Public.Affairs@weforum.org
Davos-Klosters, Switzerland, 18 January 2023 – The Defining and Building the Metaverse initiative, launched by the World Economic Forum in May 2022, has released initial findings in two briefing papers – the first research of its kind on the metaverse. The initiative combines the expertise of more than 150 individuals in diverse sectors from the public and private sectors to understand and guide the future of the metaverse to become safe, interoperable and inclusive.
The governance briefing paper, Interoperability in the Metaverse, emphasizes the importance of removing friction for users. Interoperability is one strategy for allowing users to move across and between the physical and digital world with their relevant data, digital assets and identities. It can facilitate the free circulation of data and the secure exchange of information across systems.
The value creation report, Demystifying the Consumer Metaverse, focuses on consumer applications, foundational technologies and potential pathways to economic value and growth. The metaverse will require a diverse range of organizations to redefine their brands and change the way they monetize products and services to generate consumer value. The immersive, interactive nature of the metaverse will require businesses to move further away from the one-way delivery of products and services to becoming metaverse participants and providers. As consumer organizations experiment and incubate new business models for the metaverse, their work can inspire others and demonstrate the possibility of change in other industries.
The metaverse – an immersive, interoperable and synchronous digital world – represents the next era in the internet’s development. While its precise definition is still being debated, the metaverse is already forecast to become an $800 billion market in 2024. Unlocking the potential of this new field requires coordination of technology developers, corporations, governments and civil society. The World Economic Forum has convened experts from a broad range of fields to focus on two workstreams related to the future of the metaverse: governance and value creation.
Future workstreams will focus on two additional governance-related themes: privacy, safety and security; and identity. The value-creation track will issue additional outputs focused on other industries and the social implications of the metaverse.
“The metaverse is the next version of the internet and it is critical that it’s built by all, and for all. These two outputs reflect premier work on the metaverse involving such an extensive set of stakeholders and leaders, demonstrating the unique value of public-private partnership in metaverse development,” said Cathy Li, Head of Media, Entertainment and Sport, World Economic Forum.
Huda Al Hashimi, Deputy Minister of Cabinet Affairs for Strategic Affairs, Office of the Prime Minister of the United Arab Emirates, said: “Making the most of the metaverse will require governments to be proactive in understanding both the opportunities and the challenges that a persistent and interconnected virtual environment offers. This will also require developing new capabilities and importantly a different approach to regulation, informed by agile principles. This briefing paper clearly lays out a framework that can help governments gain a better understanding of the opportunity presented by the metaverse and makes a strong case for investing now in creating the conditions that will allow to generate public value from it, whilst protecting the public.”
Peggy Johnson, CEO of Magic Leap, Inc., said: “At Magic Leap, what excites us about augmented reality is the two-way bridge it creates between our digital and physical worlds, taking information from 2D screens into 3D spaces, where it is far more intuitive and engaging. We’re at a pivotal moment for this technology, and it is critical that we have a shared set of principles that support further innovation, ensure accessibility and promote interoperability between platforms.”
Yat Siu, Co-Founder and Executive Chairman of Animoca Brands, said: “The metaverse initiative is focusing on highly relevant topics to the metaverse, like interoperability – which is fundamental to digital assets. How do we ensure true ownership of assets? How do we improve the frameworks from those used in Web2.0? These are the complicated issues this initiative is taking on and finding answers to.”
About the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2023
The World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2023 convenes the world’s foremost leaders under the theme, Cooperation in a Fragmented World. It calls on world leaders to address immediate economic, energy and food crises while laying the groundwork for a more sustainable, resilient world. For further information, click here.
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