By
Emil Chan, Chairman at
The Association of Cloud and Mobile Computing Professionals
Daniel Chun, Chair of Research Committee at
The Association of Cloud and Mobile Computing Professionals and Smart City Consortium

In many of Web3, Metaverse and DeFi projects, it has been mentioned multiple times about the use cases of de-centralised applications. This is the topic that I am particularly passionate in. I would like to dive in with a view on how retail and e-tailing commerce has already been disrupted beyond the traditional web-based online shop front. In particular, I would like to introduce three specific projects from our member companies that are involved in these new frontiers.

(Disclaimer: Emil Chan is the advisor in all three projects and Daniel Chun is the founder of ARTRACX)

• EDNS (Ether Domain Name Services) implement Web3 and .META domain names services and next generation web hosting services (link). EDNS now has over 240,000 community members in various social channels and have just recently launched. (EDNS Medium)
• ARTRACX (Art Tech project) uses enterprise-grade secured microchips and blockchain and Decentralised ID for supporting the authentication of artists, artworks — and proving its ownership and provenance. (link) (ARTRACX Medium)
• Chef Digital (DApp accelerator) — a turnkey DApps Accelerator with a virtual 3D meta platform for online events

Growth hack in Web3 and Metaverse !!

Let’s take a look at the first project, the argument of needing more than a website or a domain name has been largely sustained by sales data from the global economy of influencers and KOLs in community-driven commerce players like TikTok and Instagram. These content providers are like huge billboards and shopfronts — where brands and shop owners could create its presence online with the system. The identity of the storeowner however will need to be verified and the onboarding process is most likely using email addresses only — and may be supported by various KYC processes. In Web3 and Metaverse where the digital wallet addresses (fairly unfriendly) are used as identify the owner behind the avatar or a piece of land in the virtual economy. The identity are usually not issued by central authority. The notion of community consensus becomes important. WeChat had been using the same method to ask community of friends to provide accreditation of identity by asking your friends to confirm that “you are you”.

The identity in Metaverse now be supported by decentralising the issuing authority of the identity and EDNS does that by allowing real world person to acquire and build its shop and identity through a blockchain-based domain name that is associated with a wallet address. In this way, not only the Metaverse shop front can now be furnished with an easy to remember Web3 domain names — it allows a community to help provide proofs through transactions (tracked by blockchain and NFTs) to identify self, shops and things. The future ahead in this new frontier are very promising. There are already Web3 domain name players such as Unstoppable who had created this market. EDNS’s new innovative services portfolio and its strong technology team will be able to deliver next generation services to support commerce and transactions in Metaverse.

According to the Ms. Joey Lam, CEO of EDNS, she believes that the market EDNS is ready for the MetaVerse and Web3 market. EDNS recently announced to go live for their blockchain-based domain name services offering .meta .music .404 .sandbox ; “Part of the services suite includes direct connection to decentralised storage, Web Hosting, Web Builder, SMS messaging and verification services — features that will significantly enhance web security and privacy protection” says Joey. (link to recent press release). More details available from https://www.edns.domains/ . EDNS is recruiting Ambassadors now for part of the expansion plans ! Worth finding out.

Ms. Joey Lam is a seasoned tech entrepreneur and an executive member of the Association of Cloud and Mobile Computing Professional

ART TECH is growing phenomenally with blockchain!!

Now, let us look at a different topic — the application of blockchain and Decentralised ID (DID) solution in the art market and ecosystem. The concept of DID is not new. In the Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 era, it is mostly dominated by big tech companies like Microsoft (with Hotmail), Facebook, Google by relying on them to give Internet users an online identity. — an email account, a Google account or a Facebook account. Even a WeChat or Twitter account today are perceived as authorising access to certain privileges for accessing their free online services. These are all considered as centralised ID solution.

In DID scenarios, the narrative around who could certify who we are on the Internet will be different. This has been a debate given the fact that we have been conditioned — that even when we know who we are, we rely on central authorities to verify who we are with driver’s license, passports, health card, social insurance numbers, etc. GSMA the association for many mobile operators — and founding organisations of the GSM mobile protocol have also staked out their claims in Decentralised ID (as a trend) for future commerce especially in the Web3 era (Click link to see more).

In the art ecosystem, the need to prove identity and authenticity had always been important. In solving this problem, ARTRACX (link) makes use of highly secured-chipsets (with cryptographic technologies) from Infineon to provide authentication of physical goods such as fine art and collectibles with connection to an environmental friendly and low-cost blockchain network called Enecuum. Currently ARTRACX has already rolled out their Curator platform to sign on artists and art galleries and will be launching their platform in August. The company that offers ARTRACX had also been involved in running digital auctions for charity fundraising called OpenHeart for over 10 years. The pivot from digital auctions to a complete art marketplace with tracking, tracing and trading capabilities create a trusted and transparent environment for all living artists to self-certify themselves as artists and to self-certify their own artwork with ARTRACX’s DApps and Blockchain and secured chipsets. DID essentially certifies authenticity of people and things.

According to the Mr. Daniel Chun, Founder of ARTRACX, the opportunity to bring traditional artists, high-net worth collectors, art galleries and charities together in an ecosystem using a simple on ramp to become part of the new digital realm of tokenised assets, digital currencies, NFTs, Wallets are valuable for the next stage of growth in virtual assets. Giving them trust for transactions will become the cornerstone in Metaverse and NFTs — bringing additional governance and liquidity for the entire art ecosystem.

Mr. Daniel Chun is a seasoned tech entrepreneur, an art dealer and an executive member at the Association of Cloud and Mobile Computing Professionals and also a member of the Art ID Standard Consortium based in Morocco.

DApps Acceleration as the centre of staking in Metaverse

We now turn our attention to another member company of our association which also has recently launched a platform enabling for brands and celebrities to be involved in the new decentralised world of Metaverse and Web3 context. Chef Digital (link) has now launched their DApps Accelerator which support content creators and brand owners to create metaverse platform for transforming the traditional membership program by exclusive membership in minting, exchange/trading , marketplace, stacking, and O2O redemption. The team had previously helped clients to build metaverse platform including the successful launch of NFT projects.

DApps is short name for decentralised applications (link) and in the context of metaverse and Web3, dApps run on a blockchain network in a public, open-source, decentralised environment and are free from control and interference by any single authority. For example, an application can create a community-like dApp and put it on a blockchain where any user can publish messages. Once posted, no one — including the app creators — can delete the messages. This is where brands and enterprises could explore the use of growth in building web3 community and renew its digital engagement strategy.

Dr. Jacky Ting is vice-chairman at ACMCP.org and the Chief Digital Officer at Chef Digital Limited and a seasoned tech entrepreneur.

Community-driven and Self-Sovereign Identity is the key

As a summary, I would like to point out that the most fundamental issue in decentralised applications are all about building a community of followers that are willing to become a stakeholder in the new Decentralised Applications on blockchain, cloud and Mobile technologies.