Rise of Web3: Metaverse tokens surge as Meta’s share price plunges

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Meta Platforms, the genitor institution of Facebook, saw the largest single-day descent successful marketplace worth for a U.S. institution ever with a 26% autumn successful stock prices connected Thursday aft the tech elephantine revealed disappointing net and a diminution successful regular progressive users.

Meta famously changed its sanction from Facebook successful precocious 2021, to awesome its plans to absorption connected the Metaverse, and its struggles person coincided with double-digit percent gains for its decentralized competitors The Sandbox and Decentraland.

Meta reported $33.67 cardinal worthy of full gross for Q4 2021, compared to $28 cardinal the twelvemonth prior. However, its nett income decreased to $10.28 billion, down from $11.2 cardinal 12 months ago.

For the archetypal time, Meta broke retired a conception successful its net study for its virtual and augmented world probe and improvement business, Reality Labs. It saw losses which topped implicit US$10 billion, up from US$6.6 cardinal successful 2020. However it’s lone successful the aboriginal stages of laying the groundwork for Metaverse technology, including processing a haptic glove, allowing users to “touch” objects successful the metaverse.

Speaking with Cointelegraph, Animoca Brands chairman and co-founder Yat Siu, suggested that the crisp driblet of Meta’s stock terms whitethorn correspond a broader inclination successful which users are opening to question the centralized Web2 model:

“It's a strategy that does not stock immoderate meaningful portion of the ownership oregon worth of the network, which volition yet pb to a diminution arsenic users look for amended options.”

“As radical are inactive apt to walk adjacent much clip online, the question is wherever and how? This is an aboriginal indicator that they are moving distant from Web 2.0 and the logical decision connected wherever to spell for a increasing fig is Web 3,” helium added.

Siu argued that Web2 companies similar Meta and Apple are besides “losing their champion people” to Web3 companies and projects:

“Web 3 and the unfastened Metaverse is much than conscionable different merchandise cycle, it's a movement, and it's hard to combat thing similar that arsenic a azygous corporation.”

Crypto-backed metaverses

Decentraland, a Metaverse level built connected Ethereum, has seen the terms of its token MANA summation by implicit 20% the past 7 days, surging from a seven-day debased of US$2.19 to caller enactment levels astir the US$2.60 mark.

Likewise, SAND tokens for The Sandbox, 1 of Decentraland’s main Metaverse competitors, has seen a seven-day summation of 17.5%, entering the play astatine a debased of US$3.31 earlier surging to a precocious of implicit US$4, present seeing enactment levels astir US$3.60.

Apart from Meta, different factors are affecting prices for MANA and SAND this week. Decentraland released it’s 2022 Manifesto, announcing a prototype mobile app, improvements to its play experience, greater inferior of NFTs, and protocol enhancements.

The Sandbox team announced a concern with UniX Gaming, a decentralised autonomous organisation (DAO), and a merchandise of much “land” successful its metaverse slated for February 10th.

Animoca Brands owns The Sandbox, and determination were unconfirmed rumors earlier this week that Meta would beryllium acquiring the Metaverse platform. However Siu promptly unopen those rumors down connected Feb. 3.

There is an unconfirmed rumor that Facebook is astir to get @TheSandboxGame. It looks similar regularisation is coming sooner than aboriginal to this space... https://t.co/XiAelDoBac

— NFT Ethics (@NFTethics) February 2, 2022

Outside of Meta, different large tech companies including Apple and Microsoft are getting into the space. Entertainment elephantine Disney besides seems to beryllium gearing up for a determination into the Metaverse with a caller occupation advertisement for a Business Development Manger seeks looking for idiosyncratic to “help pb Disney's efforts successful the NFT space”.

It’s not instantly wide if Disney’s efforts could subordinate to it’s planned headset-free augmented world Metaverse task uncovered by patent filings.

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