Shiba Inu (SHIB), the popular dog-themed meme coin that started as a joke, will showcase its developing immersive metaverse experience at the upcoming Southwest Film and TV festival (SXSW) in Texas in the U.S.
It comes as the creators of SHIB announced on Jan.15 the impending launch of Shibarium, a layer-2 (L2) solution built on the Ethereum blockchain. The new network will help to make transactions faster and cheaper – and even improve user experience for metaverse and gaming apps.
According to a recent blog post, Shiba token was invited to participate at the annual festival where visitors will get a first-time preview of the ecosystem’s WAGMI Temple, the first of 11 hubs in SHIB The Metaverse.
Also read: Microsoft Makes Big Moves in AI – Is the Firm out to Dominate Our AI Future?
“Hubs are epicenters of activity within the [SHIB] metaverse, offering distinctive experiences rooted in each hubs’s theme,” said Sherri Cuono, metaverse advisor to Shiba Token. “Each offers special attractions that may only be experienced in that hub.”
SXSW is known for its conferences and festivals that celebrate the convergence of tech, film and television, music, education, and culture. The festival runs from March 10 -19, and will also feature exhibits covering experiences in augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR).
What is SHIB The Metaverse?
Shiba Inu was created to make up for what rival Dogecoin (DOGE) lacked in functionality. Itself, Dogecoin started as a joke, just like Shiba Inu, but has since acquired meme status thanks to billionaire Elon Musk’s backing.
SHIB gained the limelight when it sent half of its initial supply of one quadrillion tokens to Vitalik Buterin. The Ethereum co-founder immediately sold about $1 billion worth of SHIB and donated the proceeds to India’s pandemic relief fund.
For immediate release: Shiba Inu & SHIB The Metaverse have been invited to exhibit at this year’s SXSW XR Experience. The VR/AR experience showcase is open to all badge holders at SXSW March 2023 in Austin, Texas @sxsw
Read more: https://t.co/51Oa3DwshY
— Shib (@Shibtoken) January 12, 2023
However, without utility, meme coins like Shiba Inu and DOGE “are examples of speculative hype-coins better classified as fun for gamblers on an unprecedented 24/7 global scale,” as Mike McGlone, Bloomberg senior commodity strategist, previously said.
SHIB has not grown at the scale that its pseudonymous creator Shytoshi Kusama hoped it would. The crypto token is now building on strong community support in addition to a series of improvements being made on the network to boost its token price and improve utility.
On Oct. 6 last year, Shiba Eternity game was launched, and now the launch of Shibarium is imminent. Shiba Inu already operates a decentralized exchange (DEX), allowing users to transact peer-to-peer. The DEX is to be upgraded to ShibaSwap 2.0.
There are plans to unveil a metaverse, which is still in development, part of which will now be showcased at SXSW. According to its creators, SHIB The Metaverse is “a virtual representation of Shiba Token’s collective history.”
It “is home to immersive experiences that will allow people to explore, learn from and interact with the Shiba Inu ecosystem.” At the Texas festival, visitors will experience WAGMI Temple, so named to reflect crypto’s rallying cry of “We’re All Going to Make It”.
“The common thread is digital-plus-IRL utility including activities, commerce, customization, expression, events, education and exploring,” said Sherri Cuono, the Shiba Token metaverse advisor. She added:
“Users will be able to earn passive income, collect in-game resources, generate rewards, and even have their own space to build and manage their projects in SHIB: The Metaverse.”
What’s it like in the SHIB WAGMI Temple?
WAGMI Temple “is a zen-like realm with calming sensations, meditation, natural beauty, and spiritual connections to the world. Echoes whisper through the region, with a rich history and discovery of SHIB’s birth and its decentralized roots,” the blog post claims.
The Shiba Inu team at SXSW is hoping to use the showpiece to help participants learn how to connect their digital wallets, purchase metaverse land, and explore the WAGMI Temple. It believes that SHIB’s presence “will make it easy for people to take part in the metaverse.”
The metaverse enables new online social interactions and group experiences, such as virtual reality and gaming, according to experts. It is providing new ways for people to connect and collaborate, as well as new types of digital services that go beyond physical limitations.
Shibarium launch imminent
The Shiba Token team announced on Jan. 15 the imminent launch in beta of the Shibarium layer 2 blockchain, which is expected to make SHIB transactions faster, cheaper, and more private.
Shibarium runs on top of the Ethereum (ETH) network, and will also serve as a transitional evolution to the Shiba Inu ecosystem, centering around metaverse, Web3 innovation, and gaming. The team wrote in a separate blog post that:
“This is primarily due to the commonality of scalability and performance limitations of current existing blockchain networks.”
Shibarium’s layer 2 blockchain tech can enable a new decentralized metaverse and gaming ecosystem, “where players can interact and transact in a trustless and decentralized way and where players can own, buy and sell the digital assets they acquire.”
🍖 Introduction to Shibarium: Shiba Inu's Layer 2 Network — Rejoice #ShibArmy! Shibarium Beta is about to be launched, and through this article we want to introduce some basic concepts in order to provide clarity to the community.
Read more: https://t.co/xWyPaVlQQ4
— Shib (@Shibtoken) January 15, 2023
Shiba Inu token price action
After a massive rally two years ago, Shiba Inu has crashed 88% since peaking at $0.000086 on Oct. 28, 2021, according to CoinGecko. While the token fell in line with the rest of the crypto markets, investors have also sobered up about their expectations of the asset.
Despite the decline, SHIB remains the 15th largest cryptocurrency, with a market value of $5.78 billion. That compares with DOGE’s $11 billion, making it the ninth largest crypto asset. Dogecoin is down 89% from its all-time high of $0.7315 reached on May 8, 2021.
As of writing, SHIB is down 1.8% at $0.00001052.
and then