Paying Avatars on the Blockchain

Today at High Fidelity, we are releasing another beta milestone in our use of blockchain technology for virtual worlds — the ability to hand High Fidelity Coin (HFC) to another person while in-world. This means you can now do things like tip a virtual DJ during a performance, or in the future, exchange one cryptocurrency for another at a virtual foreign exchange office.

As the first of several programs to help kickstart the new economy, we are also giving out substantial grants of HFC to existing members of the High Fidelity community, without whose help testing, building, and designing High Fidelity we could never have gotten so far so quickly. There will grants available for all alpha and beta users having created accounts before today, as well as additional grants for those having contributed High Fidelity Marketplace content and/or established place names. Thank you, everyone.

We have also created a server for the community called ‘BankofHighFidelity’, which can hopefully be an in-world hub for those offering services such as exchange between different cryptocurrencies and HFC, as well as being the location to receive the grants mentioned above. So if you are an alpha or beta community member interested in receiving your HFC grant, please check in in-world at BankofHighFidelity. In that space, we will have a schedule of times that our banker will be available to give you a grant. The first office hours at BankofHighFidelity will be from 4–5pm PST on Thursday, February 1, and from 3–4pm PST on Friday, February 2, 2018. Please make sure to log in to your High Fidelity account and set up your High Fidelity wallet beforehand.

We believe that a strong gig economy will emerge in virtual worlds, in High Fidelity and beyond, where people from all over the world can offer each other services and find a new place to work. A frictionless cryptocurrency that can be exchanged directly between avatars, in addition to the blockchain ownership systems for digital assets that we deployed last December are the key enablers of this trend.