By Brian Armstrong, CEO and Cofounder, & Alex Reeve, Identity Product Lead

These days, everyone is talking about the Metaverse.

Primitive Metaverse platforms are selling virtual land for millions of dollars. Billions more are being invested in Metaverse startups. And Mark Zuckerberg recently renamed his entire company to reflect a focus on building the Metaverse.

The term “Metaverse” is not new. It was first used by author Neal Stephenson in his 1992 novel “Snow Crash.” But as technology improves, and we spend more of our lives online, more people are starting to think about what’s next — and how the future might revolutionize both the digital and the physical world.

Recently, our team put together an internal presentation about the Metaverse, who’s working on it, and how crypto will help make it real. I thought the presentation was well done, so I’m sharing most of the slides here.

Defining the Metaverse

At Coinbase, our thinking about the Metaverse has been heavily influenced by venture capitalist and writer Matthew Ball (you can find his work here). Like Matt, we define the Metaverse as:

The future of the internet: A massively-scaled, persistent, interactive, and interoperable real-time platform comprised of interconnected virtual worlds where people can socialize, work, transact, play, and create.

The earliest version of the internet, Web1, was about accessing static web pages. Web2 is about interactive, social experiences within closed ecosystems. And Web3 will be about digital ownership within an open, decentralized environment.

The Metaverse is the…