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The British Museum will offer NFT collectibles (again)

The Immersive Wire - 31 July 2023 (Monday Briefing)

Author

Tom Ffiske
July 31, 2023

Executive summary

Welcome to your weekly briefing on the metaverse. Here are your snippets to sound smarter in meetings this week:

  • Headline: The British Museum will offer NFT collectables through a partnership with The Sandbox (analysis below).

  • Funding: MyWorld is offering over £100k of R&D funding (UK only)

  • Earnings: Meta lost $3.7bn in the second quarter within its Reality Labs division. (The peak was in Q4 2022, when it lost $4.3bn).

  • Stat of the week: Over 80% have some level of interest in experiencing the metaverse, according to a global survey from S&P Global. An uptick in interest, perhaps?

  • Conversation-starter: A spike in VC investments occurred after Apple’s announcement, according to Pitchbook.

Finally caught up on the end of Succession. Great show, and it’s unlikely the Immersive Wire will have an intense succession period. Currently the successor looks to be a half-eaten bagel to my left.

Tom Ffiske, Editor of the Immersive Wire

Analysis

The British Museum will offer NFT collectables through a partnership with The Sandbox.

  • What are they? These collections will "reflect the breadth and depth of The British Museum’s collections," according to Cointelegraph. It also comes with a virtual space too according to The Sandbox - though details are light.

  • It’s not their first. The British Museum first did collections in 2021, auctioning 200 digital postcards.

  • How do I feel about this? I umm’d and arr’d through Friday, and I concluded it’s fine to do this so long as it does not commoditise the collections themselves. We already have merchandise that displays key items to help support the museum, and a virtual equivalent would be one great way to do the same. I felt differently when a Rembrandt painting was digitally split into a few thousand chunks which were then sold - that lowers the magic of the piece and seemed very commercial.

  • PS, I’m certain the Elgin Marbles will not be eligible for the project. Greece would not take it kindly if people can right-click and save it.

Are you ok with museum collections becoming NFTs?

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Other notable stories

Got any stories? Let me know at tom (at) immersivewire (dot) com.

  • Light news this week. Turns out late July is when most people are on holiday 🌴

  • ARuVR announced that it has appointed Paul Morton and Serena Gonsalves-Fersch as L&D specialist advisors.

  • British Army uses VR to hone battlefield skills.

  • Gatherverse launched the Human Capital Initiative, with a goal to raise $300m.

  • Meta is producing first-party titles for Horizon Worlds.

    • Lowpass considers this part of a reboot. I am less sure, but it is a new strategy to bring in more people a la Roblox and its pets minigame.

  • Metaverse Institute worked with Tampere to make the world’s first people-centred metaverse.

    • This technically went live some time ago, but due to timing differences it can be revealed now.

  • Mirrorscape, an online DND tool, launched in open beta.

  • RealitiQ XR, a. SAAS platform, just launched.

  • Rescape was chosen to deliver training in collaboration with Swansea University and Hywel Dda University Health Board.

Student profile

Beth Sun is a designer at Dream Reality Interactive, who studied Virtual and Augmented Reality at Goldsmiths, University of London. Beth made a project called the Borrower, a VR experience game project based on Quest 2, adapted from the English novel the Borrowers, telling a story of a tiny person entering a big person’s house and "borrowing" daily necessities. Beth is specialised in designing and development, and is passionate about game, AR and VR. If you like to speak to Beth, reach out here.

Help corner

Need some assistance from other readers? Let me know at tom (at) immersivewire (dot) com.

  • Jake Donaldso, a VR and Unity developer, is currently available for new projects. With over 6 years of experience in VR and Unity, Jake can help bring your games and experiences to life. You can view Jake's work and contact him through his website.

  • Metaverse Monday is another weekly newsletter that teaches you about the AR/VR industry by interviewing the founders, investors and developers building it. Join readers from Google, a16z and Nvidia - Check it out here.

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