Archicad & the Metaverse

[Link]

I wonder how Archicad will compete in the metaverse?

I think it's going to be increasingly easy to build beautiful structures without real-world limitations or clients to worry about. There will be as much, if not much more, money to be made in virtual worlds than in the real world. The first virtual building has also sold for approximately $512,000 and it will never be built. Or perhaps we sell our models as NFTs along with our real-world deliverables. 

I have personally already bought 4 lots in SuperWorld and am eyeing up Victoria VR (the first hyper-realistic virtual, unreal engine powered, blockchain world which is about to drop early next year) next. It's early days, but the digital land rush has begun. Buildings can be sold or rented, or advertising  / augmented reality rights can be leased, in multiple worlds.

Web 3.0 is just around the corner. Is anyone else planning to stake a claim? Do you think Archicad will play a big part in it?

Would love to hear more opinions!

Cheers,

Link.

[Steve Jepson]

Selling artificially useful and/or imaginary goods and services is par for the course these days in every industry.  But every real dollar extracted out of the Ethereum in this way (Non-fungible tokens) is taking money directly from the pockets of truly productive people who are trying to make a living in a real-world economy.  This is because it has the same effect as circulating Counterfeit money.  It's really not a new idea to do this, just a new way of doing it.  The Stock Market is doing essentially the same thing when imaginary profits on Futures are being bought and sold as if they were real, but no real commodities or services were ever a part of this Digital Alchemy.  It's all just one more smoke and mirrors system that is contributing to a global economic collapse. 

However, if Graphisoft will accept NFT's as payment for use of Archicad I am all for it 😉.  

[Link]

Anyone else?

[jl_lt]

Its an extremely interesting oportunity. I need to read more about it, but on a first take, i think this is where "parametric" buildings could trully shine and finally find their place, becoming buildings that actually move and transform and acomodate themselves for your very virtual needs. Look at the work of pioneers like Marcos Novak and others back in the 90´s who talked about 4d realms and "liquid" architecture before it was cool.  Their works are made for virtual worlds unbound by gravity, either for the buildings themselves AND the users. 

So no, unfortunately, unless something changes, i see these worlds becoming the domain of free form software like Rhino and the like, who dont care about constructability or economic limitations. Actually i think form, that is, static form as we architects understand it, will become absolutely irrelevant.  Form will be determined purely from algorithmic calculations and user input all of which will leave the hands and control of the architect the second after he uploads it.

But not to worry. Archicad shall become king in the real world though, when it finally fight its last epic battle against evil Revit in the Bim Armageddon and comes out with victory

[jl_lt]

Also, more people would comment on this if the topic wasnt randomly lost among other random topics (critique on the new forum layout by the way)

[Steve Jepson]

you can buy Graphisoft Park today for only $465.00 !   I am looking into how to buy it. 

[JaredBanks]

I think this is a really interesting take on it. Virtual buildings don't need to be constrained by physics. That means they don't need to be static. In fact why buy a virtual building that can't be manipulated by the end user? It makes me think about Roblox or Minecraft. People who use those games augment their structures at will. What's the value of static buildings compared to that? I clearly don't have any answers, but this is an interesting topic. I'll say this though, making a living building digital structures would be WAY less stressful. No need to worry about leaks or other building failures. Oh and NO permitting. What a dream.

[Link]

That dream will be a reality within a few years at the rate things are developing, which is much faster now, than ever before. While the internet (or Web 1.0) took 10 years to really develop and become mainstream, and social media (Web 2.0) took, what 5-10 years? The metaverse (Web 3.0) will take less than 5 years to be mainstream. All the hardware is right around the corner and headsets will end up being the price of a pair of sunglasses.

Anyone that thinks the goods and services in the metaverse are imaginary is a little naive given that it's already a multi-billion dollar industry and it's only just the very beginning. Events on Fortnite, for example, have a far bigger audience than the Emmys and the Oscars combined. Centralized banking is on the way out and pay-to-watch services, like Netflix, will succumb to paid-to-watch services.

Anyway, back to architecture, here's an interesting article about architecting in the metaverse, especially the section called 'Business Model Change: From Consultant to Content Creator': 

https://www.archdaily.com/968905/architecting-the-metaverse

It does suggest computational design and apps like Grasshopper are the way to go, which why I asked the question about how Archicad will fit in. Regardless, I think the people who embrace this notion early are going to have a significant advantage over the people who drag their feet. Of course, architecture will still be required in the real-world, so it's not one-or-the-other, but there will certainly be a massive market in the metaverse. Time to get into it!

Cheers,

Link.

[jl_lt]

I agree completely. Hop into algorithms; its now or never. There was a thread a while ago where everyone  kinda went against one guy who was arguing AI will fundamentally change everything (sorry Mr. Podolsky).  While there was agreement on the fact that AI will be important and become mainstream, almost no one, yours truly included,  agreed to the extent that it will and should replace architects. 

Im not so sure now. Although instead of replacing poor old architect, I envision a symbiotic relationship: You draw, the machine proposes options based on your input, and then refine, with algorithms being created in the background. The tecnological leap should occur when everything becomes integrated once again, like when the pencil, the hand and the mind was all an architect needed. 

[DGSketcher]

Bring me my VR headset, I don't have time to be messing about trying to save the planet with low carbon & sustainable solutions. You can all burn while I get rich trading in artificial environments with ephemeral content. 😂🙄😳😱

We know the price of everything and the value of nothing.