investing in their digital presence. What do you think of

that?

We can we can blast through this one quickly in the

interest of time, I totally agree. I mean, this has been

something since episode one that we both been harping on. I think

that this is 100% accurate, more time we spend the digital world,

the more we care about our digital appearance as much if

not more than physical appearance, the more commerce we

start doing in the metaverse the more, I love the direct avatar

term. i Yeah, 100%. Do you think

can I let me challenge that for a bit?

Because I think I'm with you a lot of the way and I think a lot

of people would agree wholeheartedly with your take on

that. I had a whole conversation today with someone about I hate

that for the most part, meta verses are still grounded in

real world constraints. People still think about putting a

Gucci store in the metaverse with walls, and a ceiling and

windows and like an I O and it bothers me because I'm like, why

are we tying ourselves to? Because, you know, it's hard to

think outside of that box, tying ourselves to real world

constraints. And it's like, I don't know, if I want my avatar

to like, look like me, but with a Gucci shirt, like my might.

And I'm not. I'm not saying that's impossible, but I also

might want to just be a dragon for a day. Or like, you know,

like

Dragon King Bucha. So I don't know, I don't I don't

disagree with that. I think you still will care. That is still

the definition of your physical, your digital presence. So, you

know,

direct to Avatar still applies. But where it

loses me a bit is is like is that future of fashion and

luxury brands? Like is there a world for Gucci where I want to

be a dragon? I don't know.

I I see your distinction. And I don't I'm not

challenging that because I think your distinction is fair and

accurate. I don't I would I don't want the metaverse to

become as a digital shopping mall. We talked about this

before. It's like yeah, oh, we just created a digital version

of like a grocery store. I go like apples like that. Yeah. But

I think the, you know, the fashion piece can include

dragons. And it might or might be a completely new Metaverse,

Rand Paul l Drago no or something and it's like the

coolest dragon avatar. So it doesn't have to necessarily be

the brand we associate.

Yeah, yeah. I think that's that's a good

insight brought back again here which is there will be native

brands, brands, right? Yeah. Air quotes that that may we may not

think of them in the same way as existing luxury or retail

brands. Like there may be a company that makes great dragon

skins right like that's their whole thing.

We got some good ones. You got some.

All right, the next one number five played

around in blockchain gaming. It says market for blockchain games

is overrun by titles that feature rudimentary gameplay

without sustainable economies. This is natural. As complex

gaming experiences take time to develop it says time passes

we're likely to see more blockchain games challenge

traditional triple A titles in terms of technical complexity.

And at some point size of the player base, though blockchain

gaming faces some notable challenges, particularly

sustainability and regulatory concerns. These are likely to be

mitigated as the space matures. Thoughts on that one?

Oh, I mean it If people should go back and listen

to our prior 31 episodes, this is like the whole premise of our

podcast if somebody says, I agree with the right action

don't agree with the title as much as I agree with what they

wrote in nuance. I do think blockchain gaming, Blockchain

games are going to take time to develop. They are going to

eventually challenge triple A titles in terms of their

technical complexity in size deployment, so I do believe it.

I'm not in unclutter. You don't need to go down that rabbit hole

because we have times but I don't see Plater long term.

Yeah,

I'll just keep this short because we've got

like a like you said, Jeff, you can go back and listen to 30

Episode 31 other episodes of the podcast where we've covered this

ad nauseam. Clear sign right in this paragraph Newzoo. clueless

on Play to earn gaming, not one mention of the word fun. All

they talk about is economies and sustainability and a whole bunch

of garbage that has nothing to do with the success of this

trend. Totally couldn't disagree more on this one. They just they

it's I'm consistently amazed how many supposedly smart people do

not understand what it's going to take to be successful in this

specific area for this trend to come true. Yeah, PvE guilds The

Future of Work played on guilds and future work. It says played

around guilds have exploded in popularity in the last year.

Their activities revolve around acquiring and then loaning in

game assets to players who can't otherwise afford the high entry

barriers of blockchain based titles. The services are popular

in growth markets, and they depend on blockchain games

offering players enough financial incentives to engage

with them. It says the future of work in the virtual realm

extends beyond just gaming. As synthetic environments and

digital twin technologies, among others become more advanced. A

wide range of Metaverse native jobs will emerge to sustain our

our tenet digital lives. What do you think of that one,

Jeff? You know, it's interesting, because I was all

set to go on my rant about PDU, about guilds and played around

and you know, how it's basically a digital denture servitude. I

guess I'll go down that rant a little bit, I don't think I

think that it is a bug, not a feature of these playoff games,

that barrier entry is so high that people need to effectively

take out a loan to start playing the game. I think that's a

horrible way to design your game. It's not fun, it becomes a

job. It's a super high barrier to entry to bring people in,

which is part of the reason why these games have miniscule tiny

player bases. So I do think that the successful player,

Blockchain games that happen in the next year or two are going

to not have those features. Or they will find a way to make it

such that you can earn these things without spending 1000s of

dollars upfront such that people need to take out the fact that

we take out a loan. I think guilds are a solution to a

problem that hopefully will not exist in the next iteration of

the space. So I'm not super bullish on guilds as a as it

relates to this definition of guilds like this financialized

you know, low syndicate loan definition not really. But the

second paragraph is actually more interested in thinking

about these digital jobs that people have within the

metaverse. And at first, I was sort of bullish like that

actually makes sense that I think I probably still am. But

as I was listening to read it, I sort of started thinking, most

of that will probably happen just with AI, right? Like I'm

thinking if I go into one of these digital fashion store,

like a clothing store, and I want to buy something, I don't

need a personal check. Hey, that can happen just digitally or

just be AI. So I'm not sure you necessarily need people like

doing jobs. metaverse. I'll leave that one open to future

iterations. I mean, there's definitely

like the guilt thing of I'll keep mine short. I

agree with you. It's It's so scary just reading that text. I

totally disagree. I mean, these things will not exist in five

years. Like mainstream gamers rail against simple things like

loot boxes, you think guilds like in this context, indentured

servitude will make will make the cut among the billions of

mainstream gamers alike, not a chance in the world. And if even

if it does, it will be regulated away. Like it's going to take

one bad story of someone who like died, playing 65 hours

trying to repay his loan. You know, for governments to step in

and be like, wait a second, this is scary. And this shouldn't be

happening. To no chance that these guilds and they should not

survive, and I love your take on it. Jeff. Future of Work. Look,

I think Metaverse gaming is all about the Future have fun and

leisure time and recreation. Future of Work is a bit

trickier. There's probably some use cases for work within meta

versus, but it's more like social component of work and

meeting people. And, you know, like, I think a lot of that will

happen first. I don't think there's ever going to be a need

for like a shoeshine person in the metaverse. That seems

wholeheartedly artificial. Now, will there be a need for, you

know, the equivalent of you know, like customer support

people, the elves we talked about right, going around the

metaverse. You know, keeping the peace, fixing bugs, getting

people unstuck, solving problems, like yes, but it's

glorified customer support. And I think those will be the first

Native jobs beyond that. I'm not convinced that yet. This is

about the future for the future funds more interesting here than

the future of work. I wouldn't put this as high as they have.

It's number seven, the rush for digital real estate, says the

last 12 months have seen major brands like Samsung, Adidas and

Gucci jumping on the bandwagon of digital land, fts. Acquiring

digital real estate is essentially a bet on the

blockchain based virtual worlds gaining in popularity, but it's

also a low risk way for major companies to ensure they will be

where their clientele is, should this become a wide ranging

phenomenon in the future.

So once again, I agree like I forget whether they

were writing this list as like a list of trends that happened

versus a list of trends for the future, because clearly, this is

a trend that has happened. We have seen this land graph, this

this kind of brush

is currently shaping.

So they are they are correct. I guess, to add my

context, I think what is much more interesting that everyone

is rushing by digital land is really what they're planning to

do with it. Because the way I think about it is it's very

similar to like the early days of internet, were very quickly

after the Internet came out once people realize, hey, I need to

on the internet, every brand web made a website. And some of them

were literally just like, hey, here's the location of our

store. And here's our phone number. And even today, some

brands that's still basically their website. But what made it

more interesting and what got really moved forward. The

internet is when brands when when native websites are coming

up with like, oh, well, now you can actually come on here and do

ecommerce. Now you can come on here and talk to people and

contact people have social elements, and you can create

your own user generated website. That's, that's when we really

started to see the explosion of I guess it was to write that

one. Can't keep these things. Yeah, that was really when you

saw the explosion, I think of what what to so what will be

interesting, if not necessarily be stories, right? Hey, Nike

bought a piece of land in the sandbox. It's like, okay, well,

what do they do that? Like, why does anyone care to go to it?

Because currently, outside of like the once a year where they

do a promotion or something, some news article comes out,

nobody's going to, they just spent money for the store. So

that's what I'm looking forward to next two or three years. It's

like, what are all these people who spent good money on land? Do

with it?

I agree, I don't disagree on this, I'll add a

little bit of a slightly different take, which is

if you were

if you were a brand when.com was just taking

off, right? I would never have faulted a brand for buying their

domain name, right, which is essentially virtual real estate.

Even if they did nothing with it. They won, right? It's sort

of like, You're a big brand, you got lots of resources. This is

an easy hedge, right? If this internet thing becomes big,

you're okay. You own it. If it doesn't sell what Right? Like

you're out 50,000 100 Whatever the cost is, right? Like no big

deal. And I applaud brands who are doing all these things,

trying all these things. I think every brand needs to be because

every brand needs to be hedging. No one knows who's gonna win

what that future is going to be we know attention will shift. We

know these meta versus people are gonna spend lots of time in

them. Now is it sandbox? Is it decentraland? Is it fortnight is

it Roblox? Is it Minecraft? We don't know yet. We don't know

who the big winner is going to be. Which is why you have to be

in all of them. You have to there has to be a holistic

strategy to be in all of them. Even if you don't know today,

what you're going to do with it yet, and even knowing that some

of them will not pan out. Because I don't think brands

traditional brands can afford, especially in your world where

you're going to be competing against Native brands also.

Right like you you got to be there. Where the virtual real

estate worries me is like, unlike a domain name. It's not

scarce in any way. It's not limited. Right, it's much less

of us sort of planting the flag if you bought nike.com. No one

else could own nike.com. Right. Like, there's a lot of brands

that can put very similar activations in sand sandbox that

like are not really differentiated. They're not like

there's a nuance here that I think can't be ignored. But I

applaud all the brands doing this and I think they should

continue to. I'm curious if you think eight you have a different

take on it. And this is an introduction to NFT collections.

It says the headline 2021 undeniably been the year of NF

T's high profile collections being sought after for the boost

in social status and financial incentives offered despite the

current market pullback profile picture NF Ts are likely to be

key elements when it comes to digital identity in the

metaverse. What do you think of that last part? Profile Picture

NF T's key element when it comes to digital identity in the

metaverse?

Yeah, this is this is a great question is I think

I'll go I think I will go yes, but I wish I had more

conviction. And maybe that just tells them where where we are

kind of in the world today. Macro kind of like it. Nf T's

have gone up and now they've come down. So maybe that's a

little bit of my skepticism at this exact moment. And the

reason I think that is because like I understand we've been

very positive on digital identity, we talked about it a

few, a few few ones up, where you know, people's digital

identity is going to be important, it's gonna be

important to be unique. I'm just not sure that that necessarily

needs to be on the blockchain. You know, there's nothing to me

that says like, I necessarily need to be on a blockchain and

be a an NF T in order for it to be a digital identity that I

consider my own. I don't own my instagram or my Twitter handle.

Physically, I don't own it legally. But it's still mine. I

still created and curated and I still care about it. Is it? Like

I don't necessarily see the distinction where it needs to be

on a blockchain. No, but

you own. I'm at Jeff Cohen 23 of Twitter.

But I don't write but that's my point. Like I consider

this your digital identity. No one else can have

at Jeff Koons record what

I'm saying I think I own it, but I don't look, I

don't it doesn't need to be on the blockchain

to what's come surely no one else can have it.

And so blockchain doesn't take anything away putting it on the

blockchain wouldn't take anything away. It would just

solidify the ownership or it might doesn't add much, but at

least it proves ownership. It's it's an authenticity

certificate. Right. I, where I totally like I I just totally

disagree. Like I like the fact of putting digital identity on

the blockchain. And I'm, I'm verified in some way my

representation all I only own and no one else can use it.

Right. I like that idea. Where I totally disagree with the

statement is there's no chance that digital identity in the

metaverse is going to be A to D painting, like a picture of a

stupid ape like this is there's no chance that this is 10 years

from now digital identity. zero chance these people are out to

lunch if they think this is what digital identity is going to be

in the metaverse. I do think it will be on blockchain. I do

think it'll be unique. It'll be you'll own it, you'll care about

it. But it's going to be something way more interesting

way cooler than a 2d photograph. A 2d piece of art and mostly

crappy art. Let's face it. All right, let's let's get to we're

almost done here. Number nine, the transition from NFT

collections to global IP. This we've talked about at length,

you know board API club, doing music events, partnerships, all

kinds of brand extensions in the mainstream. And they also talk

about loot is an exercise in decentralized IP building. Its

evolution is fully controlled by the community at large everyone

can build applications that enrich the loot ecosystem, and

bring it one step closer to becoming a major IP loot began a

movement that was then quickly adopted by other notable

projects like treasure. And that will reshape the way in some

front some brands of the future are born and evolve. So NFT

collections to global IP.

I think it's a trend that people think is gonna

happen, but I'm not that convinced. I just don't know. I

think these crypto communities are so much smaller right now

and people realize that I just think if I walked down the

street and asked 25 People like what they thought about board a

yacht club, you know, depending on what city I'm in, I bet two

of them know what it is. I just I'm not that bullish that these

are going to be like the New Avengers new Mickey Mouse or

like, you know, Disney Princess like it's just I don't know I

think that's a little bit of a pipe dream in the mind of these

people who are kind of caught up in their own, you know, in their

own universe a little bit. And some of these communities don't

even want that. We talked about the article last week where

they're kind of doing that. So I don't think this is a slam dunk

as much as they're making 100% agree,

I actually don't have anything to add. Like, it's

echo chambers that make people like global IP, and mainstream

are the two words that sunk this for me, because even gaming,

which is way more, you know, known in the mainstream, you

still pull regular people who don't know what Roblox is,

right? It's that's just the reality and, and board apes.

Although every crypto person might know it, the crypto

community is relatively small and is nowhere near mainstream

scale yet. And I just don't think the IP is that

interesting, I'm sorry to say like, board apes are not that

interesting IP, as much as they would love it to be. Number 10,

crypto and the promise of interoperability. So this is

Aetherium. With its side chains and layer twos, it's the

backbone of a sizable portion of the NFT and blockchain gaming

space. With the theory emerge, it's poised to continue its rule

as the dominant smart contract platform. Now with

interoperability at scale across games continues to be a hot

topic amongst Metaverse enthusiast, the path to adoption

is currently filled with notable technical and political

roadblocks. Nevertheless, interoperability can potentially

become a reality as shared standards are being built and as

player interest grows. So crypto and the promise of

interoperability

Well, this is a lot a lot of trends. We've talked a

lot about as well, I think we're we are bullish on

interoperability. But do you see that there's a lot of challenges

and roadblocks as they put out? Here, notably being political

when they say that maybe I mean, across companies, not as I don't

know. So I'm gonna get involved. And so you can't bring that

sword from, you know, from game to game. But But yet, the shared

standards is something we talked about last week. And with some

of these big tech companies starting to create shared

medical standards, that's something we're bullish on. So I

think I do agree with the take terms of it being theory versus

layer twos, that's a little bit outside.

Yeah, I'll put, I'll change the headline a bit

to be more accurate. It's not crypto in the promise of

interoperability, its crypto and the need for interoperability.

It's a need for capital and Metaverse to happen,

interoperability has to happen. What this is also missing is

that the game developers, the big game developers are gonna

fight this to the bitter end. They have every incentive for

this for interoperability to not happen. So as much as companies

like Mehta and others get together to Creech standards,

which is great. The big games, game developers are all going to

fight this to the very bitter end, and they will eventually

capitulate, but it's going to take years, and it will be ugly,

and it will be messy. And, and it will be necessary, though.

And we will get to that holy grail capital and metaverse. But

the game developers are going to go kicking and screaming I don't

think they're willingly just going to open up all the walled

gardens give up tons of revenue, you know, for for the promise

of, of, you know, a beautiful garden of Eden Right? Like, I

just don't, I just don't think that's going to happen as easily

or as beautifully as they've articulated here. Jeff, this is

like a great kind of like Greatest Hits episode, sort of

like I liked that this research report touched on a lot of

things we've talked about before. And hopefully you guys

enjoyed this like a little bit of a summary of a lot of things

we've talked about over the last 31 episodes, separate the

episode 32. And, like I said, hope you guys are enjoying it.

That brings us to the end of this podcast, Jeff, thank you.

As always, thank you guys for listening. Make sure you

subscribe to men of business, subscribe to our sister podcast

man or woman. And we also do a bunch of crypto podcasts. If you

love our content, go subscribe to crypto capsule on YouTube or

on any podcast platform crypto capsule hosted by one of the

biggest crypto influencers in the world. Henri ARSLANIAN, you

guys I think will really enjoy that content. If you're into

crypto, which you shouldn't be if you're watching Metal

business or listening to metal business. So definitely go check

that out. Jeff. Thank you. Thank you guys for listening. Don't

forget guys, the future is fun. We'll see you next week.

Thanks for joining us here on meta business. Make sure

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