The metaverse, NFTs and IP rights: to regulate or not to regulate?

As far back as the late sixth century BC, the Greek philosopher Parmenides declared, “nothing comes from nothing.” In the digital era, every two or three years now, apparently unprecedented phenomena seem to come from nothing and yet appear to have the power to revolutionize the world and the law. A few years ago, it was Web 2.0, then Cloud Computing, Blockchain and Web 3.0. Over the last year, countless articles have anticipated global transformation through the metaverse and NFTs (non-fungible tokens), fueling interest around the question of whether there is an urgent need for new regulations to adapt to these innovations. In other words, should the law adapt to the metaverse or should the metaverse adapt to the law? For the reasons set out below, the most appropriate response at this stage is the latter.

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