Episode 15

full
Published on:

7th Mar 2022

15. Steam vs NFTs & The Metaverse, Pixelmon Fail, Decentraland Casino Poker

In this episode, we discuss Valve's Gabe Newell attacking both NFTs and the metaverse, fan disappointments surrounding the recent character reveals in the NFT game Pixelmon, casinos and Poker gaining popularity in Decentraland, and so much more!

Episode 15 Keywords: Valve, Gabe Newell, non-fungible tokens, NFTs, metaverse, NFT games, Pixelmon, casinos, poker, Decentraland

Transcript
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Welcome to the metaphysics podcast. The Metaverse and web three are bringing about the

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biggest revolution since the internet itself. With your hosts Paul the prophet Dawalibi And Jeff the

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juice Cohen. We will be bringing you the latest Metaverse, business news and insight into what it

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all means. The meta business podcast starts now.

Paul Dawalibi:

From the boardroom to the metaverse. This is the metal business podcast. I

Paul Dawalibi:

am Paul Dawalibi. I'm joined today by my friend coast. Jeff the juice Cohen, those of you who are

Paul Dawalibi:

new to the metal business podcast. Welcome. What we do here is we cover the most pressing,

Paul Dawalibi:

Metaverse, news and topics of the week. We look at all of it through a business and C suite lens, we

Paul Dawalibi:

dissect, we analyze the business implications of everything happening in this very exciting

Paul Dawalibi:

industry. If you're a regular listener, thank you guys for tuning in every week. This is episode 15.

Paul Dawalibi:

We have been getting so much good feedback from you guys really appreciated all the love the

Paul Dawalibi:

support, make sure to go subscribe to the podcast, whether it's on Spotify, or Apple podcasts or

Paul Dawalibi:

Google Play or wherever you get this content, hit the subscribe button, make sure you get notified

Paul Dawalibi:

when the new episodes drop. And leave a review. If you love the content. It helps other people to

Paul Dawalibi:

find the podcast. Jeff, how you doing this week?

Jeff Cohen:

I'm doing good. I'm doing good. We are recording a bit of an earlier time. So if you're

Jeff Cohen:

watching the video, you see the sunlight pouring my window here. We usually record a bit later on

Jeff Cohen:

between Paul's two other podcasts. And they were doing it earlier. Because we Yeah. So

Paul Dawalibi:

it's a nice change. We look good in this lighting. Right? So if you're listening to

Paul Dawalibi:

this great i We will I love that people listen to the show. But if you're watching it, you get the

Paul Dawalibi:

benefit of our handsome you know, faces with all this good natural light.

Jeff Cohen:

It is good. I also I went back, I have a rule where I rarely ever listened to any of our

Jeff Cohen:

content after we tape it, because I kind of feel like it will freaks me out to hear my voice and

Jeff Cohen:

then I like get in my own head. But I did go back and was listening to one of the episodes. And what

Jeff Cohen:

I realized is that when I interrupt people, it's really bad. So I'm going to generally as a general

Jeff Cohen:

rule, try to not do that. I didn't realize the audio makes it sound so bad. Not Not that it's

Jeff Cohen:

like bad for me personally, when I'm around people, it just sounds bad. From a technical

Jeff Cohen:

perspective, I know more jarring when it's when it's always good. But I guess when two people were

Jeff Cohen:

talking over each other, when you're in a room, it doesn't sound that bad. But when you're listening

Jeff Cohen:

to it back it like it really is bad. So I'm going to try to let you finish your thoughts.

Paul Dawalibi:

Well, I can tell you where almost none of these social norms matter. And we're

Paul Dawalibi:

almost none of this lighting. This good lighting matters is in the metaverse, and we have a lot to

Paul Dawalibi:

talk about the metaverse this week. I think we have to start with Gabe Newell. So, you know, for

Paul Dawalibi:

those who don't know, Gabe Newell, is the founder and CEO of valve valve makes produces like or is

Paul Dawalibi:

the creator of steam, which is probably the premier marketplace for PC gaming, right for

Paul Dawalibi:

people to buy PC games. They also created Half Life and Counter Strike and Dota right there. They

Paul Dawalibi:

also are a game development shop with some of the biggest titles in the world. And, and recently

Paul Dawalibi:

games been pretty outspoken. I'll bring this article up in a second here. But he's been

Paul Dawalibi:

outspoken because he's been out talking about their latest project, the steam deck, which is

Paul Dawalibi:

sort of like a portable, very portable gaming PC that has their Steam Marketplace at its core. And

Paul Dawalibi:

so he's been doing a lot of press. And I when you know when obviously when we saw this headline we

Paul Dawalibi:

figured we have to talk about this this little snippet. And so the headline here is valves. Gabe

Paul Dawalibi:

Newell takes a flame thrower to the metaverse and NF T's obviously very little inflammatory headline

Paul Dawalibi:

there. Don't mind the pun. But let me just read what what he said here about the metaverse and I'm

Paul Dawalibi:

gonna read his comments on blockchain and NF T's first here. He says the things that were being

Paul Dawalibi:

done, were super sketchy. And there was some illegal stuff that was going on behind the scenes.

Paul Dawalibi:

And you're just like, Yeah, this is bad. blockchains as a technology are a great

Paul Dawalibi:

technology, that the ways in which has been utilized are currently all pretty sketchy. And you

Paul Dawalibi:

sort of want to stay away from that. The people who are currently active in that space are not

Paul Dawalibi:

usually good actors. On the metaverse, Gabe said, there's a bunch of get rich quick schemes around

Paul Dawalibi:

metaverse. Most of the people who are talking about Metaverse have absolutely no idea what

Paul Dawalibi:

they're talking about. And they've apparently never played an MMO. They're like, Oh, you'll have

Paul Dawalibi:

this customizable avatar. And it's like, well go into like OSHA in Final Fantasy 14 And tell me

Paul Dawalibi:

this isn't the solve problem from a decade ago? Not some fabulous thing that Your note that you

Paul Dawalibi:

know, you're inventing. So very clear where Gabe Newell stands. I'll just summarize. I'm an NF T's

Paul Dawalibi:

in blockchain. It's all sketchy and bad actors. I'm paraphrasing. And on Metaverse, it's like,

Paul Dawalibi:

it's all been done before. This is just MMOs. You're not inventing anything. Game, obviously a

Paul Dawalibi:

very influential individual, Jeff, maybe unpack this for me a little bit in terms of your

Paul Dawalibi:

thoughts, and why you think Gabe might be making very, very strong statements like this?

Jeff Cohen:

Well, on the NFT piece, I mean, it's always dangerous to paint with such a broad brush

Jeff Cohen:

where you say, you know, everyone, it's a scam, or all these are scams. But, you know, he's not

Jeff Cohen:

wrong, that there is a lot of scams and a lot of frauds. And you know, there's one, our next story

Jeff Cohen:

will actually talk about that. So I'll do that. But yeah, I mean, we have seen a lot of these

Jeff Cohen:

things be kind of crummy games that are really just specular vehicles for people purchasing

Jeff Cohen:

digital assets that frankly, shouldn't be worth anything. I think most people in the space

Jeff Cohen:

honestly, besides the most hardcore web, three gaming fans will acknowledge that currently that

Jeff Cohen:

is the case. The hope, is that, as Gabe said, this technology has a ton of value. And there will be

Jeff Cohen:

games that are created that are actually good games that actually utilize the technology and the

Jeff Cohen:

rails to create, you know, fun experiences. And I do I think both of us do believe that sort of is

Jeff Cohen:

eventually where this is heading. That's my thoughts on NF t's on the metaverse. You know,

Jeff Cohen:

it's funny, I think, before we started this podcast, that was what he said was actually

Jeff Cohen:

something that I think I espouse a bunch of times on our live stream, which is like, how is the

Jeff Cohen:

metaverse different than an MMO? And I am curious to hear your thoughts because you told me I was

Jeff Cohen:

dead wrong every time I said that. But I kind of still feel like

Paul Dawalibi:

you're dead wrong.

Jeff Cohen:

I kind of feel like that is the case. Um, you know, having said that we obviously on

Jeff Cohen:

this podcast are bullish on the metaverse. I think if we weren't, it would be pretty silly for us to

Jeff Cohen:

be doing a weekly podcast on the business side of the metaverse if we were not bullish on where this

Jeff Cohen:

was all headed. But yeah, I'm curious your thoughts?

Paul Dawalibi:

Yeah, I mean, on the blockchain and NFT stuff. I'm surprised at the statement he made

Paul Dawalibi:

just because like you said, it's a very broad brush to be using, right? Like, there's no doubt

Paul Dawalibi:

and you could give him all the benefit of the doubt here and say 95% are scammers. And I don't

Paul Dawalibi:

think that's the case. But you know what I mean? If I'm, if I'm giving him total benefit, that

Paul Dawalibi:

that's still not reason to come out and say, you know, these, this is why I want to stay away from

Paul Dawalibi:

it, right? Because if you understand it, and you're a smart guy like Gabe Newell, you should be

Paul Dawalibi:

able to navigate around the 95% that are now I understand, though, why he has to take this

Paul Dawalibi:

stance, I think there's too much at risk with steam. It takes one horrible scam on Steam, right

Paul Dawalibi:

that that takes advantage of Steam users. And and it puts his whole business at risk, right? Like

Paul Dawalibi:

if, if you don't have trust in the platform you're using to get your games to trade in game items.

Paul Dawalibi:

You don't really have a business if you're game new. All right, steam is the core of their

Paul Dawalibi:

business more than anything else. And so I understand why he's really playing as risk averse

Paul Dawalibi:

as possible here. And I understand why steam has blocked any blockchain based games from their

Paul Dawalibi:

platform, right? They've actively said, We don't want this here. Because I do you think the

Paul Dawalibi:

reputational and platform risk is too high? Now we can we can argue around what percentage of these

Paul Dawalibi:

projects are scams or not. In my view, if I'm him, it only takes one to ruin the whole thing for him

Paul Dawalibi:

or to cause pretty tremendous damage to his business. At a time when you're launching

Paul Dawalibi:

something new. That's not what you want to be doing. Right. So I think it's serves his purpose

Paul Dawalibi:

to be anti blockchain based games and anti NF T's in the moment. Fair.

Jeff Cohen:

I think the last part is interesting. I mean, I want to kind of juxtapose that position

Jeff Cohen:

with what we've seen from Tim Sweeney, who sort of although I think at times he has been very bearish

Jeff Cohen:

on on crypto gaming and kind of, probably in his heart of hearts feels very similar to Gabe Newell,

Jeff Cohen:

they are epic have been much more open to it. Is this an opening? Now if we both are fairly bullish

Jeff Cohen:

on the future of web through gaming, and think that, you know, maybe I'm putting words in your

Jeff Cohen:

mouth? So if that's not the case, let me know. But you know, we're pretty bullish on this blockchain

Jeff Cohen:

gaming phenomenon. If we were to believe that these this is one of if not the future of gaming,

Jeff Cohen:

where does that leave steam if you are now the dominant launcher, the dominant marketplace to buy

Jeff Cohen:

PC games, web three, gaming is largely almost entirely done on PC because mobile and console are

Jeff Cohen:

closed ecosystem so it's pretty much all being done on PC. Have you left a massive flank open? If

Jeff Cohen:

you're Gabe Newell, where there is a very real world where someone else becomes the steam of web

Jeff Cohen:

through gaming? And is it? Is it epic? Is it discord even though they've kind of distanced

Jeff Cohen:

themselves? I think very foolishly from web three. Because a lot of the community building is

Jeff Cohen:

happening on Discord. I think they would be the number one beneficiary if they were to create a

Jeff Cohen:

launcher, which, ironically, is something they tried to do for traditional gaming. Whereas they

Jeff Cohen:

probably could have done it for web through gaming. That's where all these things are being

Jeff Cohen:

built anyway. What do you think like it has? Is this a strategic blunder for Gabe Newell?

Paul Dawalibi:

No, I don't think so. And I'm pretty, like my feelings on this are pretty

Paul Dawalibi:

strong. I'm not like on the fence on this. And the reason is, there aren't any good web three games,

Paul Dawalibi:

right? There aren't any good blockchain based games, there aren't any good place to earn games,

Paul Dawalibi:

it doesn't exist. And so like, while you might look at this and go, strategic blunder, they're

Paul Dawalibi:

gonna you know, they're gonna lose, you know, the epics gonna sort of ride into the distance and be

Paul Dawalibi:

the only player here. The reality is pretty much everything that's out there right now is is

Paul Dawalibi:

garbage. And so, you know, yes, epic will get a lot of garbage that steam won't get. But that's

Paul Dawalibi:

not going to move the needle for Epic and I don't think it hurts steam. I think in the long run

Paul Dawalibi:

where you are correct. I am very bullish on web three gaming. But not short term bullish on web

Paul Dawalibi:

three gaming, because I don't think anyone has cracked the nut of what utility does blockchain or

Paul Dawalibi:

NF TS or any of these things, any of these technologies? What utility does it bring to

Paul Dawalibi:

gamers? And how does it improve the gaming experience?

Jeff Cohen:

I mean, I 100% agree with that. But having said that, it doesn't. Even though a lot of

Jeff Cohen:

it is crap. Currently, all of these games are not great. Don't you think by not having any of them

Jeff Cohen:

are being so outright, you know, against it, you sort of lose your your first mover advantage,

Jeff Cohen:

whereas if steam was allowing these games on there, even though a lot of them aren't good,

Jeff Cohen:

right now, once the one that was good, it's gonna be on steams platform, right? Like when mobile

Jeff Cohen:

first came out, the games were terrible. But Apple didn't say, Oh, well, you can't do it on Apple.

Jeff Cohen:

Like you have to go to Android to build games, like gaming on phones. Isn't that great? Like they

Paul Dawalibi:

do curate, though Apple does curate, right, they do a lot of like, Chinese

Paul Dawalibi:

garbage that maybe they don't need. It's a good point, Jeff, I'm not I'm not like discounting the

Paul Dawalibi:

point entirely. I just think the day someone figures out how to make a great blockchain based

Paul Dawalibi:

game, right? Those developers are not gonna not want to be on Steam, right? It's not like they're

Paul Dawalibi:

gonna be like, Oh, you guys shunned us for two years. We don't want to be there. Everyone's like,

Paul Dawalibi:

steam will always have a large audience. Like that's not going anywhere. And a very loyal

Paul Dawalibi:

audience, that's not going anywhere, I think, gave my guests if I'm in his shoes, when there are good

Paul Dawalibi:

games that people actually want to play. And I know they're not scams, and they know they're not

Paul Dawalibi:

garbage. You know, that's when I open the floodgates sort of thing and let them in.

Jeff Cohen:

So I see what you're saying. And I, you know, maybe you are correct, that steam is

Jeff Cohen:

just such a behemoth that once a game gets popular, people will want it on Steam. But by that

Jeff Cohen:

logic, wouldn't once the game is popular, and it has a player base on whatever platform this ends

Jeff Cohen:

up being whether it's epic, whether it's some new platform, whether discord, what incentive then

Jeff Cohen:

like, let's say a game builds up 20 million users, and it's really good. Is it too late? Like, what

Jeff Cohen:

is Steve's? Oh, no, now we want you ever remove your player base over

Paul Dawalibi:

five? Like, what's the downside? You miss what you miss out on one game? Right?

Paul Dawalibi:

That's the that's the the total downside, you miss maybe one. And even then, like, you know, Apex

Paul Dawalibi:

legends wasn't on steam in the beginning. It launched on on Steam later. Right. And I know that

Paul Dawalibi:

almost everyone I know plays it on Steam now. Right? Has it through Steam launches it through

Paul Dawalibi:

Steam, even though for I would say at least a year, it was only available through origin.

Jeff Cohen:

What about the scenario and I think this is probably the bigger risk. We had to

Jeff Cohen:

remember the origins of steam, right, like Steam basically built steam off the back of I guess it

Jeff Cohen:

was half right. So what it founders Yeah. Dota you know, what if this whoever whatever company comes

Jeff Cohen:

up with this, you know, first real big, really good blockchain game becomes steam because they

Jeff Cohen:

open it up, say, Hey, we're now a platform COMM And you know, this is not something that people

Jeff Cohen:

aren't trying to do look at what dapper Labs is done. Look at polygon Talana. All these

Jeff Cohen:

blockchains are basically trying to create a network where they become the steam of these

Jeff Cohen:

games. And what if one of them creates such a good user experience? Because I think we can

Jeff Cohen:

acknowledge there is going to be different onboarding different wallets. Like if you're going

Jeff Cohen:

to create the steam of web three, you're going to need To do that intentionally, you can't just wait

Jeff Cohen:

until it's already created and be like, we're steam come to us now come to us now, you need to

Jeff Cohen:

like build the product

Paul Dawalibi:

there. But it's, it's a lot easier for steam to add a little bit of functionality

Paul Dawalibi:

than for someone to go create a whole new steam. Like, I think any of those players that are

Paul Dawalibi:

looking to create their own platforms just have to look at Epic Games, and how many hundreds of

Paul Dawalibi:

millions they've, they've burned. Right? They've literally torched trying to have a relevant Games

Paul Dawalibi:

platform. I think people overestimate like the how easy it is to just start a new games platform,

Paul Dawalibi:

right? And they, they they underestimate how sticky steam actually is, I think people massively

Paul Dawalibi:

underestimate steams market power. And and I don't think that's going away anytime soon. Like, it

Paul Dawalibi:

sounds easy. We'll just create our own platform, our own launcher, people like, look epic had

Paul Dawalibi:

fortnight, I don't think there's gonna be any blockchain based game in any foreseeable future

Paul Dawalibi:

that is bigger than fortnight. And they're still struggling to create a platform that has any value

Paul Dawalibi:

or any stickiness or any kind of traction.

Jeff Cohen:

The only thing I would say, I guess, before we move on, I think we've covered this

Jeff Cohen:

topic pretty well that we've talked many times about how the audience the future audience for

Jeff Cohen:

these blockchain games is probably a bit different, particularly at the start from who's

Jeff Cohen:

playing current games. So that portends to say like, the dominant platform for web through gaming

Jeff Cohen:

probably will be a native platform, it won't necessarily be steam, it's not the same customers.

Jeff Cohen:

That's the only way,

Paul Dawalibi:

maybe, but if web three gaming wants to be successful, they will have to figure

Paul Dawalibi:

out how to bring in traditional gamers. They like they can't just ignore that audience. There's just

Paul Dawalibi:

and this is, I think, a mistake, everyone in the play to earn space makes where everyone just like,

Paul Dawalibi:

thinks we can we can sort of be totally condescending with gamers like Oh, you guys don't

Paul Dawalibi:

get it right. Like, you just don't understand how this is so great. Like, No, you need those people

Paul Dawalibi:

to play your game. And if like, if they're not playing it, or they don't care about it, maybe

Paul Dawalibi:

they should be asking why not telling them you don't understand it. So like, again, I think under

Paul Dawalibi:

estimating how difficult some of these things are. On games, the

Jeff Cohen:

story or the story might highlight why.

Paul Dawalibi:

Well, the next story is a good one. I mean, and backs up you know gives Gabe a little

Paul Dawalibi:

bit of air cover at least in his own ideas. And the headline here is NF T game pixelmon stirs

Paul Dawalibi:

controversy for under delivering on promises. It says social media users are mocking the pixelmon,

Paul Dawalibi:

the well funded NFT adventure game based on an early look at the game's visual visuals, it was

Paul Dawalibi:

pitched as the first triple A quality game of the NFT space, a play to earn open world RPG where

Paul Dawalibi:

instead of catching them all, which is a nod to Pokemon players purchase NFT pixel mon for

Paul Dawalibi:

extraordinary prices. So they their NFT sales went live. Now pixel mon purchases are able to view the

Paul Dawalibi:

actual pixel mon they've purchased. And a lot of people are unhappy. Now unfortunately, if you're

Paul Dawalibi:

listening to this podcast, you can't see this. I mean, you guys can look this up. You know, here's

Paul Dawalibi:

a little on the left a little bit of what was promised on the right, I will describe it for

Paul Dawalibi:

those of you who are listening to this. It's nowhere near call it their visual fidelity, it

Paul Dawalibi:

looks like something you know, my four year old nephew could draw. And it goes on and on. I mean,

Paul Dawalibi:

some of this art is just God awful and not god awful. Like in a purposeful way. You know, some of

Paul Dawalibi:

some of these NF T's are, you know, bitmapped art meant to look like sort of old style gaming. This

Paul Dawalibi:

is just downright bad and ugly and nothing but hot garbage here. And so pixelmon just to finish the

Paul Dawalibi:

story here pixel mon raised 75 million right, Jeff? Yeah. In sales of the of this art, I guess

Paul Dawalibi:

of this of these NF T's? Is this not the poster child for everything that's wrong with NFT games

Paul Dawalibi:

are played around games. Is that is that your view on this, Jeff?

Jeff Cohen:

I think it is. I mean, it shows everything. That's probably every problem with the

Jeff Cohen:

current ecosystem that I think people like a newer pointing out. I mean, it is a perverse system,

Jeff Cohen:

where you don't even have to create the game, and you sell items to something that doesn't exist

Jeff Cohen:

yet. Like it's just not the typical way. Our games are financed. Typically, you have to come up with

Jeff Cohen:

a pitch. You go to someone to finance the game, you sell a piece of your company, so you're so

Jeff Cohen:

equity in the company, and then you build the game. And once you build the game, you then show

Jeff Cohen:

it to gamers and say, Hey gamers, here's my game, do you want to play it? And then if they like it

Jeff Cohen:

They will buy it from you or better yet, it's free to play, they start playing it. And then if you

Jeff Cohen:

earn their, you know, engagement, they will then spend money. That's sort of the way the games

Jeff Cohen:

industry has worked forever. Now, it's this bizarre system, where you put out a white paper

Jeff Cohen:

saying, Hey, we're going to create Pokemon, but you get to own the Pokemon, basically. And people

Jeff Cohen:

give you $75 million for something that they don't even have a line of code yet they have someone

Jeff Cohen:

spent three days putting together a white paper, and this got hyped all over the internet, it it is

Jeff Cohen:

really problematic. There's a whole other angle to this where it's like, I don't know how these

Jeff Cohen:

aren't security sales. And this isn't an expertise of either of ours. So it's probably not even worth

Jeff Cohen:

getting into. But how are you not selling? You know, a security here where it's basically you're

Jeff Cohen:

selling an asset where people are hoping it's going up in value? We're talking massive dollars

Jeff Cohen:

like this is going to get regulated? Very quickly. I imagine this what do you see scams at this

Jeff Cohen:

level? The government's going to get it reminds

Paul Dawalibi:

me a little bit of the early days of like crowdfunding in the startup world where

Paul Dawalibi:

there was a bunch of scams and then the government you know, really cracked down put a bunch of

Paul Dawalibi:

regulation around it. I wouldn't be I also wouldn't be surprised. To me though, this is

Paul Dawalibi:

interesting, because and I'm leaving, I'm leaving these pictures up because they're just so bad.

Paul Dawalibi:

They're funny, they make me smile. I have to believe this is not the bad go tying this to our

Paul Dawalibi:

previous conversation. This is not gamers buying these. I don't think anyone who bought into this

Paul Dawalibi:

are actually gamers because in the gaming community, right, one of the big trends over the

Paul Dawalibi:

last few years is this massive backlash against game pre orders, right? Many, many gamers have

Paul Dawalibi:

been burned. Like if you were the person that pre ordered cyberpunk 2077 right not only did you wait

Paul Dawalibi:

like four years for your for the game to finally be delivered after you pre ordered, but like then

Paul Dawalibi:

the game you actually got was nothing like what was promised. And and a lot of people got pissed

Paul Dawalibi:

off. And there is this general sense in the gaming community that you should not preorder a game

Paul Dawalibi:

right battlefield had this, like any game that launched badly, there's always this like, never

Paul Dawalibi:

preorder a game. So I refuse to believe this was gamers that bought into this. This is like crypto

Paul Dawalibi:

speculator kind of, you know, this this crypto speculator crowd. And and I would bet that that

Paul Dawalibi:

group couldn't care less or didn't take any time to even care what this game was all about. Right?

Paul Dawalibi:

And and this is everything that's wrong about the intersection of gaming and crypto and NF T's. And

Paul Dawalibi:

this is why I tend to take Gabe Newell side because I think most of the blockchain based

Paul Dawalibi:

gaming industry could not care less about the game they're making. And we are nowhere close, we're

Paul Dawalibi:

not in the same universe as anyone being close to building a building a triple A quality game of the

Paul Dawalibi:

NFT space, as they're quoted as saying here.

Jeff Cohen:

I mean, 100% agree. It's, it's a bad look for the space.

Paul Dawalibi:

It's a bad look. And again, why I think I'm spectacularly right on my views on Play

Paul Dawalibi:

to earn, that we're nowhere near any kind of breakthrough and that I fundamentally think some

Paul Dawalibi:

of those principles are at odds with what makes a good game. And, you know, let me just add one

Paul Dawalibi:

extra layer to this because I think it's a cautionary tale. But it's also like if we're gonna

Paul Dawalibi:

succeed as an industry, we have to recognize where there are weaknesses. I think part of the problem

Paul Dawalibi:

with the blockchain based gaming space with the NFT space, is you have people with virtually no

Paul Dawalibi:

experience, no business experience whatsoever, promoting projects, getting involved with

Paul Dawalibi:

projects, pretending to be experts, when they have no clue I've never run a business in their lives

Paul Dawalibi:

and never built anything in their lives. They spend a lot of time talking on Twitter and things

Paul Dawalibi:

like that. And, and are at the core I think of what's rotten about what's going on here and are

Paul Dawalibi:

at the core of these kinds of projects. And

Jeff Cohen:

was that was that a shot at me? You know, my Twitter at Jeff Cohen? Juice Cohen I only

Jeff Cohen:

have 300 followers, I know over 1000 of you listen to this so you should be following me every

Jeff Cohen:

episode now and I know that you were just talking talking crap about

Paul Dawalibi:

No, but I think we need to root these people out like it's just because you put an

Paul Dawalibi:

NFT in your Twitter bio and and claim you're an expert, right? Like the these kinds of people

Paul Dawalibi:

getting involved with projects like this who've never been successful in any kind of business

Paul Dawalibi:

endeavor are the same scammers who are pulling things off like this and and this will turn off

Paul Dawalibi:

the gaming community forever. And I think if blockchain based games lose the traditional gaming

Paul Dawalibi:

community, there's no coming back from this right I think a few more big failures that look and feel

Paul Dawalibi:

like this, and they will never get them and play to earn is totally dead. The water in my opinion.

Paul Dawalibi:

Let's move on. I really liked the story. Jeff, you sent it to me. And and it's all about the

Paul Dawalibi:

intersection of the metaverse and poker. And the headline here is the metaverse finally has a

Paul Dawalibi:

killer app poker. And before I read the rest of this or at least introduce the rest of No, we

Paul Dawalibi:

always talk about how the metaverse has a little bit of a software problem, right. But the

Paul Dawalibi:

different worlds aren't interconnected. There's no standards. But I think one of the conversations

Paul Dawalibi:

we've had, at least on the edges are, are about like, where's the killer app for the metaverse,

Paul Dawalibi:

right? What's the reason that Grandma's gonna buy a VR headset and spend, you know, half of her day

Paul Dawalibi:

there. And so this, this headline was very eye catching to me, when they say poker is the killer

Paul Dawalibi:

app for the metaphors. And the sub headline here says decentraland is is buoyed by casinos, where

Paul Dawalibi:

players gamble for a chance at crypto wealth. So they're talking about decentraland In this

Paul Dawalibi:

article, and as it turns out, the place that people most frequently visit in decentraland is

Paul Dawalibi:

the casino. So people are dressed in their avatars, obviously, they're sitting around you

Paul Dawalibi:

know, poker table, it says graphics that would have looked cutting edge two decades ago on the

Paul Dawalibi:

PlayStation two so that, you know, maybe not the best graphics. But you you play it says guests

Paul Dawalibi:

must buy or borrow a piece of virtual swag sold by the casino that can later be sold for

Paul Dawalibi:

cryptocurrency. And the poker chips can be used to upgrade the items and boost their value. So

Paul Dawalibi:

they're not trading in dollars here. And you know, that's not what's being gambled in the casino.

Paul Dawalibi:

It's essentially, crypto or NF T's fundamentally. What's interesting. The other last thing before I

Paul Dawalibi:

open this to you here for your thoughts? Is they mentioned Hang on. Oh, yeah, they mentioned that

Paul Dawalibi:

decentraland Only permits gambling, for those who live in a real world location where it's legal,

Paul Dawalibi:

according to the apps Terms of Service. And I thought that was interesting, you know, especially

Paul Dawalibi:

given your expertise in the online gaming gambling space. But what do you make of poker in

Paul Dawalibi:

decentraland? And sort of, does this a loophole is this, you know, how are you thinking about

Jeff Cohen:

it? I have a lot of thoughts here. I'm trying to figure out how which which direction to

Jeff Cohen:

go in. I mean, it's, it's it's a very interesting story. I mean, I feel like this whole episode,

Jeff Cohen:

I've been the regulatory doomsday err, this is going to this is going to get regulated right? If

Jeff Cohen:

you I do appreciate the fact that there are only allowing people to bet in locations where they

Jeff Cohen:

currently were betting is legal. However, in order to take bets in these jurisdictions, you need a

Jeff Cohen:

gambling license. I didn't I don't know if they have a gambling license. Maybe they do. Maybe they

Jeff Cohen:

don't. I suspect they don't. So you can't just even if you're in quote unquote, the metaverse,

Jeff Cohen:

you still, you know, as of today have to follow the laws of society of, you know, countries that

Jeff Cohen:

you're you're physically located in. So I do think that that is going to be problematic. However, I

Jeff Cohen:

think it is a pretty good killer use case our killer app for the metaverse and I so as everyone

Jeff Cohen:

here knows that I work at a company called esports Entertainment Group where licensed online gambling

Jeff Cohen:

company, I've had a lot of people in this crypto web three space approached me about kind of

Jeff Cohen:

different collaborations with with metta versus and I I think it's really interesting I do I worry

Jeff Cohen:

about kind of what I just said about regulation. But But it's interesting because you go to a

Jeff Cohen:

casino there is a very social aspect, particularly when you're talking about poker table games like

Jeff Cohen:

there. There's something about being in a casino having presents going with friends sitting down at

Jeff Cohen:

a blackjack table and like winning with the table. You don't get that when you're on an online, you

Jeff Cohen:

know, just are in a typical app, particularly blackjack. Like there is a massive element. You

Jeff Cohen:

know, same thing with craps. I don't know if this is gonna just craps but like, the whole point of

Jeff Cohen:

the game as you're sort of playing with the others. So it's very social. So I do think it's

Jeff Cohen:

it's a interesting use case of the metaverse technology. And I'm not surprised that this is one

Jeff Cohen:

of the more popular Metaverse is within, I guess, decentraland Or I guess what do they call it? Like

Jeff Cohen:

apps rooms within decentraland. But it'll be interesting to see what happens. I think you're

Jeff Cohen:

going to see a lot of these things getting shut down and people go into prison, frankly, but you

Jeff Cohen:

know, it's a good use case and someone will probably figure it out legally. I suspect that

Jeff Cohen:

these people are not necessarily doing it by the letter of

Paul Dawalibi:

law. Look, I agree with you that regulation will be will come no question, but I

Paul Dawalibi:

think it's coming for different reasons but You know, the the reason I think regulation will come

Paul Dawalibi:

and come quickly is, and this happened in gaming, there were a bunch of sites in the gaming world

Paul Dawalibi:

that popped up where you could gamble, not with dollars, but with items from like, weapon skins

Paul Dawalibi:

from Counter Strike, for example, right. So what what today we would call an NFT. Back then was

Paul Dawalibi:

just a weapon skin. But what it did was it sort of disconnected sort of the gambling from real money.

Paul Dawalibi:

And the regulators made the case that this encourages gambling, especially among minors who

Paul Dawalibi:

don't realize that this is gambling, because it's just a weapon skin, or it's just this or it's just

Paul Dawalibi:

that right here, because they're not dealing in any kind of currency. Because they're dealing with

Paul Dawalibi:

essentially a virtual item, I have a funny feeling regulators will come in and make the same case and

Paul Dawalibi:

say, you know that you're going to create a generation of gamblers with this, because they

Paul Dawalibi:

don't realize this is connected to real money. And that messes with people's psychology, and it makes

Paul Dawalibi:

it more dangerous. So for that reason, I think this gets regulated. What I don't like about that,

Paul Dawalibi:

though, is shouldn't be ideal capital T capital M, the metaverse that we talked about, be more like

Paul Dawalibi:

international waters than anything else. Like Shouldn't it be, like a an alternate reality that

Paul Dawalibi:

is not bound by, you know, whether I'm sitting in New Jersey, or whether I'm sitting in Nevada, or

Paul Dawalibi:

in you know, or in a place like New York, or you know what I mean? Like, why, why are we bound by

Paul Dawalibi:

the player's physical location when we're saying we're trying to build a virtual alternate reality?

Paul Dawalibi:

That to me is weird, right, like and seems completely counter to everything. So Metaverse

Paul Dawalibi:

should stand for

Jeff Cohen:

you are absolutely correct. From a theoretical perspective, again, preface neither of

Jeff Cohen:

us are lawyers, but this is definitely an area of law that that has been tried many times, because

Jeff Cohen:

this is exactly actually something that online casinos have talked about a lot. One of the

Jeff Cohen:

things, one of the loopholes that sometimes they've tried to use is while the servers, so what

Jeff Cohen:

physically like, you know, like the servers for the casino are in either Indian Territory, or

Jeff Cohen:

they're in, you know, I Antigua or something like that, like, oh, so it should be legal because

Jeff Cohen:

that's where the gambling is taking place, quote, unquote. The government doesn't agree with that

Jeff Cohen:

there was something called the Wire Act, like many, many years ago that basically said, No,

Jeff Cohen:

that's not the case. Um, yeah, so I'm not gonna get into legal. Metaverse should have its own laws

Jeff Cohen:

and its own government, but we're not quite there yet. We're not there yet. And when we never get

Jeff Cohen:

there to run for president, profit will be the president of the metaverse. metaverse.

Paul Dawalibi:

If it's if it's by, you know, unanimous, what is it by a claim? I think we'll

Paul Dawalibi:

get there otherwise, I don't know. But if it's by acclamation, most definitely, no. I mean, it's,

Paul Dawalibi:

it's an interesting conversation to have. And there's like what we all want, that you have to

Paul Dawalibi:

balance with also the risks of what we all want, because there's definite risks of making it like

Paul Dawalibi:

just, you know, international watered version, like a digital version of international waters

Paul Dawalibi:

where anything goes that that I think, brings a whole host of other problems. The problem is,

Paul Dawalibi:

like, I the benefits gets smaller and smaller, the more you centralize, and the more you regularly

Paul Dawalibi:

regulate, right, like the ambition and the scope gets smaller and smaller as as you put sort of

Paul Dawalibi:

boundaries around it. And I think that's the frustration and where the balance point between

Paul Dawalibi:

boundary and what's allowed is will will be sorted the interesting conversation that wraps up this

Paul Dawalibi:

week's podcast, Jeff, I mean, always time flies here, and

Jeff Cohen:

we would even get to ELBs really important really cool story about Metaverse,

Jeff Cohen:

elves. We'll do it next time. Don't worry.

Paul Dawalibi:

This is going to become what is it the Jimmy Kimmel and the whether it's Matt Damon,

Paul Dawalibi:

you know where every, every every Jeff wants to do this elf story in the metaverse elf stories of if

Paul Dawalibi:

you want to hear it, too, I Nix it every single week. I veto it every single week. If you really

Paul Dawalibi:

want to hear the metaverse health story, make sure to follow at Jeff Cohen 23 and tell him about it.

Paul Dawalibi:

And I may still veto it, but definitely go tell us about it. And as always guys, like I said

Paul Dawalibi:

subscribe, wherever you get this podcast, make sure to hit that follow or Subscribe button. Also

Paul Dawalibi:

leave a review it helps others to find the podcast. And as always, we will see you guys next

Paul Dawalibi:

week.

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About the Podcast

META Business
From the metaverse to the boardroom...
Meta Business tackles the most important Metaverse industry news. Business experts dissect and discuss all of the hottest topics and happenings, from a unique C-suite perspective.

About your host

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Paul Dawalibi