A glimpse into the metaverse with Sebastien Borget from The Sandbox

by James · June 9, 2023

The metaverse represents an early opportunity in Web3 for brands to reclaim their customer relationships, previously mediated by Web 2.0 platforms, according to Sebastien Borget, co-founder of The Sandbox, a Hong Kong-based online and virtual world. Unlike traditional online platforms, the metaverse enables a more direct and user-centric approach, enabling brands to bypass platforms and re-engage users via digital assets and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

Several brands have already launched successful NFT collections and digital experiences, tapping into the new digital economy.

Yehudah Petscher, NFT strategist at Forkast Labs, sat down with Borget to shed light on the burgeoning metaverse – a myriad of virtual worlds anyone can access via their digital identities or avatars. Borget highlighted the freedom of navigation between worlds and delineated the revolutionary potential of the metaverse to redefine digital life, ownership and commerce.

With reference to The Sandbox, Borget discussed how the platform enables individuals to create, own and monetize 3D content or experiences. Using the analogy of “digital Legos”, Borget painted a picture of an accessible, user-driven platform, where anyone could become a virtual neighbor to their favorite brands or artists.

In addition, Borget expressed optimism for the future of the metaverse and NFTs in light of US tech titan Apple’s unveiling of its Vision Pro headset, a mixed reality eyewear device, heralding a significant leap forward in technological innovation.

The following questions and answers have been edited for clarity and length.

Yehudah Petscher: Sebastien, what is the metaverse?

Sebastien Borget: We see the metaverse as this myriad of virtual worlds that anyone can access through an avatar—that is, digital identities or 3D characters—that become our representation of ourselves in those virtual worlds that are more social, more immersive, and more creative thanks to technology.

We have this possibility with our avatar to move between some of these virtual worlds without having to ask the permission of the games, platform or services that host them. For the first time ever, our avatar, all our digital assets, whether they’re wearables, game items, virtual land or virtual houses, we can take it with us in all these worlds. We can exchange it with other users and we can sell it on marketplaces and start making money from it even outside the platform. That’s the true idea behind the metaverse, and it’s the start of a whole digital journey and a digital economy where we truly own our entire digital life and digital content and can use it anywhere we want.

Pets: I’ve seen brands enter the space attracted by what the metaverse has to offer. You work closely with these brands. What is it that they see in the metaverse that has them so interested in it and really flocking to it now for years?

The city: Many brands have missed the opportunity of technology and how it can be leveraged to engage with their customers, audiences and fans. So they were late to adopt the first generation of the internet and publish information online.

They were also a bit late in social media and Web 2.0 in general, where they could interact with their audience by posting more user-generated content (UGC). When they joined, they finally understood that they were gradually giving up the relationship they have with these users to the platform that owned the data behind the relationship.

For the first time, they are early adopters of Web3. They understand that users owning their data and offering a community-driven and user-centric approach that is at the heart of the Web3 value proposition was also a way for them to win back that relationship with their audience because they could reactivate it, off-platform and have a more direct conditions where when users connect to the wallet or receive digital assets, it can be replayed in multiple experiences or multiple use cases behind, and they find this possibility exciting.

We are already at the stage where brands have launched experiences. They have launched NFTs or digital asset pools. They have had success metrics in terms of engagement with these communities and they are already at a stage where they are sharing these success stories.

Pets: What is The Sandbox and what are the brands doing in the game right now?

The city: Sandbox itself is like a platform where anyone can create 3D content or experiences, truly own them and monetize them however they want. We chose voxels as representation. Think of it as digital Legos because it’s very easy and very accessible. Someone who knows how to use it without reading the manual. We also have a no-code game maker where you can essentially drag and drop your 3D content and start creating immersive experiences. We offer the opportunity to own a piece of digital real estate called “LAND” on a limited map where you can become the virtual neighbor of your favorite brand, music artist or Web3 community. You can also grow and leverage your audience as a very UGC-powered creative platform.

Pets: We saw that Apple finally unveiled its Vision Pro headset. I know Apple didn’t mention anything about NFTs or the metaverse, but I had to tell people that I think Apple’s Vision Pro might be the most important thing to happen to NFTs since maybe CryptoPunks.

What do you think of the product and will it also bring people into the metaverse?

The city: This is a major technological improvement with great computing power. It has the potential to trigger a new wave of innovation, a new wave of experimentation.

I think it’s a big step up for what could be the metaverse, allowing people to interact with their virtual assets in the physical world, making them part of their reality because of the quality of the graphics, the quality of the interaction, something which makes it so seamless and through digital ownership could benefit from it, in addition to our resource, surrounds us even more.

Pets: There is a whole range of assets that people can invest in now in the metaverse and digital ecosystem that is NFTs. It is exciting to say that Forkast Labs and The Sandbox have teamed up to create a new metaverse index that will measure the value of these assets, especially NFTs, which are part of the metaverse focus. Why is it so important to measure these assets? What can the public gain from this new metaverse index?

The city: It is very important to share so much data. That is one of the strengths we have in Web3. the data is publicly available on-chain on a trusted public ledger that provides transparency and a level of trust so that not just a single party can change that data. You don’t need to rely on APIs as in the traditional web, Web 2.0. Aggregating this data across not just one virtual world or platform like The Sandbox, but across the overall ecosystem of Web3 and multiple decentralized virtual worlds in the metaverse is like helping brands and people who aren’t in the inner day-to -day of what is happening to get a more curated view of the activities at a high level.

We need external companies that analyze the data, provide these indexes, and provide this level of intelligence on top of the raw data to grow the industry and the Web3 ecosystem.