Fashion is Transcending Physical limits; and why it’s an opportunity?
Convergence of Physical and Digital Fashion with an evolution of Gaming and Metaverse
According to Oxford Dictionary, ‘Expression’ means “the process of making known one’s thoughts or feelings.” We are beings of thoughts and emotions that make us who we are. Our need to share, validate, and express ourselves in virtual economies only boosted over time as Dopamine kicked in, and for most of us, it took control of how we behaved online.
If we look at Maslow’s Hierarchy, it’s clear that humans have a fundamental need for esteem (a. Esteem for oneself (dignity, achievement, mastery, independence) and b. The need to be accepted and valued by others). The way we carry ourselves in the real world reflects our personality, and our adoption of fashion plays a huge role in fulfilling that need. The evolution of web 2.0 empowered us with the tools to amplify our thoughts and feelings to millions in no time, and with the development of virtual worlds, the lines between esteem needs in real and virtual worlds are blurring as our need to express our creativity transcended our physical reality. Consumer values are changing as you are reading this blog!
So what does this mean from a business perspective?
Fashion (n.), according to Oxford Dictionary, means — “a popular trend, especially in styles of dress and ornament or manners of behavior.”
So the keyword here is ‘popular trend,’ and trends are not limited to physical boundaries. Trends evolve and accelerate with network effects, as the fundamental human need is to share our thoughts and experiences with others. What’s interesting about virtual economies is the network effects, which accelerates the adoption of digital fashion.
Fashion is a $2.5T opportunity globally and shows no sign of slowing down, while Metaverse is an $8T opportunity (source: Goldman Sachs), and it would be foolish to ignore how the intersection of these two would create a billion-dollar opportunity!
The demand for digital fashion in Metaverse stems from people caring about representation of our identifies. People are buying digital fashion accessories and apparels to express themselves and not treat it as a commodity.
Why do we think that Web3 would fuel the evolution of fashion in virtual economies?
I remember how excited I was about owning rare and unique collectibles and How I showed off those to my friends. With the emergence of Non-fungible Tokens, Digital Fashion has boosted the exclusivity and authenticity of digital assets, which would increase the demand for those by orders of magnitude. It’s just a matter of creating extraordinary value for consumers in digital economies.
“In 2021, it’s estimated that more than $100 billion will be spent on virtual goods in gaming platforms alone. This virtual spend creates an enormous opportunity for businesses to generate real money on merchandise for virtual worlds.” (source: metavrse.com)
We should not be surprised to hear that.
The next leap of digital fashion will be at the intersection of Artificial Intelligence, Web3, and the virtual economies. We believe that people would adopt digital fashion accessories and apparel in a way never seen before. There is no limit to creativity in virtual worlds, and hence, there would be no limits to how people could express themselves.
HummingbirdX is super excited for the next generation of digital fashion, and we can’t wait to see our community showing off their HummingbirdX fashion NFTs.
-Abhay Paliwal, Chief Strategist, HummingbirdX
