Take a moment and think of everything wrong with the online world, from data breaches to privacy violations to the overwhelming power of big tech. Then imagine them vanishing. Gone. Just like that. Sounds appealing?
Well, you've just heard the first line of a sales pitch-cum-revolutionary manifesto that's gaining traction in San Francisco and Washington DC. It goes by the name of Web3 or Web 3.0.
Web 3.0 is the third generation of internet services for websites and applications that will focus on using a machine-based understanding of data to provide a data-driven and Semantic Web. The ultimate goal of Web 3.0 is to create more intelligent, connected and open websites.
Yet, the conversation surrounding the meaning and prospects for Web3 has become very fashionable in crypto communities. The term gets thrown about by big corporates trying to muscle in on the space while avoiding the negative connotations of ‘crypto’.
Are they evaluated or weighted the same? Everyone agrees it has something to do with a blockchain-based evolution of the internet but, beyond that, what is it?
Web3 is now peppered with various concepts: sovereign digital identity, censorship-free data storage that is secure, transparent and has the interoperability of data flow. In addition, data divided by multiple servers and other ideas requiring an exegesis of enormous proportions, such as decentralised autonomous organisations. These various concepts and ideas network the interlace between the Web 3.0 movement and its viability.
What is becoming clearer is that Web3 is not just one simple idea; it is a series of ideas. It was arguably first coined in a blog post from Ethereum co-founder Gavin Wood in 2014. According to Wood, Web3 could foreseeably bypass the geopolitical data boundaries and his definition included ‘trustless transactions’ as part of its tech stack.
The internet has historically evolved; its influence on us has been profound, shaping everything from what we read, the products we purchase, the entertainment we watch and how we communicate. It seems to know everything about us – our dislikes, likes, friends, economic behaviour and favourite animal videos.
This intimate knowledge could be inferred as good or bad. For example, you can be targeted with advertisements for products you didn't know you wanted and be suggested news articles you didn't know you wanted to read. This personalisation can be convenient but also invasive.
What is becoming clearer is that Web3 is not just one simple idea; it is a series of ideas.
Web 3.0 is built upon the core concepts of decentralisation, openness and more excellent user utility. This implies that interoperability leads to a more engaged, enhanced, immersive consumer experience.
Unfortunately, even Web3 companies are encountering the kind of challenges all too familiar from the old world of social media. For example, one of the most popular platforms for NFT art, OpenSea, is currently wrestling with plagiarism and spam-related problems. Stay ‘free’ or allow rampant semi-plagiarism? So what should OpenSea do?
Follow the 'money': financials may be the birth point of Web3; from the rooted start in crypto, to the current hype over NFTs. Among some exciting innovations, the decentralised autonomous organisation, or DAO, is first and foremost a way of raising funds. Immediate impact applications are likely to be in the area of online open finance.
History teaches us it was a dream sold to us of a new ‘shareholder democracy’, where ordinary citizens would influence the behaviour of the most powerful corporations in the world.
However, if it comes to pass, Web3 is much more likely to be known as a financialised internet than a democratised one for the next while. In that sense, web3 is the high-tech equivalent of the technology ‘big bang’ of the 1980s.