The Metaverse – Opportunities, Markets, And Regulations (Video) – Fin Tech

Jones Day Financial Markets partner Mark Rasmussen explains how real-life
regulations could cross over into the rapidly expanding metaverse
space. He talks about the metaverse’s current uses and
potential advancements, and the possible legal issues confronting
its participants.

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A full transcript is below.

Mark Rasmussen:

The term metaverse is still being defined, and it may have
different meanings for different people. The term was coined back
in the early ’90s by a science fiction writer. What he
envisioned was a persistent online 3D virtual world, where we can
interact with one another. The way I see it in sort of simple terms
is bringing more of your physical world into an online virtual
world, and also bringing some of the online virtual world more into
your physical world. You might hear the terms virtual reality and
augmented reality.

Currently, the use cases for the metaverse have largely been in
the gaming and social networking environment. When I was a kid
growing up, if you wanted to play a video game with a friend, you
went to that friend’s house. You talked and you competed and
had a good time. My kids are growing up in a world where they
don’t want to be in the same room because they can’t
interact together. They want to be in separate rooms because they
can talk. They can communicate. Their avatars can meet up, and they
can fight and have contests

That’s kind of part of the metaverse that we’re seeing
today. It’s a persistent world that’s going on even when
you leave. It allows for sort of when you’re there, real time
interactions with other people through their avatars or through
other digital figures. That’s what I see today as the current
use cases, but companies are working on advancing this technology
in ways that could impact many different areas of our lives. So
imagine instead of a work meeting where you’re chatting via
some video conference technology, that’s sort of a flat screen,
imagine a world where it appears that other people’s avatars
are seated all around you. So that becomes a much more immersive,
engaging work environment. The pandemic has really accelerated both
the technology development and also our willingness to engage in
these platforms. Because by necessity, we’re not together.

Many of the laws that govern our physical world are going to be
equally relevant in the online world. We’ve already seen
lawsuits related to digital goods that allegedly infringe
intellectual property rights. Because a component of this is if you
have a digital avatar in a metaverse, you’re going to want to
dress that digital avatar in cool clothes. Just like in your
physical world, you want to dress in cool clothes. Brands signify
cool clothes to some people. So there’s a temptation to create
branded virtual clothing and items like that. If you’re a
metaverse creator or if you’re creating those digital goods to
sell them, you need to make sure you have those rights.

Another big component is how are we going to pay for things in a
metaverse? There’s going to be commerce, and you’re going
to want to pay for things. Are we going to be using old line
existing payment technology? Are we going to be using credit cards,
debit cards, or are we going to be engaging with cryptocurrencies
or other digital assets? Along with those decisions will come many
different legal questions, particularly if you’re using the
cryptocurrencies. A lot of the metaverses that are being created
are being created with their own version of a cryptocurrency. The
question is how has that been sold to the marketplace? Are they
complying with relevant regulations and securities laws when they
sell those digital assets to the marketplace?

We put more and more of our personal data online. Companies are
collecting more and more of that, and laws are being enacted to
establish standards for how companies deal with all that personal
information. I think it’s just going to increase exponentially
in a metaverse world. Clients that are considering engaging with
the metaverse need to really think hard about their brand and what
they want to associate their brand with. To me, the metaverse is
sort of the inevitable next step.

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