“There will be a huge space for entertainment in the metaverse” says Alex Bellesia, CEO & Founder of SpatialPort – a company which allows brands to create 3D eCommerce platforms in the metaverse.
“You can recreate any space in VR– such as a show’s location – with game engines, and at an affordable price. Then you can have the public interacting with the show and being able to access it from all over the world. If there is a presenter, he can invite the audience to participate in games or discussions.”
Bellesia also brings up the possibility of content creators minting NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens which denote ownership of digital assets) as unique tickets for users to attend viewing events, as one potential means of monetisation.
The idea of creating interactive versions of broadcast shows, through the metaverse, is already becoming a reality. Last year, ITV announced that it will be launching a version of its new Saturday night game show, The Void, in the metaverse by recreating the show in Fortnite Creative. The experience will allow players to compete for themselves, moving through the mental and physical challenges laid out in the show. ITV has also made clear it intends to roll out the concept to other programmes and “bring brands on-board.”
A study by Ipsos Digital reveals that while 38% of U.S. respondents report familiarity with the metaverse, less than one in five (16%) can correctly define the term. Bellesia clarifies that there are various definitions of what the metaverse is. One commonly used definition relates to a virtual place – that encompasses all other virtual spaces – where people can socialise.
But Bellesia argues for a more basic definition: “What the metaverse actually is, in my opinion, is basically the transition from a 2D user interface towards a 3D interface. The metaverse in my opinion is nothing but the evolution of most of the applications that we interact with. For example, social media is moving towards 3D – which can be considered metaverse – and then in the future VR.”
This transition will cause brands to change the ways they engage users he believes, and he predicts advertisers will gravitate towards offering gamified experiences as the best way to interact with them. He says, “It will be a way for brands to communicate more of their brand personality, brand characteristics and values, because they’re not just communicating through colours and flat geometric shapes but will actually use architecture to communicate.”
“In the metaverse you can change literally anything – even the law of physics can be altered and used to communicate specific objective from a brand. It’s going to be a tool to immerse the final user into an experience rather than simply telling them ‘hey these are the services that we’re offering’. You will need to entertain users.”
He believes that the degree to which the metaverse is immersive will be what differentiates the experience brands offer from previous attempts to gamify advertising – through web games, for example. Bellesia notes, “The 3D experiences that today is considered metaverse still have a screen that detaches you from that world. If you are wearing a head mounted display and you dive into VR or AR, it’s like you’re inside that world. So it becomes your reality.”
Bellesia believes that the metaverse will be mainstreamed sooner than people expect, but notes that the rate of adoption by brands could depend heavily on the industry. In particular he thinks social media is going to be impacted rapidly due to the efforts of Mark Zuckerberg and Meta. For mass adoption of metaverse eCommerce in the luxury product category, he predicts a time line of two to three years, while other categories will take longer to transition into the space.
“I would say this year is going to be a huge because brands are approaching the space and trying to figure something out. Next year we’ll be seeing more concrete and real products, as well as real experiences in the metaverse. In the year after we’ll really start to see the mass market approaching this”.
