Metaverse News

The Sandbox, a decentralized virtual world subsidiary of Animoca Brands, has partnered with Banijay Brands to create metaverse spinoffs of two popular TV series: ‘Peaky Blinders’ and ‘Black Mirror.’

The Sandbox will offer a full range of NFTs and avatars for Black Mirror’s integration, while Peaky Blinders’ features will include fetch quests, secret routes, exploration, and community fan gatherings.

According to Sebastien Borget, The Sandbox’s COO and Co-Founder, “The Peaky Blinders’ entrance into The Sandbox offers fans and users the chance to become characters in the world they love. Becoming a member of the Peaky Blinders in this way is something fans have never been able to experience before.”

The Sandbox is introducing two new experiences for fans to immerse themselves in the worlds of Peaky Blinders and Black Mirror. The Peaky Blinders experience will offer a fresh perspective on the gritty drama, allowing users to explore loyalty, ambition, courage, and survival themes over multiple seasons.

The Black Mirror experiences, on the other hand, will allow fans to step into the shoes of different characters within the dystopian universe inspired by the iconic TV series. Each experience will focus on a main theme or character from a Black Mirror episode, enabling users to unlock exciting new areas, make new connections, and explore the world of Black Mirror on a deeper level.

“Black Mirror has become a cult classic in the pop culture landscape with its creative storylines and jaw-dropping endings,” Borget said.

Banijay Brands is the commercial and branding arm of Banijay, a renowned media and entertainment company. It manages a variety of global ancillary rights for renowned brands like Peaky Blinders and Black Mirror, which Banijay Rights distribute.

The Sandbox describes its user experience as a combination of virtual real estate and amusement park. The company aims to create a metaverse where digital spaces are continuously shared, and heroes from various worlds come together to make magic. The Sandbox has partnered with over 400 organizations, including Adidas, Atari, Care Bears, The Smurfs, The Walking Dead, and Warner Music Group.

Luxury fashion brand Gucci has launched its archive exhibition in London on The Sandbox virtual game, creating Gucci Cosmos Land. The digital experience provides visitors an interactive journey through decades of Gucci’s history and iconic designs. The company announced this new venture on Wednesday.

“Gucci Cosmos Land is a new way for fashion and history lovers alike to access the iconic London-based exhibition from anywhere in the world,” said COO and co-founder of The Sandbox Sebastien Borget, adding: “It will allow visitors to immerse themselves into Gucci’s past, present, and future.”

The Gucci Cosmos Land was originally envisioned by artist Es Devlin and curated with archival Gucci designs by Maria Luisa Frisa. It is a virtual experience that takes users on a journey through Gucci’s creative legacy, showcasing their designs from different decades and themes.

This metaverse activation pays homage to Gucci’s origins and continued innovation since being founded in 1921.

Players can explore Gucci’s values, inspirations, and creativity by parkouring across various worlds and discovering archival designs, some of which have never been displayed before.

The Sandbox is a metaverse game that operates on the Ethereum blockchain network. Players can purchase virtual land using NFTs and create their own games and experiences.

The game can be played for free without buying tokenized items, and it has partnered with various brands and celebrities, including McDonald’s, Adidas, Ubisoft, Snoop Dogg, Warner Music Group, and The Walking Dead.

Gucci has been involved in the metaverse space for some time now. The luxury fashion house launched its Gucci Vault experience in The Sandbox in 2022. It more recently showcased its Milan Fashion Week event across various metaverse platforms, including Roblox, South Korea’s Zepeto, and China’s QQ.

During the last quarter, Meta incurred a massive loss of $3.7 billion while trying to develop the metaverse in its Reality Labs division.

In the financial report for the third quarter, Reality Labs, the mixed reality department that previously housed Oculus, suffered an operating loss of $3.74 billion during the quarter. This loss represents an increase from the $2.63 billion loss incurred in the same period in 2022.

The struggling division has accumulated losses of $11.4 billion during the current fiscal year while only generating $825 million in revenue. The revenue for Q3 alone amounted to $210 million, which is a 20% decline year-over-year. Meta attributed the drop in revenue to lower sales of Quest 2.

In this regard, Meta’s CFO, Susan Li, stated that the company expects to experience significantly higher losses year-over-year due to its ongoing efforts in product development for augmented reality/virtual reality and investments made to scale its ecosystem. She explained that most of the costs incurred by Reality Labs are direct expenses in operating costs, product cost of goods sold, and headcount.

Li mentioned that although Meta will continue investing in the division to support the development of next-generation VR/AR products, the company understands that it must earn the ability to invest by delivering consolidated income growth over time. She emphasized that Meta is entirely focused on achieving this goal.

During Q3, Meta had over 66,100 employees, down 7% from the previous quarter, due to its ongoing restructuring plan. Over 20,000 jobs will be cut.

“Our third quarter headcount no longer included the substantial majority of the employees impacted by the previously announced layoffs,” she explained.

When asked about the health of Reality Labs a few months ago, Zuckerberg admitted that there may be some investor “discomfort” as Meta aims to dominate the mixed reality market. He described the company’s continued investment as a “very long-term bet.”

Northlands College, which already has physical campuses in La Ronge, Creighton, Air Ronge, and Buffalo Narrows, has recently launched the Northlands College Metaverse Campus.

Northlands is among the few colleges in Canada to establish a full campus presence in the metaverse.

The college’s foray into the metaverse is considered a remarkable accomplishment, beginning a new phase of digital learning, enabling it to push the boundaries of education and technology integration across Northern Saskatchewan.

The initiative is part of Northlands College’s Year of Transformation in 2023, according to Karsten Henriksen, the President and CEO of the college.

Henriksen said: “That Year of Transformation is really about where we are going as Northern Saskatchewan’s post-secondary institution. Northland College is demonstrating leadership on a national level and I think it’s high time that northern residents are proud of the innovation that happens in northern and rural remote communities, not only in northern Saskatchewan but from coast to coast to coast.”

A Metaverse Campus is a web3-based platform that enables the faculty and students to hold online meetings.

The metaverse-based platform aims to connect learners, faculty and staff in Northern Saskatchewan and facilitate access to the college’s education and services regardless of their real-time location.

The new campus environment offers students the flexibility to attend recorded virtual lectures at their own convenience. This allows learners from different time zones or those who are working to follow experiential and “in-person” lectures on their own time.

The metaverse campus is designed to deliver on core principles, including community, the application of cutting-edge technology to support academics and innovative learning experiences. Northlands College considers these principles to be fundamental in line with its vision for achieving its digital transformation.

According to Henriksen, the metaverse will not only serve students but also help staff spread across the north.