A new open source standard called Bitmap makes it possible to claim Bitcoin blocks to build a metaverse. Each claimed block becomes an entry through the Ordinals protocol. Through a announcement of Ordinals Wallet, the main approaches of this project were revealed. It is a transformative metaverse or sandbox, similar to the Minecraft universe, which uses data from the history of blocks mined on the Bitcoin network which are then registered as NFTs with Ordinals protocol. It is worth clarifying that Bitmap is a game and does not register Bitcoin blocks with everything it represents in terms of software or programming. It’s a bit like that trend of “tokenizing” tweets that we experienced a few years ago. The idea, in a developed stage of the project, is build a generative map with 3D modeled blocks that users will claim. Also, at this stage, it is possible to write Bitcoin transactions as well, which would work in the Bitmap metaverse as parcels.
Owners can list transactions as parcels on their own blocks, effectively partitioning a block and making it possible to distribute parts of it to a broader community. Bitmap, Bitcoin metaverse.
Inscriptions are digital content that is associated with a Satoshi and recorded in a Bitcoin transaction (image, video, audio, text, and many other formats). The inscriptions follow the Ordinals theory, a sequential numbering that is assigned to each satoshi, as explained in our Cryptopedia. According to this theory, satoshis can be classified according to their rarity and, with that principle, Bitmap proposes to give value to blocks that have been mined at the time when Satoshi Nakamoto, the creator of Bitcoin, was a network miner.
With Ordinals Wallet you can see which blocks have been claimed. Source: Ordinals Wallet. The Bitmap team explains that the owners of a block become contributors to the Metaverse, “offering a platform to build on their blocks.” They add that “the profits from the initial sales of the block will be invested in the development of the next layer of tools in the Bitmap standard.” The way to claim a block is simple, since you just have to choose a block and use a platform like Unisat and a wallet that works with Ordinals. Bitmap is a project that came up in a short time and shows what people can do at an early stage. However, no indication was given as to what the project would look like in future stages. Beyond the initial enthusiasm of Ordinals users, some people expressed doubts. For example, a user who identifies himself as ZmAKin, who wrote: “After reading this and the website, it’s still not clear what exactly we ‘own’ in the blocks.” He added: “And is that part of the block currently signing up when we initiate the transaction? Or is it a small portion of some previously mined block?” Ordinals is a protocol that emerged late last year. Since then, many projects have jumped on the Bitcoin NFT fever. The demand and interest created by this tool has been so great that a developer created a version to register images in Ethereum, called Ethscriptions, as reported by CriptoNoticias.
