The wider world · 113 / 129 · 2 min
A metaverse
A metaverse is a world on somebody's server. The item may be a token. The company can switch the server off.
The token can point at a room. It cannot keep the room open.
A worked case
Someone buys land in a world because the map looks scarce. The company changes the client, or stops paying the server. The token still points at the old room. The room is gone. The scarcity was a picture on their machine.
The room
Land, a skin, a concert. The picture is in their software. A token can point at it. The token does not keep the world running when they stop serving the client.
Who can close it
The company that runs the servers can change the rules, delist the item, or shut the door. A decentralised name on the homepage does not move the servers into your house.
Play-to-earn is the wage version of this. The world version fails the same way: the thing you bought needs their machine.
The land was a picture on their machine
Decentraland sells parcels as tokens and renders a world in a client. The token is a record. The streets, the gathering, the screen a visitor walks through: those are software somebody serves. A homepage can say the world belongs to the holders. The servers still belong to whoever pays them and whoever ships the client.
A company can sell the same dream without a token. Meta renamed itself and invited people into a horizon it operates. The invitation is a product. Switching the product off is a product decision. A token does not change that shape. It adds a resale market for the picture.
Name who runs the servers. Then ask what the token is worth on the day they stop. Play-to-earn is the wage version of the same question, and it is the course before this one.
Read it yourself
These links are the record. They are not a recommendation, and they are not instructions. A news story or a court paper can still be wrong about a detail. The check does not change because a famous name is in the story.
Apply the check
Open a question. The line is about this topic. It is not a verdict that anything is safe.
The company, from the sale and the fees.
The company that serves the world.
Their off switch. A token cannot veto a server.
Check yourself
Write it in your own words. The course's answer opens after that. Nothing is sent.
After this you can name who runs the servers, and what the token is worth if they switch them off.