Here’s a Piece of Metaverse Hype That Is Crazy Like a Fox

Someone was trying to get attention for a run of NFT—non-fungible tokens that are supposed to certify authenticity and ownership and which be used to facilitate real estate transactions. But more often they are part of some marketing scheme. In this case, a PR representative said that the company involved was moving from pilot project to production phase, which seems to undercut the concept of an NFT as being scarce and particularly valuable.

Which shows why many are wary of hyped concepts, like the metaverse, which is supposed to be a titanic virtual universe in which people from anywhere can interact. Maybe. As Wired put it in April, “To hear tech CEOs like [Meta’s] Mark Zuckerberg or [Microsoft’s] Satya Nadella talk about it, the metaverse is the future of the internet. Or it’s a video game. Or maybe it’s a deeply uncomfortable, worse version of Zoom/? It’s hard to say.”

When a PR firm contacted GlobeSt.com to ask if anyone was interested in “commercial leasing options in Decentraland’s (Metaverse) Tallest Multi-Use Tower, Crystal Tower,” the first reaction, frankly, was dismissiveness of more hype.

But it was the next sentence that settled into the brain and made some eventual sense: “Crystal Tower is in Crystal City, the newest destination in the metaverse, designed by the young, visionary architect Felipe Escudero of Estudio Felipe Escudero for LEDY, a leading metaverse developer.”

Crystal Tower, at 548 ft. in height “with iridescent crystal-shaped spears springing up and outward,” the “highest observation deck in the metaverse,” or designs that “defy gravity” and which could only offer what they do in a virtual—read imaginary—environment.

Forget about renting space, for a moment. Forget about what brands can do. Instead, consider the architect. Escudero’s site shows a number of his projects. Very interesting work, but while including some homes, offices, and industrial buildings, they seem at most maybe 10 stories tall. Not the work where a client would say, “Oh, it’s obvious he can do this massive building and complex.” Or that he’s capable of unique conceptual work that, if something exactly like this couldn’t exist in the real world, maybe he could find a truly unique expression.

Escudero clearly was paid to do this, but it’s a brilliant marketing choice for him. A chance to stretch his creative legs and get the world to pay attention to him and his firm.

And so, yes, 548 feet really does matter. A massive structure—one that Escudero has not created in the physical world, but that a digital exercise of his creative mind might convince a prospect to give him a chance in reality.

So, when looking at the concept of the metaverse, be skeptical, but remember to look at what might be happening beneath the surface.