Tag Archives: what

What is Decentraland and how does it work?

What is Decentraland and how does it work?

Imagine living in an alternate reality where you can move seamlessly from place to place and socialise in real-time with thousands of other people, all within the same digital universe.

This is the metaverse, a term first coined in Neal Stephenson’s science fiction novel Snow Crash, which refers to a combination of virtual reality, augmented reality and the internet.

Decentraland is a three-dimensional (3D) virtual reality platform that stands at the forefront of this growing metaverse trend which has seen meta-related coins proliferate by up to 37,000% this year according to data from Macro Hive.

Founded in 2015 by Ari Meilich and Esteban Ordano, and launched in 2017, Decentraland is powered by Ethereum and its native ERC-20 token known as MANA allows users to purchase plots of LAND, monetise LAND parcels and avatars and pay for in-world goods and services.

More specifically, LAND can be bought by burning MANA, which destroys the token in order to create a new entry in the registry. Decentraland is also governed by a decentralised autonomous organisation (DAO) that enables token holders to vote on policies within the metaverse.

Although the company claims that it is the first ever virtual world owned by its users, Decentraland began simply as a proof of concept for allocating ownership of digital real estate to users on a blockchain. This digital real estate was initially implemented as a pixel on an infinite 2D grid where each pixel contained metadata identifying the owner. Decentraland has since evolved into a 3D virtual world which is divided according to different districts.

The platform has been growing at an accelerated rate and currently has a market capitalisation of $6.8bn (as of 6 December 2021). The company’s thirty-day non-fungible token (NFT) sales volume is up 417% at $41.5m, while its seven-day total sales volume is $15.7m, with 467 NFTs sold during that time, at an average price of $33,700.

How does Decentraland work?

Decentraland is most well-known for providing an infrastructure to support shared virtual worlds. The platform consists of a decentralised ledger for land ownership, a protocol for describing the contents of each LAND parcel and a peer-to-peer network for user interactions. Through the DAO, users can propose policy updates and vote on upcoming LAND auctions.

Decentraland’s protocol consists of three layers:

  • A consensus layer which tracks LAND ownership and content through smart contracts,
  • A LAND content layer which uses a decentralised distribution system to render content in the virtual world, and
  • A real-time layer which provides peer-to-peer connections for users to interact with each other.

Users claim ownership of virtual lands through a blockchain-based ledger of encoded parcels and each piece of LAND is marked by a distinct set of cartesian coordinates. Content can range from static 3D scenes to interactive systems such as games.

In addition to selling their creations, users can rent out plots such as buildings, parks, hotels and casinos to other players. Decentraland’s metaverse is divided into 90,601 individual LAND parcels which are exactly 16×16 in size and can be found at specific coordinates in the metaverse.

If you’re wondering what the main idea of Decentraland is, look no further than its thriving marketplace where users can create and sell items through a unique in-world economy. More generally, web 3.0 metaverse worlds are part of a larger interconnected crypto cloud economy in the sense that these decentralised protocols interoperate with and provide the technical infrastructure to support metaverse virtual economies.

Web 3.0 metaverse economies can use their own digital currency or the currency of the crypto cloud economy platform they’re built on – in Decentraland’s case, this is the MANA token.

Overall, this decentralised distribution system enables the platform to work without the need of a centralised server infrastructure.

In terms of identity verification, Decentraland uses a decentralised identity system which allows users to easily track and verify consent through cryptographic signatures.

An all-immersive digital world: Pros of the MANA coin

The pros of the MANA coin lie in the fact that it enables users to create games, applications, gambling services and even dynamic 3D scenes which can be monetised or rented out to other players. This in turn drives the expansion of digital goods and services within the Decentraland metaverse.

Through the LAND Estates function, users can easily manage their lands by associating adjacent plots – a feature which serves as a boost for the coin since users were unable to connect two or more parcels of LAND directly through the marketplace before Estates was introduced. Much to their dismay, users could only create, edit, transfer and dissolve Estates during the first release of Decentraland.

Another benefit of the MANA coin is that there are theoretically no limitations on how it can be used to facilitate the creation of LAND parcels within the metaverse. For those who want to earn MANA through Decentraland, there are no technical specifications in terms of what can be built in Decentraland which means that users are free to explore a range of different virtual structures.

“Decentraland has pioneered a type of virtual social space (or metaverse) that is operated entirely by its users,” Ari Meilich, Decentraland’s founder, told Capital.com.
“They serve the content that players publish on their virtual lands, streamline the communications between avatars, and vote with their MANA tokens to decide on the economic policies of the virtual world – all while distributing the DAO’s $1bn endowment among content creators,” he added.
“Decentraland’s success resided in its ability to accelerate growth even when the original development company was dissolved,” Meilich concluded.

An emerging DeFi space: Cons of the MANA coin

Decentraland is still a relatively new project that was only launched five years ago and it operates within a nascent decentralised finance (DeFi) space. Its coin is also hindered by scalability issues that are inherent to the blockchain network.

During times of high network congestion, blockchain transaction times are known to increase. In addition to processing delays, high transaction fees are also common on the blockchain network. For example, the average fee on Ethereum is currently $33.43, according to data from BitInfoCharts.

Also, MANA lacks real-world utility since only 205 merchants worldwide are accepting it as a payment, according to Cryptwerk – a scarcity which could serve as a con for the crypto.

Anndy Lian, chairman of BigONE Exchange and chief digital advisor for Mongolia’s national productivity agenda, believes that the Decentraland concept provides limitless opportunities for users.

“Decentraland has become a fertile breeding ground for businesses, artists, content creators and application developers,” Lian told Capital.com.

“For me, I don’t see many cons, however if you are going to go full steam ahead with Decentraland, I would suggest getting a suitable graphics card for an enhanced experience,” Lian added.

“Also, Grayscale launched its Decentraland Trust in February this year which proves the heightened demand for metaverse-related products. Investors who believe in the virtual world economy would surely see this as a potent sign of further growth to come,” Lian concluded.

Anndy Lian is an early blockchain adopter and experienced serial entrepreneur who is known for his work in the government sector. He is a best selling book author- “NFT: From Zero to Hero” and “Blockchain Revolution 2030”.

Currently, he is appointed as the Chief Digital Advisor at Mongolia Productivity Organization, championing national digitization. Prior to his current appointments, he was the Chairman of BigONE Exchange, a global top 30 ranked crypto spot exchange and was also the Advisory Board Member for Hyundai DAC, the blockchain arm of South Korea’s largest car manufacturer Hyundai Motor Group. Lian played a pivotal role as the Blockchain Advisor for Asian Productivity Organisation (APO), an intergovernmental organization committed to improving productivity in the Asia-Pacific region.

An avid supporter of incubating start-ups, Anndy has also been a private investor for the past eight years. With a growth investment mindset, Anndy strategically demonstrates this in the companies he chooses to be involved with. He believes that what he is doing through blockchain technology currently will revolutionise and redefine traditional businesses. He also believes that the blockchain industry has to be “redecentralised”.

www.anndy.com
j j j

What does the future hold for metaverse?

What does the future hold for metaverse?

Metaverse has been the talk of the town since Facebook’s decision to rebrand as Meta in October this year. However, the word “metaverse”, a portmanteau of “meta-“ (meaning beyond) and “universe”, existed way before this. The term “Metaverse” is often credited to Author Neal Stephenson’s 1992 dystopic, sci-fi novel Snow Crash, and many see a more recent inspiration in Earnest Cline’s 2011 novel Ready Player One. Unlike what is portrayed in movies and blockbusters, the metaverse I’m talking about is far from the stuff of sci-fi – and we’re not unfamiliar to it.

 

What is it?

Metaverse is a hypothesised iteration of the Internet; a digitalised layer of reality that hovers around and throughout the features of the real world – or, in some definitions, is entirely separate from it. Much like Christopher Nolan’s 2014 Interstellar, don’t you think?

Originally thought of as an idea of a centralised virtual world, a “place” parallel to the physical world, Cline’s Ready Player One portrayed that idea of a metaverse down to the T. When Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced his intention to build a more maximalist version of Facebook, spanning social presence, office work, and entertainment – coupled with Stephenson’s and Cline’s portrayal of metaverses as reference – it sounded like a far-fetched ambition.

Critics have stepped forward and named this version of metaverse a method of public relations building using a purely speculative and “over-hyped” concept based on existing technology. But what we do not realise is that it already exists in our world.

Online communities have existed since the dawn of the Internet’s existence and grew in the 1990s with various chatrooms and the first social media sites. Does anyone remember Friendster? It’s one of the earliest social media networks that ever existed. Apart from being known as a social network game, Friendster allowed communication between users, dating, and discovering new events, bands, and hobbies.

Metaverses, in a way, are currently present on platforms like VRChat or video games like Fortnite and Second Life. Today, logging onto Fortnite, joining a chat and launching into a game with friends is, especially to younger generations, just as social an experience as most other physical interactions.

 

Is that all there is to a metaverse?

(Hint: Nope)

The concept of metaverse, also known to many as “Web3.0”, clearly means extremely different things to different people. The metaverse is currently split into two categories – a world of gaming and game creations, and a blockchain-based digital world. The former is made up of a series of embryonic digital spaces such as Facebook’s Horizon, Fortnite, and Roblox, while the latter houses Decentraland. These spaces have clear boundaries, different rules and objectives, and differing rates of growth.

The metaverse could fundamentally change the way we interact with the digital world. In the same way non-fungible tokens (NFT) have brought new opportunities to creators, artists, and gamers, the metaverse could very possibly not just reshape the creator economy, but invent it anew.

The promise of the metaverse is to allow a greater assimilation of our digital and physical lives in wealth, productivity, shopping, socialisation, and entertainment. Instead of an extension of the Internet, the metaverse is best described as a successor of it. At its core, the metaverse is an evolution of our current Internet.

 

How does crypto fit in?

At the foundation of the metaverse, there will be a demand to deliver permission less identity, financial services, and high-speed exchange. Data will have to be stored and made available to millions, if not billions of people. The solution to this lies in the technology of cryptocurrency.

Vitual worlds that integrate cryptocurrencies have been developed by companies like Decentraland and The Sandbox. The purpose for this is so gamers can create structures like virtual casinos and theme parks, and monetise them. In Decentraland, the currency used is called MANA, and is available for purchase on exchanges like BigONE. Decentraland even has casinos where MANA is used for gambling and salaries for dealers.

NFTs, most of which are a part of the Ethereum blockchain, will give people complete ownership of their characters, and accrue in-game items including virtual land.

 

Decentraland (MANA) VS Sandbox (SAND)

Ever since Facebook virtualised the term “metaverse”, everyone seems to want to get into it. This has greatly benefited the crypto metaverse platforms, especially Decentraland and Sandbox where they are the top two metaverse projects right now.

Comparing their native tokens now, Decentraland’s $MANA has rallied more than 400%, while Sandbox’s $SAND has rallied more than 300% since 28th October 2021. An analysis of token growth alone is insufficient to get a true sense of which platform will be a leader in the metaverse space. So, let’s get to discussing!

At their foundation, Decentraland and Sandbox are a virtual reality platform powered by the Ethereum blockchain where users can create an experience and monetise their gaming experience. Land and virtual worlds are permanently owned by the community without a central authority.

Both $MANA and $SAND are ERC20 tokens, where users can use any ERC20 wallet in the market for both projects. However, Decentraland has recently linked up with wallet connect, giving better access to Polygon users.

Built on the Ethereum blockchain, Decntraland and Sandbox’s scalability capacity is limited by unstable tokens and high fees. With the upcoming update from ETH1 to ETH2, Decentraland and Sandbox may not have enough scalability capacity to adapt to massive adoption.

At this moment, Decentraland has a more structured governance mechanism compared to Sandbox. Decentraland has two tokens – $LAND and $MANA – resulting in having a Decentralised Autonomous Organisation (DAO). Sandbox users, on the other hand, need $SAND to participate in governance decisions of the platform via a DAO structure.

Let’s talk teams. Decentraland has a Security Advisory Board (SAB) that acts as a guarantor of Decentraland’s smart contract security. They have important leaders in blockchain engineering, computer science, venture capital, and data analytics. In contrast, the Sandbox team is distributed in four different countries specialising in startups, software development, finance, and blockchain business. Despite the difference in pedigrees between both teams, Sandbox has more members, hinting at the possibility of having better developments in the future.

Recent developments in projects are a good indication of where the projects are headed towards. Decentraland has announced their new partnerships and developments like an open virtual gallery with Sotheby’s, accompanied by the ability for users to shoot and edit videos within the platform. On the other hand, Sandbox’s has recently announced their liquidity mining launch and its migration to a Polygon NFT layer 2 to use 100 times less energy than Ethereum. Both projects are consistently developing new features, but Sandbox’s is a critical improvement that may very well allow for exceptional scalability.

 

Who will win?

Considering the factors that have been analysed, Sandbox seems to offer a truer and more technically comprehensive platform that is ready to dominate the metaverse. But, taking into account that the metaverse is still – in a sense – an infant, it is way too early to determine who will take the throne.

Let’s use the comparison of the top two most used search engines – Google and Yahoo – as an example. Yahoo was founded in 1994, while Google was founded in 1998. Despite the head-start Yahoo had, Google has created just as strong a brand name as Yahoo. Google and Yahoo offer different benefits but users will always prefer one search engine over the other without understanding and considering the pros and cons. Through the humongous developments of the Internet, both search engines have adapted very well that even till now, their rivalry is still going strong.

Similarly, the competition between the top two metaverse projects can be viewed as such. Sandbox was founded in 2013, while Decentraland was founded in 2015. Still in their infancy stage, both projects are developing rapidly without losing to each other holistically. Their developments may set them apart but will that determine which is a better or worse platform? Who’s to say there will even be a winner?

 

What does the future hold?

With Facebook’s extravagant entrance to the metaverse, and even rebranding themselves as Meta, Zuckerberg announced plans to fund $10 billion this year on the development of the metaverse – an ecosystem of interconnected digital experiences, services, and platforms that seamlessly blend with the real world. We certainly hope to see that Zuckerberg’s ambitions become our new reality.

Tech giants of all shapes and sizes, from Microsoft, Amazon, Tencent, and Alibaba, to Disney, and even Tinder, have announced their plans towards building a metaverse. What does this entail? Similar to Bitcoin, these whales will move and develop the metaverse faster than you can say “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”.

While it’s impossible to predict exactly how the metaverse will look like, or when it has reached its peak, the importance of cryptocurrencies for its growth is engraved in stone. As technologies like virtual reality develop, and current industry leaders like Facebook gets involved, advancements in blockchain technology and the world of cryptocurrency will play an equally important role in shaping the metaverse’s future.

“The metaverse currently has an independent, whole economy of its own, indicating that cryptocurrency and digital currency will likely become the key transactional method. Cryptocurrency is not new to us but more people have begun to get into it for various reasons as of late. One thing for sure, is that such currencies will be key to trading across the worlds – real and digital – all while being supported and distributed by technologies such as blockchain.” #anndylian

 

Author: Anndy Lian

Anndy Lian is an all-rounded business strategist in Asia. He has provided advisory across a variety of industries for local, international, public listed companies and governments. He is an early blockchain adopter and experienced serial entrepreneur, book author, investor, board member and keynote speaker.

Currently, he is appointed as the Chief Digital Advisor at Mongolia Productivity Organization, championing national digitization. He is also the Chairman, Asia for BigONE Exchange.

 

Original Source: https://metaverseinsider.tech/2021/12/05/what-does-the-future-hold-for-metaverse/

Anndy Lian is an early blockchain adopter and experienced serial entrepreneur who is known for his work in the government sector. He is a best selling book author- “NFT: From Zero to Hero” and “Blockchain Revolution 2030”.

Currently, he is appointed as the Chief Digital Advisor at Mongolia Productivity Organization, championing national digitization. Prior to his current appointments, he was the Chairman of BigONE Exchange, a global top 30 ranked crypto spot exchange and was also the Advisory Board Member for Hyundai DAC, the blockchain arm of South Korea’s largest car manufacturer Hyundai Motor Group. Lian played a pivotal role as the Blockchain Advisor for Asian Productivity Organisation (APO), an intergovernmental organization committed to improving productivity in the Asia-Pacific region.

An avid supporter of incubating start-ups, Anndy has also been a private investor for the past eight years. With a growth investment mindset, Anndy strategically demonstrates this in the companies he chooses to be involved with. He believes that what he is doing through blockchain technology currently will revolutionise and redefine traditional businesses. He also believes that the blockchain industry has to be “redecentralised”.

www.anndy.com
j j j

Interview with Anndy Lian: Views on 2022 Cryptocurrency Adoption – What Is Coming Next

Interview with Anndy Lian: Views on 2022 Cryptocurrency Adoption – What Is Coming Next

Anndy Lian is an all-rounded business strategist in Asia. He has provided advisory across a variety of industries for local, international, public listed companies and governments. He is an early blockchain adopter and experienced serial entrepreneur, book author, investor, board member and keynote speaker. Currently, he is appointed as the Chief Digital Advisor at Mongolia Productivity Organization, championing national digitization. He is also the Chairman, Asia for BigONE Exchange.

Being an Asian, I would like to hear Anndy’s perspectives on how he sees cryptocurrency adoption for 2022.

 

Jenny Zheng: Now that the SEC appears to have dropped its resistance to (certain) Bitcoin ETFs, do you expect we’ll see increased institutional adoption of bitcoin/crypto as an investment vehicle and/or inflation hedge?

 

Anndy Lian: It’s certainly welcome news to exchange-traded fund managers with the launch of the first Bitcoin futures ETF this week, with the ProShares’ Bitcoin Strategy ETF, to first and foremost provide their clients with the option to diversify their portfolio with cryptocurrencies, a testament to the maturation of the market.

 

Plus, the news that Interactive Brokers announced they will empower Registered Investment Advisors across the United States to invest in bitcoin and cryptocurrencies means hundreds of billions of dollars can now enter the market more easily.

 

It’s true that big institutional investors have been looking for a regulated way to trade Bitcoin for a while, and that’s all the more so considering the real concerns about high inflation, and the debasement of the dollar due to the US Fed’s quantitative easing program.

 

Part of that crypto adoption process however is being able to convince the regulator, the SEC in the US being the prime example, that proposed funds will be able to cover the risks for investors. For example, Bitwise, which originally filed for regulatory approval for a bitcoin ETF in 2019 before withdrawing the application after an initial rejection, has been revising its filing for more than a year.

 

But it’s also clear that since the recent Chinese mining and crypto ban the US has become a little more receptive to crypto regulation. Certainly, regulators in other countries have approved ETFs, Canada’s Purpose Bitcoin ETF, which started trading in February, ballooned to more than $1bn in assets under management in less than two months.

 

Jenny Zheng: 2021 was notable for witnessing El Salvador’s adoption of bitcoin as legal tender. To what extent do you think 2022 will involve more nations following such an example, or will at least involve more nations/governments using crypto in various ways?

 

Anndy Lian: The rollout of Bitcoin in El Salvador certainly captured the headlines worldwide, It raised the profile of the country and has no doubt attracted the attention of other countries. By the same token, the speed at which it happened, without the opportunity to enlighten citizens across the country as to the pros and cons of using the cryptocurrency will also have given them food for thought. This caution is supported by the case of Panama, which while also passing a law to increase the use of bitcoin and Ethereum as a payment option did not decree that businesses had to accept cryptocurrency.

 

In 2022 however, the real crypto push from governments will be more likely to come in the form of central bank digital currencies, most notably in China. There the central bank is looking to use blockchain at the issuance layer for its digital yuan system, which is centralized. The Chinese version of the CBDC is not yet a distributed approach due to issues around performance and scalability; though the wider ecosystem does provide solutions in the form of sidechains and oracles to enable off-chain data to connect with blockchains this seems unlikely to be adopted any time soon.

 

However, the real impetus to action by the government whether in South America or Southeast Asia may come with the rollout of Facebook’s Novi wallet later this year, with the Diem cryptocurrency to follow shortly after. The reason being that most deserving of crypto aims, to service the ‘unbanked’ citizens who lack banking services. If the Facebook initiatives take off then this could spur governments to action, if not creating their own digital currency, in supporting the growth of private-sector solutions with improved regulations and support.

 

A good example of this approach is in Ukraine, which voted almost unanimously to legalize and regulate cryptocurrency just a day after El Salvador’s official bitcoin adoption. As reported in Yahoo Finance: “This is with hopes of developing a new industry that will attract transparent investments and boost the country’s reputation as a high-tech state.” No doubt this model for adoption will prove attractive to other governments in 2022.

 

Jenny Zheng: Lastly, the end of 2021 seems primed to witness a renewed bull market. However, do you think 2022 will witness an increase in people actually using bitcoin and cryptocurrency to make payments?

 

Anndy Lian: The trend towards greater use of crypto for payments has already started, with the recent news in the US that US-based cinema chain AMC will soon be accepting cryptocurrency payments. It comes just a few months after PayPal decided to allow US consumers to use crypto to make purchases and news that Mastercard would be supporting cryptocurrency payments across its network.

 

While in the retail sector, Walmart and Amazon’s crypto recruitment announcements have raised awareness that these retail behemoths may be planning to open their doors to cryptocurrencies. At Amazon, it appears the plans are well advanced, as a “full-on, well-discussed, integral part of the future mechanism of how Amazon will work,” according to a City AM report.

 

While there are certainly challenges in accepting Bitcoin for payments, especially when the price volatility is factored in, more and more merchants are looking to add crypto purchasing to their business. According to a survey last year by BitPay, “up to 40% of customers that pay with crypto are new to the merchant. Second, purchase amounts are twice that of credit card purchases. Third, crypto is less expensive than credit cards, and lastly, there are no fraud-related chargebacks”.

 

A clear use case for cryptocurrency also comes with international money transfers, for example, with low transfer fees and fast transfer speeds, and anyone can use it. “However, Bitcoin has become less attractive for remittances due to the increasing cost of Bitcoin transactions. Some competing cryptocurrencies, such as Ripple and Dash, are also targeting the remittance market with substantially lower fees,” suggested a recent report in Investopedia.

 

Jenny Zheng: Any final words?

 

Anndy Lian: Well, the year 2022 seems to be the best year for cryptocurrency adoption. If you looked at the crypto innovation curve that I have shared on Twitter. You have not missed anything. Crypto is still young.

 

by Jenny Zheng @jennyzheng.Early crypto advocate | Investor | PR Expert | Cofounder of Blockcast.cc

 

 

Original Source: https://hackernoon.com/interview-with-anndy-lian-views-on-2022-cryptocurrency-adoption-what-is-coming-next

Anndy Lian is an early blockchain adopter and experienced serial entrepreneur who is known for his work in the government sector. He is a best selling book author- “NFT: From Zero to Hero” and “Blockchain Revolution 2030”.

Currently, he is appointed as the Chief Digital Advisor at Mongolia Productivity Organization, championing national digitization. Prior to his current appointments, he was the Chairman of BigONE Exchange, a global top 30 ranked crypto spot exchange and was also the Advisory Board Member for Hyundai DAC, the blockchain arm of South Korea’s largest car manufacturer Hyundai Motor Group. Lian played a pivotal role as the Blockchain Advisor for Asian Productivity Organisation (APO), an intergovernmental organization committed to improving productivity in the Asia-Pacific region.

An avid supporter of incubating start-ups, Anndy has also been a private investor for the past eight years. With a growth investment mindset, Anndy strategically demonstrates this in the companies he chooses to be involved with. He believes that what he is doing through blockchain technology currently will revolutionise and redefine traditional businesses. He also believes that the blockchain industry has to be “redecentralised”.

www.anndy.com
j j j