‘Global Governance’—Leak Reveals ‘Unprecedented’ Plan For Crypto That Could Play Havoc With The Price Of Bitcoin, Ethereum, BNB, XRP, Cardano, Dogecoin, Solana, Tron And Litecoin
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The bitcoin price has struggled to regain its Covid-era momentum this year following its 2022 downturn, partly due to technology companies pushing back or abandoning their plans for metaverse development altogether and amid a Federal Reserve-led round of global monetary tightening (though China could be about to change all that).
Now, as the chief executive of major bitcoin and crypto exchange Binance teases when he expects the next crypto price bull run to begin, a leaked European Union draft document has shown the trading bloc wants to create a system of “global governance” to manage the “unprecedented opportunities” of virtual worlds.
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European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen promised the European Union trading bloc would … [+]
“Virtual worlds bring unprecedented opportunities in many societal areas,” the leaked European Commission paper seen by Coindesk read, citing benefits for healthcare, education and culture. “This technological shift also involves new forms of global governance”—such as crypto-based decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs).
The E.U. is expected to call for international engagement on topics such as technological standards, identity management, censorship and surveillance when the paper is published, possibly as soon as next week, to ensure the next generation of the internet “is shaped as an open, secure space, respectful of E.U. values and rules.”
In early 2024, the European Commission will create “regulatory sandboxes” that can be used to test out projects. It also warns of the risk of gatekeeper” companies blocking out competition from smaller rivals.
“The Commission will support the creation of a technical multi-stakeholder governance process to address essential aspects of virtual worlds and web4 that are beyond the remit of existing internet governance institutions,” thought to be referring to the global bodies that prop up the internet and its protocols such as the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).
Web4, an evolution of the internet that began with the email-based web 1.0 before growing to the social media and Silicon Valley-centric web 2.0 that remains pre-eminent but has been challenged by the decentralized blockchain and crypto technology of web3, would in theory herald the seamless integration between the physical and virtual worlds.
Meta, the company behind some of web 2.0’s biggest platforms—Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp—has experimented with web3 and cryptocurrencies but has since dedicated itself to web4 development, with chief executive Mark Zuckerberg going all in on the company’s virtual reality headset.
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Metaverse hype helped the bitcoin price rocket to never-before-seen highs in 2021, boosting the … [+]
“There’s bad news and there’s good news on investment in this sector,” Barry Downes, managing partner at Sure Valley Ventures, said in London at SEC Newgate’s Understanding The Metaverse event last month.
“The bad news is that the amount of capital deployed by venture capital into start-ups has declined since 2020. The number varies by region, but broadly speaking, venture capital funding is down 40% from its peak overall. In the crypto sector it was down 80% in the first quarter of this year compared to the same period last year.”
However, Downes said he has seen crypto venture capital investments surge back over the last two months, rising by 34% from April despite the uncertain economic backdrop.
“I think we may see this positive momentum continue, so it’s a good time to start and build a company in this space. Some of the biggest companies in the world have been created during downcycles. We think it’s a great time to invest in these types of companies,” Downes said.
“Fast forward seven years, a lot of the challenges facing the metaverse today will be resolved. In terms of applications, the hardware has to get to a certain point before the applications take off. We are starting to see the hardware get to that point now with the Apple Vision Pro and competition against the Meta Quest Pro.
