Even as the global economy is facing unprecedented levels of uncertainty, Ethereum — the second-largest blockchain project in the cryptoeconomy — has never been more vital and promising.
To be sure, the biggest sectors driving Ethereum’s recent ascension has been the arenas of decentralized finance, or DeFi, and stablecoins, which collectively just reached a new all-time high market cap of $8 billion USD atop Ethereum.
Yet for as promising as DeFi and stablecoins are, they’ve also generally overshadowed the promising progress of some other Ethereum projects in recent weeks. In my humble opinion as a crypto analyst, one of the space’s most underestimated projects to date is Cryptovoxels, a virtual world built on Ethereum that’s seen explosive growth as of late.
It’s not even that I think Cryptovoxels is a guaranteed blockbuster over the long-term, per se. Rather, I think the virtual world has all the makings for a project that could be much bigger later, and in that sense, the great traction it’s already made makes it something of a blockbuster hit already.
In the very least, then, the project is teeming now and points toward a teeming virtual world ecosystem atop Ethereum in the years ahead. For those interested in learning more, let’s dive a further into CV!
What Is Cryptovoxels?
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Simply put, Cryptovoxels is a virtual reality (VR) world built on Ethereum. In short, the project allows you to buy and sell virtual properties and other digital assets in the CV world.
Yet the Minecraft-like CV is definitely more than just the sum of its parts. The project is part real estate, part VR, part hyper-digitization, and part crypto among other things. The community the project has accrued so far isn’t monolithic, either, but rather quite diverse: there’s been speculators and builders and everyone in between in CV to date.
These realities have collectively led to more than 7,300 ETH in transaction volume around CV parcels hitherto. And such volume is set to rise for the foreseeable future as CV plots are now more in demand, and thus pricier, than ever.
A Land for Creators
Cryptovoxels provides digital builders with a Minecraft-like experience. In this way, CV has already seen plenty of talented builders strutting their stuff with impressive build sites within the digital world.
Yet digital architects are just one obvious user of CV. In reality, the digital world’s utility is really only limited by its users’ imaginations. As such, in recent months the Cryptovoxels project has become a major gallery avenue for prominent cryptoartists.
In other words, many artists building non-fungible tokens (NFTs) atop Ethereum are now building galleries and showcasing their works in CV, which just shows how much the young platform has been friendly to content creators in general.
Why? The “Digitally Scarce” Factor
One of the most noted NFT analysts presently in Ethereum’s ecosystem is Andrew Steinwold, the publisher of the Zima Red newsletter.
This month, Steinwold published a Zima Red edition dubbed “The Scarce Web.” You’ll surely want to read the longer piece, but to sum it up, Steinwold argued therein that virtual world projects like CV were “scarce web platforms.” If you want to understand why CV plots are valuable, Steinwold’s argument is a key one to understand:
“Today’s best examples of the scarce web are blockchain-based virtual worlds, such as Decentraland, Cryptovoxels, Somnium Space, and The Sandbox. When I use the term “scarce web platforms” in this blog I am referring to blockchain-based virtual worlds … To explain further, these virtual worlds sell plots of land for users to build anything they’d like. Users can build a social media profile where they link their photos and post their bio, or they can even create an e-commerce store. Virtual worlds are simply a 3D version of a website with the added features of native monetization and scarcity.”
Origin City Auctions
The flagship virtual territory of Cryptovoxels is dubbed Origin City. One of the most understated stories within the Ethereum ecosystem recently was that the last Origin City plots just sold out via auctions on April 8th, 2020.
This means no Origin City plots can be bought through auctions anymore — Origin City parcels can now only be acquired by peer-to-peer (P2P) trades.
In this sense, CV has achieved an important early threshold of decentralization, and now demand will be a major factor for the project’s arena going forward. For example, such demand is high presently. On decentralized marketplace OpenSea, the lowest-priced CV parcel is currently marked at 2.99 ether (ETH), which comes out to around $520 USD at the time of this article’s writing.
This price floor stays in flux, alas. It was lower before, and it may be higher later. But for now that floor is a testament to how popular CV has become, as buyers already have to pay somewhat of a pretty penny right now to lock down their own digital land.
Island Properties Coming
Origin City properties may be sold out in the Cryptovoxels ecosytem right now. But that doesn’t mean that CV auctions are over for good, however.
Indeed, the virtual world’s builders have recently been raising the possibility of adding and thereafter auctioning off new island territories based around the periphery of Origin City.
Accordingly, in the weeks ahead more CV auctions are likely coming, though if anything they will only be for add-on island territories. If you want an Origin City parcel, you’ll still have to purchase it on secondary markets.
A Project That Constantly Improves
Cryptocurrency projects are software projects. That means that most of the top crypto projects are constantly updated, and typically via very talented specialists.
In this vein, the Cryptovoxels team has earned a reputation for being one of the most productive and industrious groups in the entire cryptoeconomy. Why? Follow the project on Twitter, and you’ll see its builders ship upgrades at a truly incredible pace.
Some crypto go for months without being updated, but Cryptovoxels is in the opposite camp: it’s upgraded on an almost day-to-day basis, which is a very impressive dynamic that shines well on CV’s small albeit talented development team.
Amid the Rise of VR
The ongoing COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic has raised the specters of remote work and remote living higher than ever. This potent focus shift may last for years to come, at least depending on how things play out from here, and the virtual reality (VR) industry stands to gain in big ways accordingly.
As such, this renewed focus on shared digital spaces has only helped to raise the profile of Cryptovoxels in the cryptoeconomy. And while the project is still young and has plenty of room to grow, it’s undeniable that its profile and popularity have significantly grown in recent months.
In this light, Cryptovoxels is seemingly one of the big underdog bright spots currently active within the ecosystem. It’s profile will undoubtedly continue rise so long as the prospects of VR continue to spike in and outside of the cryptoeconomy.
In other words, Cryptovoxels isn’t just well-built. The project is also well-timed, too. And zooming out, CV shows that Ethereum is far from just a decentralized finance platform — it can be so much more, including a settlement layer for digital real estate transactions. It’s worth exploring these wider possibilities, and CV is one of the coolest projects doing so today.
