BitcoinBTC 0.0%, ethereum and other major cryptocurrencies have crashed since metaverse digital world hype through 2021 helped push them to all-time highs (despite shock interest from Wall Street recently turbo-charging the bitcoin price).

The bitcoin price has struggled to regain its Covid-era momentum this year following its 2022 downturn, partly due to technology companies pushing back or abandoning their plans for metaverse development altogether and amid a Federal Reserve-led round of global monetary tightening (though China could be about to change all that).

Now, as the chief executive of major bitcoin and crypto exchange Binance teases when he expects the next crypto price bull run to begin, a leaked European Union draft document has shown the trading bloc wants to create a system of “global governance” to manage the “unprecedented opportunities” of virtual worlds.

“Virtual worlds bring unprecedented opportunities in many societal areas,” the leaked European Commission paper seen by Coindesk read, citing benefits for healthcare, education, and culture.

“This technological shift also involves new forms of global governance”—such as crypto-based decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs).

According to Forbes, The E.U. is expected to call for international engagement on topics such as technological standards, identity management, censorship, and surveillance when the paper is published, possibly as soon as next week, to ensure the next generation of the internet “is shaped as an open, secure space, respectful of E.U. values and rules.”

In early 2024, the European Commission will create “regulatory sandboxes” that can be used to test out projects. It also warns of the risk of gatekeeper” companies blocking out competition from smaller rivals.

“The Commission will support the creation of a technical multi-stakeholder governance process to address essential aspects of virtual worlds and web4 that are beyond the remit of existing internet governance institutions,” thought to be referring to the global bodies that prop up the internet and its protocols such as the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).

Web4, an evolution of the internet that began with the email-based web 1.0 before growing to the social media and Silicon Valley-centric web 2.0 that remains pre-eminent but has been challenged by the decentralized blockchain and crypto technology of web3, would in theory herald the seamless integration between the physical and virtual worlds.