Chinese corporations offer metaverse World Cup viewings, X2Y2 backtracks on royalties, and more.
Zach Anderson Nov 21, 2022 01:56
China-based technology companies are reportedly working on tech that would give Chinese soccer fans the ability to watch the FIFA World Cup within the metaverse. Video streaming platform Migu is one of six Chinese firms that has secured the rights to show the World Cup. The efforts are part of a five-year plan released by the Chinese government in early November to boost the local virtual reality industry.
People have said that a lot of technology companies in China are working on making it possible for Chinese soccer fans to watch the FIFA World Cup in the metaverse.
These initiatives are part of a five-year plan that the Chinese government unveiled at the beginning of November with the intention of enhancing the capabilities of and fostering the growth of the local virtual reality (VR) sector.
According to a report from the state-run media outlet Global Times that was published on November 20, the video streaming platform Migu is one of six Chinese companies that have secured the rights to show the World Cup. Migu plans to create a "Metaverse-like" space that will allow users to watch a livestream of the game while wearing virtual reality headsets.
ByteDance, the company that owns TikTok and its Chinese version, Douyin, has been granted the licencing rights to air the competition. ByteDance's VR headset subsidiary, Pico, will be offering live broadcasts of the World Cup, and users will have the ability to create and congregate in "digital rooms" to watch the game together.
It looks like China's virtual reality (VR) business, which is still new, is using the World Cup to test out the technology.
On November 1, an ambitious industrial strategy was pushed by the nation's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, together with four other agencies in the country.
Even though China's five-year plan for 2022–2026 says it wants to improve its virtual reality (VR) industry and ship more than 25 million units worth $48.56 billion, the plan doesn't say if this goal is for each year or for the whole plan.
The plans don't say anything about whether or not the metaverse would use blockchain technology, like the city of Wuhan's proposal, which was later changed to remove any mention of non-fungible coins (NFTs).
X2Y2 reduces the amount of the optional royalties. NFT marketplace X2Y2 has recanted its opt-in royalties policy and said in a Twitter thread dated November 18 that it would once again impose creator royalties on all current and future collections.
In August, the marketplace was one of the first to implement alternative royalties. At that time, it transitioned to a system known as "flexible royalty," which enables purchasers to choose the amount of the royalty that they would pay.
The NFT community responded to it in a variety of different ways.
