Introduction

In the early 2000s, the widespread use of the Internet and mobile devices gave people around the world access to all kinds of information, and soon people were able to connect with anyone, anytime, in real time, regardless of where they lived or what country they were in. The Internet and mobile terminals became a catalyst for the spread of information around the world in the early 2000s.

At the same time, the internet encouraged major developments in the global economy, which has expanded exponentially and dramatically in size.

However, under the leadership of governments, international organizations, and private megacorporations primarily located within developed countries, much of this economic growth has been captured by a small number of people.

Under this system, two people with the same qualifications would be valued differently depending on their home country, region, and the legal tender supporting their economic activities, with a brutally large premium favoring developed countries over developing countries. Of course, nobody chooses the country they are born into. It is like a loot box with no options.

Against this backdrop, a new technological innovation appeared onto the world stage in the 2010s: blockchain technology, represented by Bitcoin and Ethereum. This new economic technology unleashed unparalleled rewards, impartial to region, country, race, religion, family background, or education. We are convinced that blockchain technology is the antithesis of regressive wealth appropriation.

However, while the blockchain ecosystem has overcome cultural and geographic barriers, there is still a need for new solutions that will integrate this powerful tool into the daily lives of the great majority of humanity.

Blockchain technology includes new digital currencies, payment token (mediating payment and value exchange), utility tokens (representing the right to access certain goods and/or services)　and other forms of payment and value exchange, security tokens (a substitute for stock certificates and credits), and the emerging governance tokens as an extension of these. The use of NFTs, which are unique data with transmission rights that cannot be replaced, serve as digital proofs and contracts, and at the same time, the digital data itself can be considered as an asset.

Especially since 2019, DeFi services based on staking, such as lending, yield farming, or liquidity mining, have quickly attracted the attention of investors around the world, and the market has expanded rapidly.

However, we recognize a danger that these new tools will be seized upon as yet another means to maximize the wealth of the “haves” – the incumbent wealthy – without much spillover to the have-nots, unless essential issues are solved.

Finally, in 2021, we saw the NFT game (blockchain game), which until then had been searching for a decisive move to cross the chasm with its enthusiastic fans, finally begin to break its stronghold. It has finally moved from the Problem Solution Fit to the Product Market Fit phase. The specifics will be discussed later, but in the long history of computer games, we have seen a shift from "pay to play" games to "free to play" games, and games have given birth to a new concept of "play to earn" games.

Even before 2020, NFT games were still a way for users to earn revenue by playing games, but the physical and psychological hurdles for this were quickly lowered, and the number of users exploded, mainly in Southeast Asia. Titles that are representative of this trend had DAUs (*1) exceeding 2 million at one point. Although still small in scale compared to larger mobile game titles, the transaction value reached US$2.2 billion (*1), and the ARPU grew to more than 100 times that of any other game. In fact, users in developing countries such as the Philippines are now able to earn enough money from playing games to live a comfortable daily life.

"Free to Play" is a one-way business model in which the developer generates revenue by using free access as a hook to attract a large number of players and then tempting them with non-free items to satisfy their desire to save time or gain the approval of the upper echelons of the player hierarchy. In contrast, "Play to Earn" is a win-win business model in which all stakeholders, both users (players and investors) and developers, interact with each other, earning revenue and increasing the total amount of wealth (total assets) of the entire ecosystem. This is a completely new model in which the platform earns a fee for the distribution of the total assets.

However, there was still much room for improvement and refinement in terms of further scaling and sustainability for each of the stakeholders-players, investors, developers, and platformers. Because these improvements were not realized, the value of the tokens subsequently plummeted, and the "Play to Earn" movement quickly went into decline.

Various "x to Earn" services that track people's basic activities of daily living (BADL) and generate revenue for them have sprung up, some with MAUs exceeding 700,000 (*2) at one point, but they have likewise been forced to make major course corrections due to the collapse in token value.

In addition to NFTs with utility characteristics used for the above-mentioned titles and services, the distribution scale of NFTs with various characteristics, such as those specialized in collectibles, also expanded rapidly, especially from 2021, especially those related to prominent brands and enthusiastic communities around the world.

However, since January 2022, when the scale of NFT transactions worldwide reached $17.2 billion (*3), the situation has remained stagnant, partly due to fluctuations in global market conditions.

In the midst of this period of great change, we are building a completely new metaverse platform, AKIVERSE, to realize the needs and movements that are suddenly emerging, and the ideal world that will come after, or perhaps even before, them, using the technology and excellent precedents as a reference.

It is possible to start with a single smartphone and an Internet connection, without the need for an expensive computer, and without having ever touched crypto assets or blockchain, just as you do with the games and other content, experiences, and actions that everyone in the world is enjoying today, and you will be rewarded according to your results.

We are solving the challenges of the aforementioned excellent precedents, while at the same time accommodating the further rapid evolution of technology, social conditions, and new values that continue to occur in real time today, and creating a completely new "extended society" for all, where anyone can safely participate, regardless of region, country, race, religion, status, family origin, educational background, or living conditions, and everyone will be able to enjoy economic value, as well as self-fulfillment.

In the following chapters, we will describe the world of AKIVERSE and the many experiences contained therein, with the games as the first point of contact with daily life, and how these experiences are connected in the form of an economy.

(*1) ref The Lunacian (*2) ref Dune Analytics (*3) ref Dune Analytics