Making a virtual world enforce some scarcity mechanism simply manifests real world problems in the virtual world.

Any system implement artificial scarcity would be a DRM system. In order for you to able to "wear" virtual Nikes (because you paid for them) and me not be able to "wear" them (because I didn't) the metaverse could not be open and federated.

In order for me to see your virtual Nikes I'd have to retrieve the mesh and texture files for them. My system would have to be locked down such that I couldn't pull those files out of my local cache.

From your side of the issue, would you (the hypothetical royal you) pay for virtual Nikes if I could tell my client device to ignore remote resources? What good are your virtual Nikes if people can choose not to see them?

Obviously replace Nike with any IP holder even down to the smallest of small time creators. A metaverse with artificial scarcity would be the walliest of walled gardens with a giant moat on the outside. The only way to make that work is to have a completely locked down and closed system.