Worldwide Web3 Wonderland | Edition #23 – Feb 2023
Summary of news from 3rd to 15th Feb 2023
Welcome, Fellow Wanderers! 🌌
The latest edition of our worldwide web3 update is here with some intriguing and groundbreaking breakthroughs from the world of the decentralised web!
We've scoured the far corners of the web3 universe to bring you the Top 10 headlines of the week —
Plugging into Visa’s global network, Wirex signed a long-term strategic partnership with the payments company, becoming a member of Visa in APAC and the UK to directly issue crypto-enabled debit and prepaid cards to over 40 countries. At the same time, Banxa integrated with MetaMask to simplify on-and-off ramping fiat to crypto, enabling users to have Alternative Payment Methods (APMs), lower fees, and a secure and regulatory-compliant payment channel.
Prioritising the fan community, UK’s premier basketball team London Lions teamed up with BitPay to work towards a community-led programme of knowledge sharing and practical experience around cryptocurrency and effective money management.
The hype for digital assets and immersive experiences was observed to be reaching new geographies, with The Sandbox signing a memorandum of understanding (MOU) deal with the Saudi Arabia Digital Government Authority (DGA) to explore metaverse initiatives. OpenSea also made a splash in the headlines by releasing the next phase of its Drops feature, allowing select creators to include multi-stage minting phases and personalised landing pages for their NFT releases. Taking its NFT ecosystem growth to the moon, LooksRare announced a multi-year agreement with MoonPay that will enable its users to buy and sell cryptocurrencies exclusively through MoonPay.
In a turn of events, Microsoft (MSFT) ended a project that aimed to encourage the use of the metaverse in industrial environments just four months after it was formed. The company wants to prioritise shorter-term projects over those needing longer to generate meaningful revenue. Meanwhile, The United Kingdom Tax Reform Council launched a campaign against the Bank of England’s plan to introduce a central bank digital currency (CBDC), warning that such a move could seriously harm individual privacy and lead to intrusive changes to the taxation system.
Aave was in the news for not one but two events the past week: It deployed its native stablecoin GHO on Ethereum’s Goerli testnet, Aave Companies, joining an increasingly competitive space as rival DeFi protocols are also moving to release their own protocol-native stablecoins. Speaking of which, MakerDAO introduced Spark Protocol – a fork of Aave's version 3 (v3) and a potential rival – which is a front-end app that will allow users to interact with DAI in the form of borrowing, lending and staking.
Web3 Word Of The Week: Testnets
Testnets are alternative blockchains that developers use to test their code and new features before deploying them on the main blockchain network. They also help identify bugs and security vulnerabilities that could cause problems if they were deployed on the main network.
That's all for now!🤘
We hope you enjoyed this edition of the Worldwide Web3 Wonderland!
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