“Web3 is about taking power away from centralized entities and putting it back into the hands of individuals” - Gavin Wood (Co-founder of Ethereum & Polkadot)
Ranjan Das
Assistant Professor Department of Csc & IT, Patkai Christian College
We cannot imagine a life without the internet today. It is inherently wonderful but fundamentally chaotic. We shop, bank, chat, and play through it. Whatever we do, we do it online nowadays. Yet there is a catch. We are essentially tenants in a digital city owned by some enormous corporations. We provide the content, the data, and the attention, while they own the square we stand on, the shops we browse, and a detailed map of our every traversal. And, it eventually leads to money.
Underneath, a quiet but profound revolution is now brewing. It promises to hand us the keys to our own digital castles. This revolution has two intertwined jargons: Web3 and the Metaverse. Do not let these words intimidate you. At heart, these ideas are about making the digital world work for you. In the process, they are set to change our understanding of money. They challenge our conventional perception of money’s purchasing power and its intrinsic value at its very core. Let us build this new ecosystem from the ground up. The first and most crucial brick in this system is the blockchain.
Forget the complexities of computer science. Think of a huge digital notebook, a very special notebook shared by thousands of people across the world. When a transaction takes place, such as “Alpha sent Beta Rs.500 on 28th February, 2026 by 09:47:23 AM,” it is written into this notebook. Then that page is copied and sent to thousands of identical notebooks everywhere. Everyone holds the same time- stamped record. If someone tries to forge and change their own copy, it would not match the thousands of others, and the fraud would be instantly detected. This is the core genius of blockchain.
It is a transparent, secure, and unchangeable public digital ledger along with the time stamp. So, the trust is not placed upon a middleman, but in mathematics shared by a global community.
What currency flows through this system of Blockchain? This is where cryptocurrency, or crypto, enters the story. Think of Bitcoin or Ethereum as the native digital money of their respective blockchains. They are not controlled by the Reserve Bank of India or the Federal Reserve. Their rules and value are maintained by the network itself. Sending crypto is like sending a unique, signed digital token directly to someone’s digital wallet anywhere in the world, often within minutes. It is a full proof token transfer through the blockchain, but for value.
This leads us to Web3. If the early, read only internet was Web1, like a library, and today’s interactive but centralised internet is Web2, like a rented social media plaza, then Web3 is the user owned internet. It uses blockchain technology to give control back to users. In Web3, you are not merely creating content for a platform. You can own a piece of the platform itself. Your identity, your data, and your digital possessions can be truly yours, portable, and under your control. It is the paradigm shift from being a permanent renter to holding the freehold to your digital life.
But where do we live in this new user owned internet? This is where the Metaverse enters. Do not imagine only clunky virtual reality headsets. Think of the Metaverse as the next evolution of the internet. It is a persistent, shared, three dimensional digital universe you can step into. You are represented by an avatar, your digital self. You will not simply browse a car website. You will sit in a digital showroom, open the door of a perfectly rendered model, and take it for a spin on a virtual track. The internet becomes a place you inhabit. And, this has become financially fascinating. In this digital world, you will own things. But how do you prove ownership of a unique digital item, such as a plot of virtual land, a rare digital artwork, or a stylish jacket for your avatar? This is the role of the NFT, or Non Fungible Token. “Fungible” means interchangeable, like currency notes. “Non fungible” means one of a kind. An NFT is a digital certificate of ownership, permanently recorded on the blockchain.
It is not the digital file itself. It is the unforgeable, verifiable authenticity to that file. It is like the difference between owning the original, signed Mona Lisa painting of Vinci and owning a poster of it.
Anyone can see the poster. Only one person can prove that he own the original. NFTs bring this idea of ownership into the digital world. Let us now connect these ideas and see how they reshape the financial system. The first major shift is the decline of the bank as the unavoidable and legitimate middleman. Here enters DeFi, or Decentralised Finance. This is a global, open financial system built on blockchain. You can lend your cryptocurrency and earn interest automatically. You can borrow against your digital assets without a credit check. The terms are enforced by smart contracts, which are self executing programs. These smart contracts work like digital vending machines. If you insert the right amount of crypto, the contract automatically delivers a loan. No paperwork. No banker. No waiting. It is a finance that is automated, transparent, and accessible to anyone with an internet connection.
The second shift is the fusion of work, play, and earning. Today’s online games sell you swords, skins, and outfits that are locked inside the game and they are worthless if you stop playing. In a Web3 enabled Metaverse game, a specific magical sword can be an NFT that you truly own. You can sell it to another player on an open marketplace. You can even rent it out. This is the play to earn model.
For many people, especially in developing economies, gaming is already becoming a genuine source of income. Their time, creativity, and skill in digital worlds translate directly into real world value. Play is no longer just leisure. It is labour. And labour is no longer confined to field, factory or offices.
The third shift is the rise of a new layer of commerce. A virtual plot of land in a popular part of the Metaverse can increase in value, just like physical real-estate. You can build a virtual art gallery on it and charge admission to the digital visitor. A musician can perform live concerts for millions of avatars and sell NFT tickets that also serve as lifelong backstage passes. An architect can sell NFT blueprints for virtual homes. A fashion designer can release limited edition digital clothing worn only by some selected celebrity avatars. Brands can open flagship stores that exist entirely in digital space yet earn very real money. The line between a digital business and a physical one will slowly fade. What matters will no longer be where something exists, but who owns it, who can access it, and what value it creates.
To make this understanding more concrete, imagine a day in the life of Shriman Jonathan Livingstone a few years from now. In the morning, Jonathan’s avatar attends a team meeting in his company’s virtual office in the Metaverse. He is paid for his work in Ethereum, which arrives directly in his digital wallet. There is no payroll delay and no banking queue. It simply arrives. In the afternoon, he decides to sell an animated digital sculpture he bought years ago as an NFT. The transaction takes place on a global marketplace. The blockchain instantly transfers the cryptocurrency to him and the NFT to the buyer. The original artist, whose royalty is coded into the NFT’s smart contract, automatically receives ten per cent of the sale. Jonathan uses some of his crypto to pay part of his real world rent through a DeFi app. No forms. No waiting. No awkward phone calls. Again, in the evening, he relaxes by exploring a fantasy Metaverse game. He wins a rare, fiery digital helmet. Because it is an NFT, he owns it outright. Later, he trades it with a player in another country for a digital music track he loves. That night, he meets friends as avatars at a virtual cinema. He enters using an NFT membership pass that gives him a discount. His digital jacket, a limited edition NFT from a famous designer, receives compliments. Somewhere, a fashion house has just made money from a jacket that does not exist. And the best part is, nobody feels cheated.
This future is already under construction. Of course, it is not without danger. Prices can swing wildly. The technology can be complex. Scammers lurk in digital alleys, waiting for the unwary. It feels like the new version of the Wild West End of Mark Knopfler, full of both promise and peril. Regulation is still putting on its boots.
There are also deeper questions to address. Who governs these digital worlds? How do we protect privacy while maintaining transparency? How do we ensure that the access is fair and not reserved only for the wealthy or technically gifted? These are not minor concerns. They are the new social contracts of the digital age. Yet the direction is unmistakable. Web3 and the Metaverse are merging to create an internet where you are not merely a consumer, but an owner and a stakeholder. The financial world of tomorrow will not trade only in stocks and bonds. It will trade in digital land, avatar fashion, creative rights, game assets, and in the pieces of the platforms themselves. Money will become programmable. Value will attach to digital identity, experience, and reputation in ways we are only beginning to imagine.
So, whenever you read in the newspaper about an expensive digital artwork or virtual land being sold, do not focus only on the price. Look beyond the headline. It is not really about pixels on a screen or land that cannot be touched. It is about a deeper transformation in how we relate to the digital world. We are moving from merely visiting the internet to truly inhabiting in it. It is gradually shifting from simply displaying things to genuinely owning them. This shift gradually changes how we create, how we earn, and how we define value itself. Your future wallet may exist in a digital space, but the worth it holds will shape real lives, real livelihoods, and real possibilities. In that sense, the digital future is not distant or imaginary. It is arriving, quietly but decisively, and it is very, very real. “The metaverse is the next evolution in social connection.” Mark Zuckerberg (CEO of Meta.
