Towards Active Participation in Virtual Social Worlds: Using Technology to Build Communities. The Metaverse has been a topic of much discussion recently. While its actual definition and evolution will continue to be hotly debated, the one thing that all invested parties can agree on is the need to have a “critical mass” of people in social worlds, so that the network effects can generate value for individuals and enterprises.While on the one hand, events such as the live concert hosted by Epic Games in Fortnite for Travis Scott drew more than 27 million viewers in 2020, on the other hand, platforms like Decentraland and Sandbox reported less than 1000 daily active users in 2022.In this talk, we discuss Adeia’s innovations that aid serendipitous interactions between avatars, which facilitates the development of communities or tribes in virtual worlds. In particular, we will discuss server allocation to users that are entering virtual social worlds or events. We will also explore how digital goods of value, such as NFTs, can be associated with users’ 3D personas as a catalyst for trading in the virtual world.