In an official statement, Meta asks the US government not to “ overregulate » the metaverse so as not to hinder innovation in this new market.
No regulations for the metaverse?
Meta urges Washington to take a direct approach to the metaverse. According to Mark Zuckerberg’s company, excessive regulation could prevent actors working on this topic from doing so grow under good conditionsand even “ hinder innovation “. In a document released on Friday, December 2, 2022, Meta argues that many of the laws and regulations around the world could apply to the metaverse and that would not be good.
According to the social media giant, this is not a good strategy. Edward Bowles, head of technology policy at Meta, told reporters that regulators could ” block innovation ” if they created a new regulatory regime for the metaverse. As a reminder, the metaverse is still a bit of a generic term, designating an immersive virtual world that doesn’t yet exist and where users might one day work, play, shop, and interact with each other.
It’s common for companies, especially the titans of Silicon Valley, to discourage politicians from creating new regulations. But in recent years, lawmakers have tended to want to scrutinize big tech companies and especially their investments in virtual reality. Recently, the FTC blocked Meta’s acquisition of Within. It must be said that technologies related to the metaverse open the door to a vast worldespecially in terms of privacy.
In this declaration, Meta precisely gives guarantees to the regulators on the creation of a code of conduct and strict rules. In Europe, Margrethe Vestager, responsible for digital matters within the European Union, has called on regulators to lean on the metaverse in order to “ fix problems before it’s too late “. In France, a report calls for the extension of European rules on privacy and online expression to Metaverse.
Oddly enough, in the US, regulators haven’t really picked up on the subject yet. The US government and legislators are currently facing a cryptocurrency crisis, with the fall of FTX. The case of the metaverse will probably be treated in a second time and Mark Zuckerberg has certainly not finished his via crucis.
