Tim Sweeney: The open metaverse requires companies to have enlightened self-interest

Twenty years ago, at the dawn of the Xbox era, Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney convinced Bill Gates to spend a billion dollars on more memory chips for the Xbox. He faced a lot of pressure, but Tim didn’t back down. After all, it was Bill Gates’ money. And it was the right thing to do for gamers.

Fast forward to today. Sweeney is at it again. Epic’s Fortnite has 350 million users and the company recently raised $1.7 billion. It also launched an antitrust lawsuit against Apple in part to eliminate 30% app store platform fees for all developers and to make the platforms for games a little more open. Sweeney believes that this the right thing to do, and it’s why he’s a good person to talk to about how to make sure that the metaverse is open and developed in the best way possible.