Quick take:
- The Turkish government has officially launched a virtual office in the metaverse.
- The country’s communications director Fahrettin Altun said his department had become the first public institution in the meta-universe.
- The Communications Directorate’s metaverse office is accessible via a mobile device from anywhere in the world, Altun said.
Turkey has officially launched its first government office in the metaverse. The country’s director of communications Fahrettin Altun said Tuesday the Communications Directorate had “become the first public institution in the meta-universe.”
Speaking during the launch event, Altun said the metaverse office is part of a border digital strategy being executed by the communications department. The department has been following events in innovation and digital transformation and aims to increase representation in relevant platforms.
“I am very happy to share with you that our Communications Directorate is the first public institution in the meta-universe in terms of leading these new generation technologies,” said Altun.
“As the first step of our directorate’s Web3 transformation and metaverse strategy, we are launching our Meta Office, which is accessible via mobile devices from anywhere in the world, as of today,” he added.
Like many Arabic countries in the Middle East and Eastern European region, Turkey has been one of the earliest adopters of web3 and the metaverse. Last September, the UAE’s economy ministry opened an office in the metaverse. It also has a metaverse-based health service centre and an examination centre.
Turkey launched its digital transformation strategy, which features plans for web3 and the Metaverse in January 2022. Dubbed BLD 4.0, Ali Taha Koç, the most senior person in the Turkish Presidency’s Digital Transformation Office said the policy was created to handle several subjects including the question of NFTs.
In February last year, Ankara University became Turkey’s first higher education institution to offer a course on non-fungible tokens (NFTs). Koç attended the launch event.
The Communications Directorate is not the first organisation in Turkey to open an office in the metaverse. Earlier last year, Turkey’s DEVA Party became the first political party to open an office in the metaverse, with the Deputy Chairman Burak Dalgın saying it will use the office to hold meetings in the metaverse.
During Tuesday’s announcement, Altun said web3 and the metaverse present the country with an opportunity to become a global power.
“Truth is and will be our most important slogan in the metaverse and digital world as it is in the real world. All technological and digital impositions that ignore the truth and human beings are impositions we must oppose and fight against,” he said, adding “We must work hard to create a fair, human-centred, and safe world, and we must make this effort in new digital universes as well.”
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