Why Metaverse on Scalable Blockchain Makes Sense
With Facebook changing its name to “Meta” and Mark Zuckerberg staking his name and fortune on it, the world is paying more attention to the metaverse. But Zuckerberg’s metaverse centered on a social media platform that allows the sharing of virtual worlds is just one piece of the gigantic puzzle that is the metaverse.
According to Robert Rice, a metaverse pioneer with 30 years of expertise in augmented reality and virtual reality (AR/VR), the two main technologies involved in the development of the metaverse, “it’s the sum total of all the data and information and everything digital that surrounds us” that is more experiential, immersive, interactive and visual.
“I think if you begin to think of things in this way as opposed just some 3D fun virtual world off to the side, but really think of the metaverse as this whole encompassing thing, I think it makes it a lot easier to really understand and identify the sheer potential that the metaverse has and what we can do with it,” Rice, who is also the founder and CEO of AR/VR tech solution provider Transmira, Inc., said during his presentation at the BSV Global Blockchain Convention in Dubai.
Already, Citi has predicted the metaverse to present an $8 to $13 trillion market opportunity by the year 2030. Imagine how big the metaverse could be when it transcends just fun and games, and becomes useful and relevant to every industry.
According to the metaverse master, this is only possible when the virtual world is linked to the real world through “full-scale, city-wide, one-to-one, near-photorealistic digital twins” of real locations. Transmira’s metaverse platform Omniscape is exactly this. In fact, it has partnered with leading geospatial tech firm Aerometrex to create digital twins of the major cities of the world.
With this kind of metaverse that can seamlessly cross over to the real world, anything literally is possible. It is a metaverse that allows people to go to places and feel like they are actually there; and then have the option to buy things and have them delivered, receive promotional coupons and freebies that can be exchanged in real-world stores and communicate with holograms of other people within the virtual space.
A lot more is possible. The example Rice gave is truly exciting. Imagine an oil rig situated in the middle of the ocean. Now, imagine a top executive not having to always ride a chopper and go on site every time an inspection is needed or a problem occurs.
All that has to be done is to log into the metaverse, go to the oil rig’s location, click on certain machineries, and check the efficiency, maintenance records and safety measures implemented. The executive can even click on the hologram of the rig manager and chat him up for updates. This not only saves time and money, but inspections can be done as often as possible.
But is there a database out there who can handle the gargantuan amount of data needed to build this kind of metaverse and deal with the equally massive amount of data it will generate on a daily basis? A blockchain that can scale limitlessly is the only solution that makes sense.
“Being able to access all the information is cool, awesome and exciting. But being able to access it knowing it’s on blockchain and it’s updated constantly and frequently that I can then go back and look at that historical time period, and start getting data or information or analytics or insights here, all that’s important. But that also requires a massive amount of regular and frequent transactions. BSV makes that affordable and viable, whereas doing it on other chains is suddenly not affordable or viable,” Rice pointed out.
A blockchain that scales has the ability to continuously increase its data blocks and throughput, at the same time reducing transaction fees to the bare minimum. This means that it would be able to meet growing market demands without having to deal with data and transaction capacity limits.
The BSV Blockchain is currently at 4GB blocks and a throughput of 50,000 to 100,000 transactions per second (tps) at fees ranging from 1/20 to 1/100 of a cent. Compare this to unscalable blockchains BTC’s 1MB blocks and seven tps, and ETH’s 70 tps at average fees of $1.99 and $10.11, respectively, and the huge disparity is obvious.
With blockchain that can scale unbounded, exabyte-sized blocks and billions of tps at fees of 1/1000000 of a cent per transaction are real possibilities in the future. This is what Rice means when he says that with BSV, everything is viable and affordable; and micropayments have a lot to do with it.
Micro-payments allow the sending of very small amounts of money. Imagine sending 10 cents as a reward for every customer who spends $10 in a shop within the metaverse, but having to pay $1.99 or $10.11 for every transaction. It is definitely not practical, and no business would spend a hundred times more in fees than what they are actually sending. And this is why the metaverse only makes sense when it is built on a scalable block-chain.
“BSV as a block-chain is absolutely superior to every other option that’s out there. It’s fast. It’s scalable. It can handle the data. It can handle all the things. And the transaction fees are so minimal that it is perfect,” Rice explained.
“Using metaverse technologies the right way allows you to communicate with other people. It’s sharing business, sharing culture. It’s sharing ideas, sharing technology. And that right kind of sharing and those kinds of environments lead to right into commerce and then education. And you know, retail and all kinds of other amazing things. The metaverse, if done right, becomes a multiplying factor to everything else,” Rice added.
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Last Updated on June 29, 2022
