As the world loses their shit over the VisionPro, like any good tech developer, I will give it 3 months before tearing it limb from limb (or reluctantly loving it—as is my wont). This week I’m at Viva Tech in Paris as well as checking out the sights, sounds and smells of the wonderful world of NFTs at Art Basel (where you can see the Claudia Gϋdel X Nak3d collab). Speaking of collabs - we’re proud to bring you this week's er, week in Metacrun.ch, in association with the incredible Kawaji, the home of Japanese Snacks delivered straight to your door.
This is Hodoi
I travelled to Mumbai recently for a talk and I flew with Qatar Airways. First up, I can’t tell you how much I love being in Mumbai. The people, the place, it was a once in a lifetime thing. However, the layover in Doha was not all that, which is a shame because Doha was made for the metaverse and now, Qatar Airways—and I’m not on commission here at all when I say that everyone has to fly Qatar Airways once in their lives to see what I mean; it’s like a nothing you will ever experience in your lives, truly—have launched their QVerse metaverse. Waste of time? Yes. Got legs? No, not really unless you really can’t check–into your flight using all other normalised options. This is never going to make the Metacrun.ch Metaverse Top 10, and that’s a shame because someone has put in the hard work and effort of a decent enough UX and ahem, onboarding solution but the thing is, it’s just a 360, a webGL experience, it’s nothing special and you can do anything inside it except for look at the lounge where you will check-in to your flight. WHY THIS? It’s terrible.
Let's Cosplay as Adults
The world of banking, the traditions of finance that go back thousands of years (at least 4 thousand years—fact fans) but it hasn’t really changed much. People put their money in a trusted organisation, people withdraw that money with or without interest. People get loans, people struggle to pay loans back. It’s the cirrrrrcle of liiiiifffffe. Well, it is in my life anyway. But banks want to change and so they should. In the last 7-10 years neobanks have brought forth borderless banking as de riguer and with it different ways of borrowing and spending. It’s still very traditional though, right? And even with the metaverse, these pillars of transaction design won’t change because we’re in a webGL or engine driven experience. So what’s the point? I think this story from Yahoo is about marketing: plain and simple. Banks need new customers, and potential customers languish online playing games or accessing news/apps/metaverse beauty week/[insert your favourite waste of time here]. The closing couplet was the most powerful for me anyway, and that’s about assets, not banking, and I’m excited to see how items in gaming and the metaverse will transcend into digital asset classes if they haven’t already and well that needs a bit more cowbell than a man in a suit, don’t you agree?
Visual Kei
This is a quick one because you know how I feel about Metaverse Beauty Week: WASTE OF TIME. I will say this though, Metaverse Beauty Week will be an absolute tour de force for one element of technology and that’s interoperability. So, tbh there’s nothing to see here, move on and I dunno listen to a cool Visual Kei band like Dir en Grey or something like that.
Sai shikō suru
There’s a saying that God loves a trier. Well, way to use our imaginary friends in the sky to illustrate what it means to be a loser. That’s not to say that Louis Vuitton are losers either, if you’ve been following this newsletter every week you will know that here’s a special place in my heart for LV. However, the Albert Einstein levels of madness in trying to find a formula that fits for them is obviously predicated on how much money you have. I don’t have €39,000 to spend on what is ostensibly a loot box. Do you? If you do then the Via Treasure Trunk NFT collection is for you. And as per Louis Vuitton, it’s the usual nonsense of difficult onboarding and heavy ass graphics. One to avoid unless you really, really love Louis Vuitton and are rich.
Cherry Magic!
Utsukushii Kare, Yuri or Another, gosh there are a million BL and GL things to love about Japan. Since it’s pride month it’s time to dust off those rainbow wings (hopefully not the metallic kind) and glide into any parade of your choice! But how is the world of the metaverse, games and interactive media navigating pride? JF Larouche is the lead on an LGBTQIA+ NFT project devoted to finding the fun in queer and beyond! The Galactic Gaylords are a celebration of personal identity. The Melancholy Monsters Club NFT project is brought to us by comic book artist Jessie, and hopes to highlight the mental health aspects of the LGBTQIA+ community through the MMC NFTs! Finally, Not Your Bro is a collection of 10,000 NFTs crushing the male-dominated world of NFT with this stunning homage to LGBTQIA+ peeps worldwide. Check out these and more here.
So that's enough metaverse for this week. With my investigative journo hat on, I’ll be coming live and direct from Viva Tech to see what’s hot and what’s definitely Arigatō, demo īe, arigatō in Paris. Why don’t you subscribe to our playlist on Spotify for the latest and greatest? You can also enjoy a deep dive of all things metaverse into your inbox exclusively once a week. Don’t forget that we’re repping Kawaji all week in Metacrun.ch so 今週をお楽しみください!
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