“Metaverse & Virtual Economy” sheds light on the new economic phase brought about by the advent of the metaverse era. Photo courtesy of Hans Media

New era of metaverse dawns

Neal Stephenson authored a science fiction novel, named "Snow Crash," in 1992 where human avatars interact with each other and software agents in a three-dimensional virtual space.

The novel piqued the curiosity of some Korean fans because its main character Hiro Protagonist’s mother is a Korean woman whose family was enslaved by the Japanese _ Hiro is a Japanese name, not a Korean one.

In 30 years, the book is on the lips of so many people not only in Korea but also across the globe due to the author’s insight _ Stephenson dubbed the three-dimensional virtual space as metaverse.

The term is composed of the prefix “meta,” which means beyond, and the stem “verse,” which refers to universe. The buzzword is about the world’s rising interests in a virtual space and its influence on an actual world.

Choi Hyung-wook recently published “Metaverse & Virtual Economy” to delve into metaverse’s economic impact, which is demonstrated by the rise of such popular platforms as Roblox, Minecraft and Fortnite.

Believing that metaverse will replace the internet, Choi expects that metaverse will become a dominant platform in the not-so-distant future.

“The two-dimensional internet is evolving into the three-dimensional metaverse. The latter’s users will search, read news articles, play games, connect to social network sites, shops, and do businesses in the virtual world,” Choi said.

He also predicts that v-commerce, or virtual commerce, will form the mainstream retail business.

“Cable TVs led to home shopping channels. The internet is responsible for e-commerce, and Facebook resulted in social commerce. Metaverse will bring about v-commerce,” Choi said.

“The virtual commerce platform will come to the fore. Citizens will be able to experience products in an unprecedented way around the clock. Training machines, fashion goods, and adult products would be first targets.”

The writer also notes that the NFT will work as a metaverse register. Short for the non-fungible token, NFTs are gaining more traction across the board after Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey’s first tweet as an NFT sold at almost $3 million.
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