Autor Cointelegraph By Ariel Shapira

In his monthly crypto tech column, Israeli serial entrepreneur Ariel Shapira covers emerging technologies within the crypto, decentralized finance (DeFi) and blockchain space, as well as their roles in shaping the economy of the 21st century.With the news that Meta plans to take a nearly 50% cut of virtual asset sales in Horizon Worlds, it will not be surprising if independent artists and content creators turn away from the Metaverse entirely. Or at least from its Meta rendition, no matter how excited the company might be about the creator economy. It’s one thing to pay this much when the taxes go toward making life better for your community, but Meta is a business, not a charity.And it’s not like your average creative type is living the high life. Streaming services have made life harder for musicians, and insurmountable creative fatigue has taken a toll on the variety and quality of creator-driven content across multiple markets. All too often, today’s creators are left to chase the ever-changing monetization policies on various platforms, and landing a sponsorship is no walk in the park either.In theory, the advent of the Metaverse offers a new way for the creator economy to blossom, particularly with crypto integrations and decentralized platforms creating an alternative pathway for creators to make money. In reality, the prominence of major centralized Web2 companies, like Meta, within the Metaverse space doesn’t exactly indicate a warm welcome for independent creators.Related: A letter to Zuckerberg: The Metaverse is not what you think it isThe concern about these major players dominating the Metaverse and Web3 space is not a result of anti-corporate hand-wringing; rather, it relates more to the liberties and flexibility that would exist in this new creator economy. For creators that maintain a creative business through any major Web2 platform, these companies’ reputations are the ultimate wake-up call.The hassle of entering the MetaverseYeah, it’s a hassle indeed. Although Meta is justifying its eye-popping fees by shifting the blame to regulatory roadblocks brought on by Apple, it’s hard to see how that helps the creator. Big Tech platforms are not the biggest fans of one another — we know that much.For all the flak nonfungible tokens (NFTs) get, they do offer creators a better shot at turning in a decent profit. Even though they have their own flaws (how many of the early sales were snatched by bots?), there are ways around those. Creators can court early buyers through a democratized whitelist platform like SparkWorld, putting the traditional whitelisting on an equitable footing where everyone gets a fair shot at the game.Furthermore, with platform fees like Meta’s, we can wave goodbye to price tags that actually make sense. If creators have to hand over half of their earnings to Big Tech companies, you’re unlikely to see many more Metaverse projects like BattleFly, which sells its NFT combat butterflies at very affordable prices. And let’s be real: Nobody will pay a Gucci-level price for something that’s not only not actually real but also not actually Gucci.Beyond pricing and fees, the other major obstacle for the Metaverse creator economy is interoperability. As it stands, major Metaverse studios only prioritize interoperability in their marketing. The actual developer scene is split between a few domineering projects all seeking to have a Metaverse monopoly, with little interest in cooperating with each other.Related: The metaverse: Mark Zuckerberg’s Brave New World Reshaping the Metaverse fabricAs it stands now, the centralized Metaverse seems intent on hitting off the crypto community’s centralization bingo card. This makes for a good selling point for studios crafting the Metaverse outside of Big Tech’s purview: Give accessibility and freedom to independent creators, and they will make most of the work for you. It’s as simple as that. You can hire 100 developers to build the backbone of your Metaverse, but they’ll never be as passionate as 1,000 independent fans who decide to make it their home.Though it might seem beneficial only to have a few players making an impact in the Metaverse, the incompatibility of the leading Metaverse projects forces creators to choose sides. For example, a burgeoning fashion designer making Metaverse wearables has to select between creating products for Decentraland, The Sandbox or Horizon Worlds. All of these projects run on different engines and have their own software development kits and frameworks to navigate. It’s unlikely that a designer or programmer has the wherewithal to create projects for all three platforms, not to mention the dozens of metaverses popping up along the way.Related: The best is yet to come: What’s next for blockchain and the creator economyBlockchain-based Metaverse projects may lack Meta-level brand recognition, but they can strive to provide a welcoming environment that emphasizes accessibility. While Big Tech can be slow to respond to user feedback and create bridges between worlds, the dexterity of decentralized projects can push them ahead of the centralized Metaverse model.For centralized conglomerates that use the Metaverse as simply another corporate arm, interoperability is not beneficial — Apple’s affinity for vendor lock-in should tell you that much. For everyone else, it’s a different story. When facing off with a giant like Meta, it makes sense to add value to products someone else makes if they do the same for yours. On your own, neither of you stands a chance; but together, you are one another’s power multipliers. After all, the Metaverse seems infinitely monetizable, but you have to be able to make things users want to buy. And the more platforms they can use their purchase on, the better.Interoperability stretches beyond development and programming to also encompass factors such as community guidelines and monetization. Meta and Google are notoriously fickle and inconsistent with changing the parameters of acceptable and monetizable content. Just go ask any YouTuber how difficult it is to start making ad revenue on their content, let alone continuously support themselves from it. Why would Big Tech change its rulebook in the Metaverse?Excessive fees, platform incompatibility and uneven community guidelines compound into a perfect storm for content creators to recoil from centralized Metaverse platforms. As development lurches forward, the lack of support from independent artists will cause the centralized Metaverse to morph into a megacorporate playground that lacks any enticing variety or culture to draw users in.A Metaverse that operates as a decentralized autonomous organization, for its part, can be completely transparent with monetization guidelines and allow tokenholders to vote on how creators can monetize their digital work. And as operational fees like gas costs decrease and more efficient blockchains and tokens join the fray, developers get to build decentralized projects that are cheaper for users to join. This also makes for a more inviting, inclusive environment for independent creators.The Metaverse is meant to be an all-engrossing project that brings forth a new era of imagination and interaction to the internet and changes how users approach creative industries. A flourishing creator economy is absolutely possible in the Metaverse, but if development continues down this incongruous path filled with financial and operational barriers, that economy will never materialize. Ultimately, independent creators and artists should feel empowered by the concept of the Metaverse, not stifled by it.This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.The views, thoughts and opinions expressed here are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.Ariel Shapira is a father, entrepreneur, speaker and cyclist and serves as founder and CEO of Social-Wisdom, a consulting agency working with Israeli startups and helping them establish connections with international markets.

In his monthly crypto tech column, Israeli serial entrepreneur Ariel Shapira covers emerging technologies within the crypto, decentralized finance (DeFi) and blockchain space, as well as their roles in shaping the economy of the 21st century.The impending Metaverse dominates crypto headlines as analysts almost obsessively race to predict what innovations the new digital world will bring. Facebook’s rebranding to Meta seems to be the tip of the iceberg, as Microsoft — and some other Big Tech companies — announce their plans to integrate into the Metaverse.The hype around the Metaverse is only natural. There’s no question the humans of the future will spend more of their time than some would care to admit wearing a VR headset. But the keyword here is future — most Metaverse developments are building a digital world for which the vast majority of humans won’t have use for many years to come. It’s important to save energy and attention for the developments coming out of mainstream crypto/DeFi because they are already massively transforming economic incentives. Take Ripple (XRP), which was sued by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for allegedly offering an illegal securities offering through sales of its cryptocurrency token, XRP. The company that steered the advantages of blockchain away from the “let’s overthrow the banks” crowd to the “let’s work with them” crowd has come a long way from the days in which many thought a Federal lawsuit would be the last nail in the coffin of crypto as an industry, recently having taken an upper hand in the lawsuit. Several thousand miles south of the United States, Bitcoin (BTC) has become the focal point of a city in El Salvador.Related: SEC vs. Ripple: A predictable but undesirable developmentThese two symbolic developments highlight the magnitude of blockchain-based finance and its stride toward mass adoption, and it’s worth taking a closer look at them, as well as other major blockchain successes looking forward. Just as many crypto investors lock in their gains periodically rather than holding forever, so too must the industry. The Ripple effectThe recent change of tides in the landmark SEC case against Ripple could amp up the momentum for crypto adoption. Two years ago, the SEC sued Ripple for allegedly raising “over $1.3 billion through an unregistered, ongoing digital asset securities offering.” The case stirred fear in the hearts of similar projects, as well as investors concerned about the implications of their investments. But the tables have turned, and Ripple claimed “a very big win,” when the judge denied the SEC’s request to reconsider shielding key documents.Should Ripple fend off the SEC lawsuit, the world’s lone superpower could be well on its way to taking a friendlier stance on crypto, and that would open the floodgates. And that doesn’t necessarily mean that the most radical crypto purists would be emboldened. Ripple’s work toward arming outdated banks and traditional financial infrastructure with the blockchain-powered tools already being used by DeFi platforms could give legitimacy to the idea of updating the centralized financial system, rather than replacing it with the libertarian DeFi dream.Related: ​​It is time for the US to create a ‘Ripple test’ for cryptoThis would have serious economic implications for the future of the global economy that analysts should spend at least some of the time they think about NFTs deliberating.Making DeFi accessibleAnd while Ripple makes waves and Bored Apes populate Twitter, what of DeFi? The market is currently valued at 207 billion, compared to slightly above 104 billion on April 25, 2021. DeFi is actively opening traditional investment opportunities to retail investors across the globe. At a time in which inflation is rising, and housing becomes less affordable across the globe, access to investment opportunities for retail investors, aka average people, can be a lifesaver. And that’s what critics often miss about crypto as an industry. Those who argue blockchain is a technology looking for a use case miss developments by companies such as Levana, which actually will introduce crypto investors to DeFi through games that teach them how to use leverage with lore about a dystopian future of a Mars populated by humans. Such an approach, known as the gamification of investing, is spreading like wildfire, as is the industry as a whole. The DeFi world is projected to explode by around 70% by 2026.Related: DeFi gaming: A catalyst to mainstream adoption of decentralized financeGovernment collaborationAs Ripple makes headway in nudging the United States toward greater crypto openness, countries ranging from Germany to Singapore are pushing crypto regulation forward. Of course, there’s also the high-profile case of El Salvador adopting Bitcoin as legal tender as the prime example of a country experimenting with crypto to attempt to innovate its path out of financial ruin. Other countries, too, are taking steps to leverage blockchain to their advantage.The Philippines government is actively partnering with a company called Oz Finance to offer economic opportunities through special economic zones (ecozones). The idea is to empower individuals and companies to operate virtually or physically in tax-free, privacy-protected, decentralized application (DApp)-friendly zones powered by Oz’s utility token TOTOz.Blockchain is becoming so intertwined with the average person’s life that universities such as Harvard and MIT are offering courses in blockchain, showing how the world is shifting towards mainstream adoption even among academics.While it’s constantly expanding, the blockchain industry as a whole only has so many resources to deploy at a given moment, especially with developer shortages across the globe. As such, it’s important to keep things in perspective and pay attention to initiatives improving the financial lives of average people here, in this physical world, before we all ape into the Metaverse with the rest of the Degens. This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.The views, thoughts and opinions expressed here are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.Ariel Shapira is a father, entrepreneur, speaker, cyclist and serves as founder and CEO of Social-Wisdom, a consulting agency working with Israeli startups and helping them to establish connections with international markets.

In his monthly crypto tech column, Israeli serial entrepreneur Ariel Shapira covers emerging technologies within the crypto, decentralized finance and blockchain space, as well as their roles in shaping the economy of the 21st century.In the year 2022, we no longer need to ponder how many stars there are in the sky — Yale astronomer Dorrit Hoffleit has already established that humans can see about 9,096 from Earth with the naked eye. Now that we are past that, we might as well start pondering how many metaverses there are on the internet, and oh boy, are those plentiful.When rebranding into Meta, the company formerly known as Facebook opened the floodgates, pushing the concept of the metaverse, a shared virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) digital experience, right into the spotlight. Where Meta went, others followed. The word “metaverse” only came up seven times in investor pitches in 2020, according to Sentieo. In 2021, the watershed year, entrepreneurs mentioned it about 128 times when pitching. One would think that from a consumer perspective, metaverse proliferation can only be a good thing. As more and more metaverses lay their claims to users’ time and attention, they naturally have to compete among themselves. Ideally, they would try to outshine one another by offering a better user experience, more functionality, and other consumer-friendly practices.Related: There is room for the metaverse in 2022, but the virtual space is far from perfectGrabbing the biggest piece of a pieIn reality, though, the through-the-roof metaverse propagation may very well fly in the face of its very own core principles. A shared experience means everyone can join in, should they want to, but this is where we hit the first hurdle. To meet up with your friends in Meta’s Horizon Worlds, its prime metaverse builder, you’d better make sure that you all have Oculus Quest VR sets. To experience something like OVER’s AR-driven metaverse with NFT-based land ownership, though, you only need a more or less modern smartphone. This is in itself an accessibility issue, which, in Meta’s case, also comes with the temptation of user lock-in through dedicated exclusive hardware. Falling to this temptation means siloing your entire metaverse.Transferring the user’s assets from one metaverse into the other is not an easy feat either. We’ve already heard nonfungible token (NFT) advocates lavish praise on how NFTs will usher in a whole new era of revolutionary interoperability in video games. That hasn’t happened so far, though, and there is more to this than technological constraints. Business considerations are in play as well, as NFT game developers are more interested in selling their own NFTs than adding value to those created by others.A constellation of VR- or AR-based metaverses can hypothetically operate on similar logic. If a user wants their avatar in Metaverse 1 to don the Gucci shirt they bought in Metaverse 2, it means the economy of Metaverse 1 lost on a sale. Furthermore, if Metaverse 1 ends up supporting wearables from Metaverse 2, it means it is adding utility to the assets sold by another vendor without any benefit for yourself, if not at the detriment to your own offering. On the business level, projects can find workarounds for this issue. It could be fees on interoperable item sales that would give every supporting metaverse a cut in the transaction. Alternatively, metaverses can strike cross-promotion deals and explore other ways to create shared value.Related: The metaverse will change the paradigm of content creationEven a bilateral interoperability accord among metaverse projects pushes the situation away from the zero-sum game it may look like. Metaverse 1 may add value to assets offered within another ecosystem, but its own assets get extra utility, too. If their respective ecosystems bring in user bases of comparable sizes and have roughly the same transaction volumes, the arrangement looks pretty fair.This is where we have to deal with the technology challenge, though. Even if the two hypothetical metaverses are built on the same engine, you still can’t easily import objects from one to the other. Metaverse 1 may be going for a realistic look and support cloth physics, so in this world, the shirt actually behaves like a real-world one. Metaverse 2 may aim for the pixelated retro style, with a more simplistic take on physics and blocky humanoid 3D bodies for avatars. Bringing these two designs together is actually a pretty tough job. In this specific case, Gucci would be better off making two shirts from scratch, one for each metaverse, than trying to make a single interoperable one. Ownership-wise, both shirts could be linked with their respective NFTs, which would, for their part, sit nested in a top-level NFT representing ownership over the entire shirt stack. Initiatives like this could still use a plethora of supporting frameworks. Pre-made libraries and SDKs will make it easier for metaverse developers to handle interoperability within larger cross-platform ecosystems. They are already in the works, with projects like Univers building a backbone for metaverse creators to use for moving their creations on-chain and into a greater network of connected services and decentralized applications. It’s not hard to imagine similar initiatives smoothing out interactions between different engines as well as metaverse-specific SDKs and frameworks. We could even see machine learning-based algorithms that will turn the realistic-style wearables into their pixelated peers or vice versa on their own.Further down the line, interoperability could become a major selling point for projects looking to draw more users. Metaverse developers should work to overcome the business and technological challenges involved. They should look up to the future and build a metaverse of metaverses, not siloed technological and hardware stacks. Without a holistic and seamless online universe bringing everyone together, we will end up scattered across its many shards — pretty much the same as now, but with more clunky headsets to wear.This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.The views, thoughts and opinions expressed here are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.Ariel Shapira is a father, entrepreneur, speaker, and cyclist and serves as the founder and CEO of Social-Wisdom, a consulting agency working with Israeli startups and helping them to establish connections with international markets.

In his monthly crypto tech column, Israeli serial entrepreneur Ariel Shapira covers emerging technologies within the crypto, decentralized finance and blockchain space, as well as their roles in shaping the economy of the 21st century.Traditional finance experts are warming up to the idea of crypto, but outlandish headlines of record-breaking hacks and overhyped projects don’t necessarily reverse its bad rap. Unfortunately, we’ve seen the total value locked in decentralized finance (DeFi) recently nosedive, which isn’t exactly helpful in changing skeptic’s minds.While crypto is much more than its lows, those in the centralized finance (CeFi) space aren’t necessarily jumping to accept this idea at face value. To alleviate their qualms, projects should integrate tried and true CeFi qualities with more novel practices. This will allow neophytes to dip their toes in the DeFi world as a trial run — and expand the usability of the financial instruments to a whole new level.Picking up CeFi’s slackMany worry about crypto’s volatility,specifically fearing that it is not backed by anything tangible like gold and believing that crypto will lose value over time. This likely comes from the comfort and familiarity of fiat, which technically isn’t backed by anything tangible either since the end of the gold standard, but has the backing of a trusted centralized entity.These fears perfectly encapsulate how the cross section of DeFi’s and CeFi’s respective strengths can ease investor uncertainty to usher in a new class of people into the crypto sphere.Tokenization of commodities enables blockchain-based ownership of a physical asset, which is essentially just a decentralized version of an already-existing practice in traditional finance. Tokenized precious metals are somewhat similar conceptually to a share in a gold exchange-traded fund (ETF), as they represent the investor’s stake in physical gold stored elsewhere and largely work toward the same purpose. Projects like VNX offer digital ownership of tokenized commodities that are backed by physical assets including gold, giving the investor the same benefits as investing in physical gold but have the versatility of a crypto asset on top of that.Related: Understanding the systemic shift from digitization to tokenization of financial servicesStablecoins are also a viable option, allowing investors to reap the benefits of decentralization while maintaining the security of traditional finance. Backing from fiat and other real-world assets removes the common fear that crypto has no basis. Stablecoins like TrustToken (TUSD) grant investors more certainty and flexibility, lowering the stakes for any user by enabling easy redeeming of their funds at any given moment. While no investor would expect a stablecoin to shoot up Bitcoin- (BTC)-style — the “stable” part in the name should hint at that — they are still a viable option for storing one’s funds. Investors can use their on-chain fiat in various DeFi earning protocols, securing higher annual percentage rates (APRs) than a bank would offer on a regular deposit. This, again, makes for an upgrade for an otherwise the most traditional asset of them all.These types of projects essentially offer DeFi services to traditional financiers on a silver platter, working as a novel wrap for financial instruments that they already trust. This is what makes them perfect for those who have their qualms or uncertainties — they can get a feel for crypto products and see the benefits of decentralization first-hand while not straying too far from what is familiar. This will help them realize that crypto is not as bad as headlines make them out to be or as scary as they may have previously thought.Related: The battle between DeFi, CeFi and the old guardMeeting in the middleThese projects indicate how CeFi’s strong suits can be applied to blockchain-based solutions for a more well-rounded and holistic experience, especially for newer users.As Bitcoin’s movements mirror those of the stock market more and more, we can see that the differences between these two financial ecosystems are not as vast as many believe. This has been interesting to monitor, especially as some suggest that the slim contrasts between crypto and fiat make crypto and DeFi unnecessary for institutional investors.However, numerous cases clearly outline why decentralized finance can be a saving grace. Even if we take a look at Russia’s recent invasion of Ukraine, it is clear how crypto changed the game for everyday citizens. The European Union cut multiple Russian banks from SWIFT, the global messaging system connecting financial institutions, essentially making any foriegn transactions significantly more complicated for them. However, many Russian citizens were able to control their finances through digital assets, as they are easy to transfer and highly liquid. Crypto can clearly come in handy when people least expect it, which is why doubters should test the waters now.Related: The world has synchronized on Russian crypto sanctionsThe practical uses of DeFi are becoming more apparent to the mainstream, which is benefiting the crypto industry as a whole. As people experience the benefits of crypto first-hand, the bad rap will slowly but surely fade away.The projects that mesh qualities of both traditional and decentralized finance give investors the luxury of easing their way into DeFi. Such products can lead DeFi down the path to full-blown adoption. Investors can dip their toes as they please without worrying about extreme market volatility and uncertainty.This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.The views, thoughts and opinions expressed here are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.Ariel Shapira is a father, entrepreneur, speaker, cyclist and serves as founder and CEO of Social-Wisdom, a consulting agency working with Israeli startups and helping them to establish connections with international markets.