Brigadoon Weekend | No. 2 | January 22, 2022
Curating the top ten emerging issues from the week shaping commerce + culture
ONE
It is time for blockchains to move from the wild west badlands.
Last year, VCs backed about 460 blockchain projects, spending nearly $12.75 billion, up from 155 deals worth $2.75 billion in 2020, per Pitchbook data.
Plus the venture arms of Coinbase and FTX are now some of the biggest dealmakers.
Such moves are only compounding concerns about corporate concentration of blockchains among lawmakers and regulators.
Big Tech and VCs increasingly control the decentralized entities said to democratize Web3 for the general public.
"While cryptocurrency industry insiders promote the 'democratized' benefits of digital assets, in truth, crypto concentrations of money and power match or surpass those in traditional financial markets." -- Alexis Goldstein - Policy Director @ Open Markets
Look for the crypto industry to make moves beyond the tech's possibilities to use cases where blockchains can be tools for good and not just tools for speculation and profit.
TWO
Non-traditional routes of information for investing are increasing.
More than half of American Generation Z and millennial investors said they had made investment decisions due to information they saw on social media, according to a survey by US financial app M1 Financial.
An October survey by consumer research firm Cardify found that mainstream celebrities and executives are the number one source of information for cryptocurrency holders. Almost 60 percent of survey respondents turned to these high-profile individuals for information on cryptocurrencies more than half the time.
"More and more retail investors . . . are [trading] based on very non-traditional routes of information, whether it's on Reddit or on Instagram." -- Charles Whitehead - Professor @ Cornell Law School
Look for increased regulation of crypto products with SEC Chair Gary Gensler urging Congress to give his agency additional powers to protect investors.
THREE
Retailing in the metaverse.
The metaverse will redefine brand engagement, product discovery, and online conversions, with NFTs as the stepping stone.
NFTs are the most accessible point of entry for the metaverse, with their potential extending to new retail formats and shopping incentives. According to Bloomberg Intelligence, global metaverse revenue will reach $800 billion in 2024 vs. about $500 billion in 2020.
"Gen Alpha, currently ages 0-12, will be the first generation to grow up in the metaverse. They will prefer digital goods to physical goods." -- Cassandra Napoli - Senior Strategist @ WGSN Insight
Look for brands and retailers to use the metaverse for new revenue growth and communications experimentation, with a keen focus on Gen Alpha.
FOUR
Microsoft cites the metaverse as a reason for buying Activision Blizzard.
Microsoft sees the Activision Blizzard acquisition as the foundation for "building blocks for the metaverse."
The metaverse is the convergence of two ideas that have been around for many years: virtual reality and digital second life.
In November 2021, Microsoft outlined plans to introduce the 250m users of its Teams software to the more immersive metaverse.
Microsoft said that in the first half of 2022, Teams users would be able to start appearing as avatars in the online meetings they already attend.
With Activision Blizzard's 400 million monthly users combined with the 250m people who use Teams at least once a month, Microsoft's reach is 92x more extensive than the 7m paying users Facebook has for its existing workplace communications software.
Look for tech companies to race to be the first to bring the technology to the office as this is the best chance to create digital alter-egos that people are likely to carry with them in their wider working lives.
FIVE
Four tech giants dominate the internet's critical cable infrastructure.
By 2024, MSFT, GOOGL, FB, and AMZN collectively expect to have an ownership stake in more than 30 long-distance undersea cables, each up to thousands of miles long, connecting every continent on the globe save Antarctica.
Combined, Microsoft, Alphabet, Meta, and Amazon poured more than $90 billion into capital expenditures in 2020 alone.
The four say they're laying all this cable to increase bandwidth across the most developed parts of the world and bring better connectivity to under-served regions like Africa and Southeast Asia.
Vertically integrating down to the internet's physical infrastructure reduces the cost for delivering search, social network services, and cloud services. It also widens the moat between themselves and any potential competitors.
Look for tech companies to continue arguing in the press and court that they are not "common carriers" like telcos - because it would expose them to thousands of pages of regulations particular to that status.
SIX
Intel "mega-fab" is coming to Ohio.
Intel is reportedly planning to build a large chip facility in New Albany, Ohio, a suburb of Columbus, the state capital.
Intel reportedly plans to invest $20 billion in the site, and the city of New Albany is working to annex up to 3,600 acres of land to accommodate the facility.
This investment is a BFD for the United States, Ohio, and the Great Lakes Region.
Ohio has landed what could become the most extensive semiconductor operation on Earth.
Look for Ohio to be the leader in developing the "Silicon Heartland" and securing the Great Lakes Region as the place for cutting-edge technology for decades.
SEVEN
Space is the place for resources and glory.
The US, China, Russia, India, Japan, and South Korea are all planning lunar missions in 2022 and beyond.
The Outer Space Treaty of 1967, joined by all of today's key players, states that "space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means."
"Space is a frontier that creates dreams and hopes in the minds of people. It is also an important infrastructure for the nation's economic security." -- Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida
Look for growing cosmic competition for resources, technological superiority, and national glory, with the potential to amplify rising international political tensions on Earth.
EIGHT
China's births hit a historic low.
China announced that its birthrate plummeted for a fifth straight year in 2021, moving the world's most populous country closer to the potentially seismic moment when its population will begin to shrink.
For the first time since the Great Leap Forward, China's population could soon begin to contract.
This demographic crisis could undermine China's economy and even its political stability.
Look for some of Beijing's centralized-government efforts only to compound the problem, prompting complaints and creating more anxiety around parenting and marriage.
NINE
Game-theory optimal has changed poker forever.
Professional poker players learn from computers how to make their play more unpredictable and harder to beat.
Professional poker players have added computer geeks to their team due to Richard Gibson's dissertation, "Regret Minimization in Games and the Development of Champion Multiplayer Computer Poker-Playing Agents." Pros now hire computer programmers to analyze their game data, find "leaks" or mistakes in their play, and perform game-theoretical analysis.
Regret is a math concept to making decisions in an uncertain environment—it's the difference between an optimal decision and an actual decision. The key is to make your playing more unpredictable and thus less exploitable.
Look for all types of poker players to engage in a style of play called "GTO" (game-theory optimal) with the knowledge that eventually, their opponents will err, and they will profit.
TEN
NFL fandom expands to international markets.
In March 2021, the NFL signed an 11-year-deal with its media partners valued at about $110 billion.
Pro football viewership on television and digital streams has only jumped upward, growing 10 percent and reaching its highest regular-season average in six years.
Pro football dominants the United States like no other sport. Pro football is must-watch programming.
NFL games accounted for 48 of the top 50 most-watched broadcasts in the 2021 regular season and 91 of the top 100.
Not content with the United States, the NFL has unveiled International Home Marketing Areas, calling it a "strategic effort to enable clubs to build their global brands while driving NFL fan growth internationally."
Look for the NFL to grow new fans in Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Germany, Mexico, Spain, and the United Kingdom.
