How Snap is sidestepping the metaverse

More than other recent years, in 2021 the tech industry focused a great deal of its energy on a single question: who will build and own the next generation of the internet?

In one corner you have the scrappy upstarts eager to topple the existing world order and rebuild it from scratch on the blockchain. These companies give their effort the aspirational name “Web3.”

In the other corner you have the existing tech platforms, who envision the next generation of the internet as a slightly more interoperable version of the existing web. What will set it apart is new hardware: augmented reality glasses and virtual reality helmets that will bring us together in a series of linked experiences that occupy an ever-increasing share of our waking...

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