Bill Gurley and Philip Rosedale - Back to the Future - [Invest Like the Best, EP. 254]
My guests today are Philip Rosedale and Bill Gurley. Philip created Second Life in the early 2000s and helped build it into the largest virtual 3D world ever created at the time. Frequent listeners will recognize Bill, who was an investor in Second Life via Benchmark Capital. During the conversation, we cover the fascinating story of Second Life and the billion-dollar economy that persists through to this day. Bill and Phillip share their key learnings from the experience, including the importance of usability, their views of the current metaverse opportunity, and what excites them most about the current focus on virtual realities. If you’re curious about what the metaverse might become, these two experts have seen much of this already and are kind to share their lessons with us. Please enjoy my conversation with Phillip and Bill.
For the full show notes, transcript, and links to the best content to learn more, check out the episode page here.
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Invest Like the Best is a property of Colossus, LLC. For more episodes of Invest Like the Best, visit joincolossus.com/episodes.
Past guests include Tobi Lutke, Kevin Systrom, Mike Krieger, John Collison, Kat Cole, Marc Andreessen, Matthew Ball, Bill Gurley, Anu Hariharan, Ben Thompson, and many more.
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Show Notes
[00:03:22] - [First question] - The origin story of Second Life and why they created it
[00:05:38] - How many people were playing Second Life at its peak, the in-game economy and its growth trajectory
[00:06:49] - The interface between the in-game currency and its function for players
[00:10:53] - An example of early entrepreneurship and user-created IP in Second Life
[00:12:13] - Was technology a rate limiter to success in such an early version of the metaverse?
[00:14:35] - What was most exciting about creating it and it’s early-stage potential
[00:18:23] - Why Unity isn’t more adopted by creators and players like Minecraft
[00:24:42] - Defining what the metaverse means to each of them today
[00:28:50] - What Discord has taught them about aggregating people digitally
[00:33:02] - Simultaneously crossing the digital chasm and the uncanny valley
[00:38:16] - Key differences between games and platforms and the role of purpose
[00:42:04] - Why cryptocurrencies and blockchains haven’t produced experiences akin to the virtual Travis Scott concert
[00:47:13] - Why removing friction and centralizing financial structures can help growth and thoughts on play to earn gaming and user spending
[00:53:27] - Digital asset ownership and digital trustless exchanges in the metaverse
[00:57:30] - Pros and cons of today’s speculative digital asset valuations
[01:01:05] - Interesting pockets of opportunity that could benefit the metaverse ecosystem
[01:04:28] - How they’d build and construct an ETF with metaverse exposure
[01:07:18] - Thoughts on AR and VR and which holds more promise for public adoption
[01:08:02] - Surprising findings about the role audio plays in digital worlds
[01:10:23] - What they’re watching most closely in this emergent sector
[01:11:29] - Limitations of visual and sonic barriers when recreating real-world interactions
[01:12:42] - The kindest things anyone has ever done for them
The Future of VR with Second Life and High Fidelity's Philip Rosedale
Today I'm at the headquarters of High Fidelity in San Francisco talking with co-founder and CEO, Philip Rosedale.
Philip and the team at High Fidelity are creating free and open source software that enables real-time, social virtual reality. Some of you may also know Philip as the creator of Second Life, the iconic “internet-scale virtual world.”
In fact, this episode was actually recorded entirely in virtual reality. Philip and I were both wearing headsets in different rooms. You can actually watch a video capture of our 3D VR chat, featuring a slightly awkward-looking avatar of myself.
In this episode we talk about:
The most advanced uses of VR today, like school kids being able to take a virtual field trip into an Egyptian tomb, and where VR is headed in the future. We discuss what VR might look like 5, 10, and 20 years in the future and which companies are best positioned to take advantage of the shift to VR.
How widespread adoption of VR will transform our lives, especially when it comes to how we work and go to school. Philip gives the example of kids being able to go to school together with others from the other side of the world and how that will change for the better how we relate to one another.
We also get into some of the philosophical questions around VR, including how to deal with identity and anonymity in a virtual world and why VR can enable better privacy online.
We also talk about some of Philip's favorite VR applications as well as some of his requests for products in the space.
We’ll be back next week so be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Breaker, Overcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts. Also, big thanks to our sponsors, GE Ventures, Rally Rd, and AngelList for their support. 😸
Quotes From This Episode
“If I can go to school on a virtual planet where there are kids from all over the whole world, look at the human impact of that versus me going to school with only the kids that are within ten blocks of my house. There’s a homogeneity to local places that is going to get completely turned off with VR.” — Philip
“[In Second Life] people were surprisingly vocal with one identity. I think maybe we only have a certain amount of ability to imagine ourselves as different things and I think there’s a fatigue with really being out there far away from how you imagine yourself.” — Philip
“Virtual worlds are very interesting in that they put a big spotlight on these issues around privacy, anonymity, and freedom of speech. We’re not going to have our real names floating around our heads in VR.” — Philip
Companies and Products Mentioned in This Episode
Facemoji — Emoji your face.
HTC Vive — Discover virtual reality beyond imagination.
Magic Leap — Lightweight wearable that brings dreams to life.
Ubiquity6 — Edit reality together.
Why It's so Hard to Keep Stablecoins Stable
Rune Christensen of MakerDAO and Philip Rosedale, founder of Second Life and High Fidelity, discuss why stablecoins are called crypto's holy grail, why they may be what's necessary for mainstream adoption, and all the ways a stablecoin can be constructed. Philip brings in his experience with Second Life's Linden dollars, often called the first true virtual currency, to describe how it was constructed and how he's planning to disseminate the cryptocurrency of his new virtual world, High Fidelity. Plus, we talk about why a digital USD wouldn't be a threat to stablecoins and whether collateralized stablecoins resemble fractional reserve banking or not.
Maker DAO: https://makerdao.com/
High Fidelity: https://highfidelity.com/
HFC: https://docs.highfidelity.com/high-fidelity-commerce/basics/hfc
More info on Linden dollars: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Second_Life
The Hacker Noon post by Haseeb Qureshi: https://hackernoon.com/stablecoins-designing-a-price-stable-cryptocurrency-6bf24e2689e5
IMF SDRs: http://www.imf.org/en/About/Factsheets/Sheets/2016/08/01/14/51/Special-Drawing-Right-SDR
Episode with Bill Tai: http://unchainedpodcast.co/maitai-globals-bill-tai-on-why-blockchain-is-the-6th-wave-of-technology
Vitalik's post on collateralized debt obligations for issuer-backed tokens: https://ethresear.ch/t/collateralized-debt-obligations-for-issuer-backed-tokens/525
Other stablecoins:
Tether: https://tether.to/
Basecoin: http://www.getbasecoin.com/
Havven: https://havven.io/
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