The government of Barbados wants to establish an embassy in the metaverse, this virtual parallel universe, sometimes described as the future of the internet and which Facebook has made its new business project.
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The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of this small Caribbean island signed a partnership last Sunday with Decentraland, a virtual reality platform where users can buy digital objects with cryptocurrency, in order to create this new diplomatic representation.
The preserved physical embassies
"
The Embassy in the Metaverse is proof of Barbados' spirit of initiative in bringing international relations and diplomacy into the technological age
," Gabriel Abed, Ambassador of Barbados, said in a statement. in the United Arab Emirates and former cryptocurrency entrepreneur, who leads the project.
The micro-state, which has just under 300,000 inhabitants, said it would keep its physical embassies.
The exact operation of the embassy in the Metaverse has not been detailed, but the government of Barbados has indicated that there will be online consular services there as well as a teleportation portal to travel to the whole. virtual universes. "
It's like they have a new website, except that this site is three-dimensional with a kind of physical embodiment and can be accessed through a virtual reality headset,
" explains Rabindra Ratan, who teaches media and information science at Michigan State University.
However, the real usefulness of such diplomatic representation raises questions. "
It is difficult to imagine that an asylum seeker from a hostile government seeks refuge in a virtual embassy or consulate even if this is not necessarily the goal
" of such a place, quipped Will Gottsegen, contributor for the site specializing in cryptocurrencies Coindesk. “
The concept of physical space legally attached in one way or another to another country does not work very well for virtual reality, where jurisdiction is not clearly defined,
” he adds.
Barbados' announcement and its enthusiasm for fashionable technologies are also a tool for the small nation to have a voice in the diplomatic scene, as its political leaders have recognized.
In a similar vein, El Salvador, a country in Central America, adopted bitcoin in October as its official currency alongside the dollar.
Read alsoFacebook: why you have to take the metavers seriously
The metaverse already exists in the form of virtual universes linked to video game platforms, such as Roblox.
The concept has been in fashion since Facebook announced its ambitious plans in this area.
The world's leading social network renamed its parent company “
Meta
” at the end of October and plans to hire 10,000 people in Europe to work on the construction of the Metavers.