The value of digital real estate
Digital spaces have always been valued. Users from the earliest days of using the Internet hung in masses in them. What makes Web3 so special for digital real estate? One of the main benefits is that NFTs allow users to own, rather than rent, pieces of digital real estate, whether land or metaverse locations for private or shared use. Blockchain is the core technology of web3 that offers decentralized, tamper-proof public information about who owns what digital assets.
The digital space is theoretically infinite, and can expand without boundaries. The question of naysayers is still relevant: “Does it make sense to own digital land or digital buildings?” Actually the answer is quite simple. There is a point, and it lies in the fact that the metaverse is like a city in which you live. Let's say you went for a walk, along the way you meet billboards with a bunch of ads that stick into your brain. Over time, when you need to buy something, be sure that you will pay attention to exactly what was shown in the advertisement. This is how great marketing works. Companies, shops and advertising have always been and will be relevant, whether it is the real world or the metaverse.
Many have built their own stores in the metaverses, where you can buy virtual products from the real assortment of the brand. In fact, you need to pay attention to an important aspect. The value of a particular land plot can vary greatly, because there are places where advertising or a store will attract more attention, the richer the plot, the more expensive it is. When choosing a site, a brand pays attention to the popularity and traffic of the site it buys.
Local Proximity
Local proximity, what is it? And what does it matter in the virtual space. Indeed, in some ways, proximity to the events and amenities of the metaverse can be more valuable than in the physical world: for example, the audience of a virtual concert is large, which in principle could draw a lot of attention to everything that happens around, especially to buildings nearby.
However, virtual proximity matters much less at medium and long distances. In the physical world, having a house in the suburbs is very valuable, because it gives you more space, but it also allows you to work in the city nearby. But when you can teleport, it doesn't matter if your virtual "home" is somewhere near your "work" within the geography of the metaverse.
More broadly, in the metaverse, humans are unlikely to engage in long distance travel when teleportation is possible. The only exception is when long-distance travel is in itself a valuable or recreational activity. For example, a trip on a virtual ferry, on a train or even on an airplane, where you can explore the environment while you are on the road.
All of this means that the value of land and real estate in the metaverse to users is likely to depend on what is nearby, and not on the full geography of this metaverse. We can expect to see thriving stores, malls, micro-cities, or even entire virtual worlds like islands in digital space—filled with activities that encourage people to travel within them, but separated by distances large enough for people to simply teleport from one place to another.
Zoning and Planning the Metaverse
The potential for building is limitless, but people may not want to set up shop next to something that distracts or interferes with the metaverse. If the virtual space becomes unattractive, users may be teleported to another location. This places a particularly heavy burden on metaverse architects and platformers, who must control their spaces according to user preferences and their intended use cases.
For the same reason, high-level rules are often needed to prevent obscenity, harassment, and other uses that devalue the digital experience for users.
At the same time, the ability to create outside of classical design (or even physics) is one of the biggest advantages of the digital space. The main benefit of some metaverses will be the freedom they give users to create whatever they want.
The only natural happy medium is to focus only on the overall layout of the space and the visual plan. This is what the metaverse is White Sands did with her recent collection of luxury villas: forbidding people to change their appearance, but at the same time giving the opportunity to remodel the interior inside. This reflects the rules in many places in the physical world that attempt to preserve the external visual character of districts and neighborhoods, while at the same time allowing, reconstructing and reorganizing the spaces inside buildings.
Platform Selection
Which platforms are the most valuable? Logically, joining a platform that already has a dynamic ecosystem is the right decision. This means that digital land can be especially valuable to a user or developer when it is on the popular NFT Worlds platform, which is powered by the Minecraft engine. Similarly, buying land in The Sandbox and Otherside may be the right decision.
The value of the platform depends on the actions and functions offered to the user. Some platforms are built to support digital versions of everyday tasks, others are fantasy game worlds, and still others simply invite users to explore and interact in an endless space.
Meanwhile, it can be especially valuable for digital asset creators such as artists, game studios, and NFT communities to create ways that are compatible and portable across platforms. One of the biggest benefits is web3, the ability for users to take their digital assets with them wherever they go, acquiring a personal identity, status, and other attributes.
Portable decentralized identity applies to everything: someone might want to take a weapon or a talisman that he uses, for example, in the world of video games, and decorate his virtual office with it. But in the metaverse, potentially even buildings can be moved from place to place. A user who owns a digital building can create their own space by filling it with their favorite artwork, furniture, or items, and then take it with them as they travel across the platforms.
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