The best argument here I think is the self-referential nature of Web3. Many of the other ones are basically saying "It reminds me of the dotcom bubble", but ...

The best argument here I think is the self-referential nature of Web3. Many of the other ones are basically saying "It reminds me of the dotcom bubble", but ... in the end, the Internet won big. At any rate, I miss the old web sometimes, where people threw up bizarre websites ranting about the occult, or their academic passion or what have you. Crypto definitely does have a "playing with our food" feel a lot of the time, but I also think there's a privileged American perspective in turning your nose up at DeFi. In America we can generally count on a well regulated financial system, a stable currency, and a good climate to transact and do business. Many, MANY other places do not have this. If inflation is 10-20% like Turkey or Brazil, or your bank might bail in your assets to socialize losses like in Greece or Cyprus, or the only way to invest is through shady brokerages who might rip you off, DeFi is a fantastic alternative. Not to mention some coins helping with the right to transact anonymously. The writing is on the wall for cash, and how many of you are thrilled about a world in which your every purchase and transaction is easily available to governments and corporations? It gets lost in all the hubbub, but Monero is one of the best privacy enhancing tools to come along in years. While it can be used for horrible things, it can also be invaluable to dissidents and other benign actors, just like cryptography in general can. Fred Wilson's post on "the opening" re: the potential of NFTs I think is also worth a read -- https://avc.com/2021/08/the-opening/ https://avc.com/2021/08/the-opening/ It's hard to understand the memetic disease NFT participants catch until you're actually in the middle of it. Whether everyone will catch it or it will peter out is still up for debate.