Accelerating the Web3 Metaverse with Outlier Ventures

This week, Joe Petrowski (Technical Integrations Lead, Web3 Foundation) is joined by Jamie Burke, CEO, and founder of Outlier Ventures, an accelerator that supports the development and growth of emerging technologies, including Polkadot. They are currently running a Polkadot accelerator through their Base Camp program. Burke describes what he set out to achieve by founding Outlier Ventures in the context of the current internet where platforms are vulnerable to state capture and coercion and are biased against users. With these flaws in mind, the pair discuss the optimal Web3 tech stack with ‘sovereignty first’ as a core design principle and building a permissionless financial system in the context of the Metaverse. The conversation moves on to the Metaverse as a framework for the direction of Web3 where value and identity are transferred and owned by the user. They discuss how to navigate this realm in terms of technology, finance, and culture, and how this aggregate economy would enable a more open metaverse across lots of different use cases, from music to gaming, the creator economy, and more. Links Outlier Ventures’ website (https://outlierventures.io/) Polkadot Base Camp (https://outlierventures.io/base-camp/polkadot-base-camp/) The Open Metaverse OS (https://outlierventures.io/research/the-open-metaverse-os/) Age of Surveillance Capitalism (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Age_of_Surveillance_Capitalism), Shoshana Zuboff The Master Switch (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Wu#The_Master_Switch), Tim Wuh The Sovereign Individual: Mastering the Transition to the Information Age (1997, with James Dale Davidson) Highlights 00:57 Introduction to Outlier Ventures 07:00 User-centricity in Web3 and the Metaverse 11:55 Use cases of NFTs encourage blockchain adoption 18:00 Creating a Web3 Stack to enable a more open Metaverse 21:05 The success of NFTs in the gaming industry 28:40 Integrating into a digital economy to be part of the Metaverse 33:50 Introducing digital scarcity to digital assets = enabling property rights 38:10 Reworking economics primitives 41:25 Free markets, the sovereign individual and fluidity collectors 51:40 Commodification and financialization of data with blockchain technology 54:30 Data unions to empower individuals on Polkadot and Kusama 56:28 How can the Metaverse compete with physical nation-states? 1:05:00 Web3 stack for a better Metaverse user experience 1:10:00 Outlier Ventures support for the Polkadot ecosystem Special Guest: Jamie Burke.