The father is no other than our good friend and colleague, Marco Daturi, who runs the Italian dive portal ScubaPortal.it and Scubazone magazine and as such a long-time dive industry professional who knows a thing or two about diving and technology. Unsurprisingly, his young son, Lupo, is following in his footsteps.

They asked themselves: "How can the voice of the ocean reach everyone, and make the individual appreciate the importance of safeguarding such an immense asset? And how can this urgency be translated into truly concrete action?" In response, they created a museum room in the Metaverse to raise awareness of the need to protect seas and oceans.

Metaverse

In case you do not already know, the Metaverse is a network of three-dimensional virtual environments, which is centred on social interaction. This virtual reality is assisted by the usage of virtual and augmented reality headgear.

"The Metaverse enables us to almost literally 'immerse ourselves' in the first virtual photographic exhibition dedicated to the oceans with the aim of raising awareness of the need to protect seas and oceans," the Daturis explain.

In an isle space, a gallery of underwater photographs taken by Daturi in various countries around the world, a crypto obj by Daturi's son, Lupo, 11 (with LupoVero as his handle), and a portal to Sea Shepherd outdoor space have been created.

Crypto coins and tokens used in the metaverse are not businesses that generate revenue and profits. Instead, they are a type of digital currency that can be used to make purchases or participate in a metaverse.

Grand opening

The grand opening takes place on 23 May at 8.00 pm (CET). Access will be global and admission is free. The event aims to bring together and unite different perspectives for one specific purpose: raising awareness about what is happening in the seas and oceans.

After all, since most of us will obviously never get the opportunity to join a Sea Shepherd crew in real life, we can now at least participate virtually and offer our support in this important community as avatars. Caring for the health of the oceans means having the sea inside.

“The oceans need us. I have too often seen up close the total lack of respect for the sea in my travels. While crossing Indonesia, we came across islands of plastic. Unfortunately, the sale of shark fins and dried seahorses are still practised in Asian markets. Not putting too fine a point to it, our waters are also becoming impoverished very quickly by submerged landfills and illegal fishing practices," explained Daturi.

MetaOcean opens a series of projects aimed at raising awareness, some aimed at young people, on the importance of safeguarding the biodiversity of the oceans and the fight against illegal fishing and cruel practices such as shark finning.

“MetaOcean brings these problems into a new environment with images aimed at showing the beauty of a still little-known world, the submerged one, which we risk losing if we do not take care of it. The metaverse is certainly the future, and if in the past we have already done a lot of communication in this sense, it seemed right to dive in here too,” added Daturi.