34 ms·

Why Web3?

• altdataseller 5y ago
  This article is filled with absolutely 0 reasons why Web 3.0 should be taken seriously. All it says is: Web 3.0 matters because I say so. And we will prove it, Yes.. and?
  • riffic 5y ago
    the hn crowd really needs to stop amplifying these authors with buzzwords in the title sort of things.
    • vernie 5y ago
      Yea and whoever owns this domain needs to hand it over to someone who produces H.264-compressed videos.
  • dragonelite 5y ago
    It really sounds like the big data, machine learning, AI and enterprise blockchain craze from 5 years ago. Where those things were used for the most stupid things just so the marketing department could put it on a powerpoint slide.
    • mchusma 5y ago
      But big data and AI have real usecases. For example AlphaGo, GPT, protein folding, better photography, etc.
    • mattwilsonn888 5y ago
      Big data, machine learning and AI are massive sectors of the tech economy today. The only thing you demonstrate is that there is a difference between aggressive marketing leeching of the core idea and the motivations behind the core idea itself.
• sergiotapia 5y ago
  I feel sad that this beautiful thing has been usurped by shysters, grifters and scumbags. Web3 is decentralization. Not crypto, not blockchain, not your shitcoin, not your mining and most definitely not your NFTs. We need to take it back for our children's sake.
  • corobo 5y ago
    I'm on board How?
• DonHopkins 5y ago
  My web goes to 11. Accept nothing less.
• rsanek 5y ago
  >That was also a time of great cynicism. We almost did not get our first fund raised. Nobody was buying the story we were telling. Not sure I understand the parallel being drawn here when the market cap of crypto currently stands at over $2T. Clearly, plenty of people are buying.
• PaulHoule 5y ago
  The author struggles to make the point that Web3 has value. Isn't "another opportunity for grift" a source of value for grifters?
  • creeble 5y ago
    Or even mention the “value” of the many DeFi apps that are available on the ethereum blockchain. What do they do? My real question is: why would an investor want to put money into a company that doesn’t “own” the data from their customers? Do they even _have_ customers? What is their business model? I know, I know - they make commissions on all those billions of transactions that will happen on the blockchain. Right? Is the value simply coming up with new ways to add cost to transactions? I’m lost. Even when web2 was in an eyeballs race, I understood that you could monetize eyeballs with advertising (in what I considered a worst-case model). And SaaS was an obvious model, even if Marc Benioff seemed to yell about it a lot. What is a web3 business model outside of currency exchange?
    • PaulHoule 5y ago
      On a very small scale I am working on a next-generation web for myself and people immediately around me. My #1 principle is cost minimization so that I don't need to worry about what it costs to run. Futurists circa 1970 expected that people would be getting their news from something like cnn.com in the Early 1980s https://www.niemanlab.org/2013/08/summer-reading-2013-the-information-machines-their-impact-on-men-and-the-media-by-ben-h-bagdikian-1971/ https://www.niemanlab.org/2013/08/summer-reading-2013-the-in... In some sense it came true in that you could access the AP newswire on Compuserve and the Source and that there were teletext services in Europe. All of these faced bad economics. The cost of CompuServe was astronomical. The only one that came close to mass market was Minitel in France and that was because the phone company saw they could save money on directory services. The web came along because technology had progressed an order of magnitude past feasibility to the point where people could publish stuff on the web and not worry about what it costs. That act of closing the circle and making it financial sustainable really trashed it.
  • JohnWhigham 5y ago
• qaq 5y ago
  One thing that is confusing most loud supporters of Web3 are VCs and yet: "It all comes down to the database that sits behind an application. If that database is controlled by a single entity (think company, think big tech), then enormous market power accrues to the owner/administrator of that database. If, on the other hand, the database is an open public database that is not controlled and administered by a single company, but instead is a truly open system available to all, then that kind of market power cannot be built up around a data asset" So why are they flowing billions of dollars into this ? If there is no locking what will create outsized returns for them?
  • Apocryphon 5y ago
    Wouldn’t an open database lead to loads of ACID issues or is the point of blockchain to prevent that
    • jshen 5y ago
      It’s a very limited database that is very slow and scales poorly.
      • capableweb 5y ago
        The currently most popular implementation of this "open database" (Bitcoin) is indeed slow and scales poorly. But if you start looking into the new ideas, you'll find there are plenty of still decentralized blockchains with much faster confirmation times (even as low as 5 seconds) today.
        • endisneigh 5y ago
          Which coins have confirmation times that low with the volume of Bitcoin?
          • capableweb 5y ago
            The volume has nothing to do with the confirmation time, it's a constant no matter if it's 1 or 10000 transactions. Avalanche, Algorand, Polygon and more fits the bill of very fast transactions, in case you're interested in looking into the matter further.
• 58x14 5y ago
  This reads like an obligatory post on the topic with no real substance. I’m on mobile so it’s a good opportunity to succinctly express what I view as the major, near-future positives for Web3: - identity and trustless SSO via things like ENS and “sign in with {client such as metamask}” - data sovereignty, or at least less platform lock-in, especially for low/no code users - grants, crowdfunding, and other financial support for useful open-source projects. This may be the most provably successful outcome to date in Web3; I’m confident I could cite enough sources here with a little homework. I encourage all readers to disassociate (or rather decouple) the terms “cryptocurrency” and “NFT” from Web3. Web3, while still fairly nebulous, in my current understanding, is mostly protocol-level implementations of web paradigms incorporating decentralized technologies. Like any growing technology, there will be many variations, and the unscrupulous outliers should not overshadow the constellation of fascinating things humanity can speedrun with these new building blocks.
  • tptacek 5y ago
    The SSO thing has come up before. Trustless, decentralized, immutable databases are essentially the exact opposite of what you want in an SSO system; it's hard to think of an application where blockchain technology has less promise than SSO, which is about fine-grained policy control, out-of-band account recovery (the hardest problem in SSO), instantaneous revocation, and centralization of controls.
  • Zamicol 5y ago
    Anytime the ENS sign in stuff is brought up, I feel obligated to point out the following: Alex Van de Sande, the co-founder of ENS, posted in 2018 an interesting demo with UniLogin, "[Universal Logins demo for Ethereum](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5t94cCg6XE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5t94cCg6XE)". [The project was abandoned in 2020](https://medium.com/universal-ethereum/out-of-gas-were-shutting-down-unilogin-3b544838df1a https://medium.com/universal-ethereum/out-of-gas-were-shutti...). This is a hard problem that needs a fantastic solution. I don't think sign in with Ethereum is better than UniLogin. UniLogin was good, the team was smart, and this was still too much of a problem for them to feel like it was worth their time to solve. Then there's the significant problem of state expiry. How do you log out? I don't see that they're really addressing this problem. Right now the EIP has the attitude to "push that problem down to the servers". Websites need complete solutions, not more problems. Others have already made progress down this road, and I don't see anything different from what has already been done before.
• simonebrunozzi 5y ago
  I think it's really easy to be doubtful about web3, especially given how much BS is floating in the space, and the high amount of pure speculative trades having been made so far. I still believe that there's something there, but I'm not sure what it is. I am also unsure that the current wave of companies will be able to find it. The different between the early adoption of web2 and this current web3 cycle is that web2 brought a proper value to its users. I still fail to see how web3 is providing value at all. Perhaps specific aspects of crypto (e.g. NFT used for real estate transactions) will be the killer app?
  • cinntaile 5y ago
    In many countries real estate transactions are validated by a notary elite that has a lot of political clout. Technical superiority is not even a factor here.
    • NationalPark 5y ago
      Which countries?
  • PragmaticPulp 5y ago
    > Perhaps specific aspects of crypto (e.g. NFT used for real estate transactions) will be the killer app? I consider myself to be very good at security, offsite encrypted backups, managing private keys, and other opsec details. But there's no way I'd ever want the ownership of my house or cars or other property controlled by an NFT. If something happens to my private keys, am I stuck with the house forever? If my private keys are stolen, does someone else suddenly own my house because they have the NFT? In a hypothetical world where NFTs were the token of real estate ownership, governments would simply step in and make sets of laws to override and re-issue the NFTs according to legal outcomes. They would store the overrides and other information in a centralized database that they control, and everyone would be bound to respect the overrides in the centralized database. So the NFT becomes a gimmick.
    • kurttheviking 5y ago
• DJBunnies 5y ago
  Web3 doesn't mean anything, it's just the adopted jargon of a couple of groups with different visions for what it means. I fear more posts relating to said nonsense will only legitimize those topics in the eyes of the uninformed.
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
• yks 5y ago
  What is the name of this cognitive bias that shows up in all web3 conversations about how internet/web2 ended up being a success and therefore web3 will too? If X led to Y, then Z that (we say) is similar to X will also lead to Y.
  • 58x14 5y ago
    Maybe hindsight bias? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindsight_bias https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindsight_bias
  • Traubenfuchs 5y ago
    false equivalence
• scubbo 5y ago
  The linked post[1], ironically, really helps to cement why I consider web3 to be interesting technologically but mostly nonsense from a product perspective. > As a first approximation all the big powerful internet companies are really database providers. Facebook is a database of people’s profiles, their friend graphs and their status updates. Paypal is a database of people’s account balances. Amazon is a database of SKUs, payment credentials and purchase histories. Google is a database of web pages and query histories. This is profoundly, naively, staggeringly wrong. The products that these companies provide to users[2] are not "the databases" - they are "the ability to do useful, meaningful, real-life impactful things". Facebook is not valuable as a service because of its database - it's valuable because I am able to interact with that database in ways that result in other people seeing the thing that I posted. PayPal is not useful to me because of those recorded balances - it is useful because merchants and financial institutions respect those balances are being equivalent to money. And so on - Amazon is useful because things actually show up at my door, Google is useful because it can use those links/queries to serve me the page that I was searching for. This is, ironically, why many claims of web3's supremacy fall flat. As this[3] long-but-very-worthwhile rant about NFTs in gaming makes clear, simply claiming "ownership" is almost meaningless for anything other than simple financial transactions (which, I callously suspect, is 99% of what web3 is actually intended for anyway). If you want to say that you "own" a video game gun, that's all well-and-good - but to actually use it in a new game, that requires implementation effort from coders and artists, balancing, support, etc. In fact, the pleasant-sounding ideal of "own your digital assets anywhere!" is nonsense - it's meaningless to _own_ something if you can't actually _do_ anything with it. Ironically, it is actually _better_ for the customer to have their data/assets/what-have-you in a single database owned-and-operated by a single company - because then there is a reason for that company to continue to provide support for interactions _with_ that data. Don't get me wrong - the commodification of customer data by Big Tech enrages and unsettles me, too, and I feel uncomfortable with the fact that we mostly rent internet services rather than owning them. But I've yet to see a convincing argument that Web3's notion of "ownership" actually results in anything tangible, anything other than bragging rights. If there's a way of effecting that ownership such that you can actually _do_ something with it (other than selling it), I'll be interested. [1] https://continuations.com/post/671863718643105792/web3crypto-why-bother https://continuations.com/post/671863718643105792/web3crypto... [2] Obviously, those databases are valuable to advertizing, targeting, marketing, etc. companies, but I'm focusing on the customer experience here. You can't build up a valuable database if you cannot attract customers - and, anyway, isn't one of the whole points of web3 that customer data _isn't_ for sale? (A likely story...) [3] https://t.co/0X0mMRFD2O https://t.co/0X0mMRFD2O
• cblconfederate 5y ago
  The legitimacy of a worldwide database can be solved if the UN decides to run a MySQL instance, creates APIs for transactions between individuals, and agrees on a worldwide legal framework for transactions. In the eyes of many this would look more legitimate than the "network of terrorists and CP". I don't think that argument is enough
  • malermeister 5y ago
    There's already a worldwide API for transactions between individuals. It's called SWIFT.
    • cblconfederate 5y ago
      It's not global though, countries like Iran have had banks disconnected, and subject to various political interests.
      • malermeister 5y ago
        That's fair, but that seems like more of a feature than a bug. Why have a system we can't control if there's already one we can use for our interests?
        • cblconfederate 5y ago
          the UN != NATO
          • malermeister 5y ago
            Sure, but we != the UN. Why spend energy building something so Iran (your example) can benefit?
• offbeatrock 5y ago
  why not sell an existing service as a new one by swapping the current database for a private centrally controlled blockchain? Think of all the cheddar.
• endisneigh 5y ago
  Let's say all crypto goes down in value 10% year after year in 2022 indefinitely. This shouldn't necessarily affect the value or necessity (or lack thereof) of Web3. Can Web3 practically succeed under these conditions? Unfortunately after engaging with many in person and on this forum, I've yet to hear a coherent strategy or purpose for Web3 that doesn't rely on centralized entities at any part of the chain, or rely on crypto going up.
  • christopherwxyz 5y ago
    Consider that lots of companies have relatively small market caps relative to their profit mandate, and yet they still provide a crucial value to their customers. GE with a workforce of over 174,000 employees sells 75 billion dollars in goods and services, yet has a price to sales ratio of 1.37.
    • ShamelessC 5y ago
      > Unfortunately after engaging with many in person and on this forum, I've yet to hear a coherent strategy or purpose for Web3 that doesn't rely on centralized entities at any part of the chain, or rely on crypto going up. Did you want to respond to the person? Or just chime in with a random anecdote about GE.
• wslh 5y ago
  The crux of web3 is the UX, last mile, and/or listing problem: even if you, hypothetically, could find a decentralized solution for every centralized one, the last interface to this mechanism will be centralized. Your UI (e.g. mobile app) is centralized so the best UI will eventually win because most end users care about UX or will enter this interface because they see a well paid ad. If this UI (e.g. a decentralized search engine interface) wants to censor some content then it will win over the decentralized protocol behind it.
  • kinship7 5y ago
    You're right that the UX layer could be centralized. However, the data that the UX is built on would not be centralized. In the Uber example, it's as if the ride-hailing backend were available to anyone. The centralized UX could censor transactions like you say, but the barrier to entry is low for another UX, built on the same decentralized data, to emerge and challenge the centralized UX. That's because the data is available to everyone.
    • wslh 5y ago
      > but the barrier to entry is low for another UX I don't agree. I think excellent UXs have a super high barrier of entry. Look at apps such as Google Docs, TikTok, etc. A company could build an UX without even thinking about being decentralized and users will care about the UX but not about "decentralization politics". If an excellent decentralized UX is built, you just copy the interesting parts and add you proprietary ones, sell you brand and success!
      • synapse_soap 5y ago
        Google Docs - not just a UX, built on the Google ecosystem with its existing network of users and massive amounts of data TikTok - not just a UX, but a massive social network, again with lots of data. In a decentralized world, there will be a decentralized social network like TikTok. The UX would interact with that social network; it wouldn't create the social network itself. To give another example, it's as if Facebook's social network was open to anyone to build a UX on top of and interact with. Much lower barrier to entry.
• arbuge 5y ago
  I read this as yet another article stating how great web3 is going to be and how important the decentralization aspect is, without making it clear exactly why this is the case, and what concrete examples of things we'll be able to do with it (that we're unable to do today) are. Web3 sounds to me like one of those soap opera startups PG talks about. They sound like a great idea when you propose them, but do people really want them in reality?
  • mritchie712 5y ago
    It was "sitcom" startups[0], something like "uber for dogs". I guess some of web3 qualifies, but I don't think something like Ethereum would fit that category at all. 0 - http://www.paulgraham.com/startupideas.html http://www.paulgraham.com/startupideas.html
  • numbsafari 5y ago
    With web3, there is no deplatforming, no moderation, no accountability. There is no responsibility. That’s what they really want. They want a system that, in their minds, won’t be subject to regulation or social pressure. They are still mad that Reddit blocked certain groups. That parler got banned from public clouds. Those are the things that made them “wake up” to the need for web3. Deleting data and social accountability are important features that they find abhorrent.
    • corobo 5y ago
      > With web3, there is no deplatforming, no moderation, no accountability A collection of NFTs got deplatformed, moderated, and even accepted accountability yesterday https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29714296 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29714296
      • threeseed 5y ago
        That is what the reality will be. But the image that is being communicated is Web3 is decentralised and impervious to the kinds of moderation we have today.
      • 5y ago
• Barrin92 5y ago
  public data isn't going to keep things decentralized because data isn't the only thing that matters, if anything it matters less and less. Core part of what large internet services do is process data and provide services built on top of a lot of compute. We have big internet companies because processing that amount of information is computationally expensive and thus centralization is the economic solution. Not even traditional p2p solutions have yet been able to compete with large entities, and 'web3' with its crypto solutions is substantially worse because it's computationally more expensive by design. Not to mention there's also the fairly obvious point that a lot of those companies exist by processing data that is inherently private because users demand it to be so. Nobody is willingly going to put their chat messages on the blockchain to be read by the public.
• balaji1 5y ago
  what's web3? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
  • rzzzt 5y ago
    A blockchain of NFTs!
• pphysch 5y ago
  Global finance will eventually be eclipsed by large-scale economic planning systems. It will probably take a couple decades for finance to go the way of alchemy, but the signs of its irrelevance are there: hilarious schemes like SPACs, DeFi, NFTs. Totally divorced from the underlying economics.
  • rytill 5y ago
    Interesting take. I’m not sure many would agree with you. Care to expand or point us somewhere where your ideas are expanded?
    • 0xcde4c3db 5y ago
      I'd be interested too. I've seen takes loosely along these lines before, but my familiarity is pretty shallow and I don't remember specific sources. There's a line of thought that traditional pro-capitalism analysis of the "economic calculation problem" would tell us that a massive corporate retailer like Walmart should be mired in inefficiency compared to retailers with more localized authority (e.g. regional or franchised chains). Since that's not what we see, something must be missing from the analysis. For example, some have proposed that technological advancements (in fields including telecommunications, logistics, and accounting) have made centralization radically cheaper and more effective since the 1980s or so.
    • pphysch 5y ago
      I was being provocative -- finance will not totally disappear, but it will play a greatly diminished role in human economies. Successful national economies will adopt a tech-driven, centralized approach to economics. The global, eternally-fungible USD, and all the problems it brings, will cease to exist. Non-transferable, expiring, digital currencies may be employed in limited domains, for example "food credits" or "fuel credits". This means that free markets will still exist much like today, you can shop for whatever food you want, but you now can't use your "food money" for e.g. financial speculation or buying a new car. This unlocks UBI as a practical solution to many societal problems. You can give everyone $250 foodbucks a week with 1 month expiration and not worry about massive financial fraud & waste. Price mechanism still works, food industry is still competing for your foodbucks which would be converted into some other representation of economic value upon purchase. Libertarians will lose their minds at this, but frankly the nations that adopt a centralized tech-driven economy will vastly outperform those still based on legacy financial systems. In fact, they already are beginning to. There is so much waste in the current American economy and yet most Americans are still struggling to pay rent and put food on the table. The alternative future is the one described by DeFi/web3 crowd, which is essentially based on a deep misunderstanding of what finance and money is about and how they relate to the actual economy. They tend to view economics as a subset of finance ("fix the money, fix the world") when really it's the other way around, and finance itself is nonessential.
• rexreed 5y ago
  I posted a while ago a comment that large tech companies and their investors are not really motivated for decentralized systems, but that they have to tell the markets they are. Otherwise they will face increasing regulatory and liability pressure due to how they wield control and power over their platforms and customers / users (products). On the one hand they want to be shielded from the effects of running large, centralized systems, but on the other hand, they don't want to give up their walled gardens, customer lock-in, captive audience, no right-to-repair benefits. [0] [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29449724 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29449724
• zzzeek 5y ago
  perspective of a not terribly interested party: * two years ago: "bitcoin! bitcoin! bitcoin!" - tech community: "bitcoin is a pyramid scheme and also bad for the environment." * a year ago: "crypto! crypto! not bitcoin, there's others and also fintech loves blockchain!" - tech community: "nope, still a pyramid scheme, financial community goes whereever there's hype and $$$, they couldnt care less about 'tech'" * 6 months ago: "nfts! nfts! look there's an actual thing associated with it!" - tech communuty: "but you don't actually own anything. obvious speculation scam" * 2 months ago: "web3! web3! it's vague! except it's all about those things above we just make it less obvious and more buzzwordy!" - tech community: please leave
  • capableweb 5y ago
    Want to share where I can read the unified opinion from the "tech community"? I'd consider myself as part of the tech community, but never said anything of those things, are you sure you can speak for everyone in the community?
    • zzzeek 5y ago
      > Want to share where I can read the unified opinion from the "tech community"? a good place to start would be the majority of replies on this thread
      • capableweb 5y ago
        HN is such a small slice of the "tech community", if we see the definition the same way (people who work in "tech"). I don't think you should take anything you read here as "majority of people in tech thinks like this", because the size is so small.
        • brandonmenc 5y ago
          My experience is that the ratio of crypto skeptics here on hn more or less mirrors that of any non-crypto focused tech community (ex: coworkers, SIGs, etc)
• riffic 5y ago
  Matt Baer, developer / owner of Write.as, has a competing and differing vision of web3 (perhaps better labeled "web 3.0"): https://write.as/matt/what-would-a-real-web3-look-like https://write.as/matt/what-would-a-real-web3-look-like It'd be preferable for users and developers to gravitate towards a web built on community standards, rather than one built on an exploitative ecosystem. Dave Winer notes "web3 is venture capital wanting a new bubble to inflate so they can get the kinds of returns they used to get." (https://twitter.com/davewiner/status/1475876218905976843 https://twitter.com/davewiner/status/1475876218905976843)
  • sascha_sl 5y ago
    The problem with this "web 3.0" proposal is that the tech is web 2.0. RSS, diaspora, pump.io and friendica have all been around for ages. The real problem is a lack of incentives for those in power (generally those with large marketing departments) to adopt or support them. We see this every time a major service slowly kills off their API. Data portability and interoperability are nice for gaining adoption, but the first thing you kill when it outlives its usefulness to the centralized entity. And the average user doesn't care about this, and probably also doesn't want to do the research to understand decentralized federation. People already unlearned that gmail is distrinct from email, and here we ask them to yet again anchor their trust in even smaller entities than your average email provider to curate their social feed and keep their instance up. It is a much better vision of the future of the internet than web3 - even through web3 sells the blockchain as the magic silver bullet to these issues. But it will fail for the same reason.
• ggregoire 5y ago
  HN meta: funnily enough, I made an extension that highlights keywords on HN and I added "web3" to the list this morning after reading this 3-week old comment: "It feels as if 5 similar articles [about web3] reach the HN top page every day like this. The same arguments are made, the same rebuttals are made, the same comments are made ad nauseam, every single time, with no apparent conclusion. Are we officially living in a simulation? What's happening?" [1]. 2 hours later, I refresh the frontpage and here we go. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29484941 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29484941 Also if you looking for recent past threads about web3: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=pastMonth&query=web3 https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=pastMonth&query=web3
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  • cableshaft 5y ago
    You're not kidding. I could swear I've read some of the comments in here, word for word, in past web3 posts. I wasn't even sure it was a new post at first, the comments (and the replies to those comments!) have been so similar.
• ohazi 5y ago
  VC: "The key innovation is this new database!" Points to slowest / lowest throughput / most expensive database ever designed Sigh.
• jayd16 5y ago
  Can we stop talking about web3 unless we're talking about an actual spec, service or product?
  • Traubenfuchs 5y ago
    Sorry, there are none. Only premined ICO scams, crypto speculation and NFT scams/speculation.
  • capableweb 5y ago
    Why? Web3 is an idea/concept, much like the web itself or the internet (neither are "an actual spec, service or product"), but we can still discuss the web and the internet no?
    • nonstickcoating 5y ago
      The Web and the Internet are the sum of it's protocols plus the infrastructure build on top of it plus the untangible social effects it has. This is true for Web3 as well, but the protocols are in their infancy, the infrastructure is sparse and the sociale effects (as of now) concentrated in the blockchain space. The parent comment wants to discuss those three topics (maybe minus the social implications) with regards to what amounts mostly to a buzzword right now, precisely because Web3's protocols, infrastructure and social implications are far to under developed to warrant serious discussion concerning long-time stable solutions to real-world problems. I sympathise with earlier comments, that would like to seperate Web3 from blockchain and crypto-coins precisely to discuss the possible merits or protocols actually fullfilling what the crypto space right now fails to deliver on.
• vinnie-io 5y ago
  there are no practical use cases for blockchain outside of git
• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• todd3834 5y ago
  I wish I could separate decentralized database from volatile investment. I understand that it can provide an incentive to get paid for essentially hosting part of the database. Is your average person benefiting from this or did we just give most of the centralization to mining farms where electricity is cheaper? Is web3 crypto money? Is it peer to peer? Is it blockchain? Does the blockchain really make sense for something like a HN clone or an instagram? If I were trying to proselytize web3 I would be promoting tech demos and convincing people why it is better. Like the Rails blog video that blew all of our minds in the past. We all wanted to use Rails after that. The benefits were clear.
• Shadonototra 5y ago
  because institutions lost their influence no kids reads newspaper, nor they watch the TV, traditional propaganda has no effect on them web3 would be a way to centralize everything again, so propaganda could be better targeted, opinions controlled, and easily censor-able you lol'd at china and their social credit score system? don't be jealous, you'll have yours! but it wont be about being a good citizen, it'll be about being a servant consumerist i see web3.0 as a way for the establishment to regain the influence they lost on their people the boomers trying to stay relevant the people late to the internet party, can't have a piece of the cake, so they want to force their way in a way for societal scammers to keep doing what they love doing NFT people? they can't wait selling art they bought for $5 from fivers and pretend you own a piece of a database they rent on digital ocean for $5 a month lol, what a wonderful plan, definitely something China is jealous of, no wonder they are looking for ways to get the hell out of this planet and conquer the space because there is one thing that would definitely kill our species, if the west tries to expand its shitty society outside of this dying planet -- i mean, people dream of meta verse, how ridiculous, therefore i can be ridiculous with my posts too! who cares, we not looking for transcending humankind, are we? my bad my bad, i mean, you not even trying lol
• mumblemumble 5y ago
  As time goes on, the ever-evolving nature of the predictions about how crypto will change the world for the better keeps looking more and more like the ever-evolving nature of the predictions we were seeing 50 years ago about how the space aliens were going to come along and change the world for the better. Granted, crypto has a bit of an advantage over the space aliens in the race to realize a transformative impact on the world, by virtue of the fact that it actually exists. That's not the parallel I'm trying to draw here. It's more... it seems that they're both a situation where people are really just attached to this one amorphous romantic idea, and the specifics really don't matter at all. Meaning they can be freely reconfigured, at will and without much limit, in order to ensure we're always talking about something that's off in the future rather than something we might expect to happen now, let alone in the past. Which, something like that is absolutely perfect fodder for daydreaming. So then I ask myself, "Is kicking a ball through it a core part of the plan, or is this goalpost really just a thing that's fun to move around?" Perhaps my problem is that there's not really any romance in my soul.
• neurobashing 5y ago
  be wary of any person talking about you're going to have this big distributed consensus, based on some kind of buy-in to something, without first finding out who has the most buy-in, and just what it takes to overcome their %.
• mark242 5y ago
  "Permissionless data" is actively harmful to people who do not want their data put into an immutable datastore. It smacks of "moderation-free content" which is simply a nonstarter. If web3 is truly about privacy and data portability, then 90% of the people working on DeFi should shift their efforts to making a better browser, possibly one that incorporates IPFS natively and quickly.
• pg_bot 5y ago
  I think the VCs are stuck between a rock and a hard place. It makes sense to invest in "web3" because of the potential power law returns if someone figures out how to make something useful. However, I think we've had enough time to evaluate enough of these technologies to claim that the emperor has no clothes. It may take a few years but I think every single web3 investment will have to be written off as a complete loss. There is just no problem being solved there that couldn't be solved more efficiently elsewhere.
  • capableweb 5y ago
    > However, I think we've had enough time to evaluate enough of these technologies "We" (humanity) started working on networking/the foundations of the internet in the 1970s, and it wasn't until late 1990s that it actually became mainstream and started providing a solution to "real" problems we had at that time. What makes you confident we can judge cryptocurrencies in just ~12 years instead of ~20 years it took for the internet to take hold? > There is just no problem being solved there that couldn't be solved more efficiently elsewhere. How about a network where anyone with a computer could transfer X amount of something to someone else, without having to rely on a single 3rd party? You'll say that it's not a problem in practice, but the same thing was said about email in the past.
    • pg_bot 5y ago
      Even in the early days of computing, there were obvious benefits to networking computers. The work wasn't done for no reason, there was clear value in coming up with all of these protocols. The main reason it took so long for general adoption was the fact that computers were not in most family homes until the 1990s. The barrier to adopting the internet wasn't the inherent value of the protocols it was the cost of the machine to the average consumer. I'm confident in saying this because we are further along in the computing adoption cycle and we haven't really come up with anything useful. Your point about transferring something to someone else without a third party ignores transaction costs. Who cares if you need a third party if you are purchasing something legally and the cost to transact is low?
• m_ke 5y ago
  Open food facts is an example of an open database that doesn't need snake oil to thrive. If you really want to decentralize access to data then the focus should be on open source and publicly available data dumps. https://world.openfoodfacts.org/data https://world.openfoodfacts.org/data
• dgudkov 5y ago
  Decentralized cryptoapps may have a point, but somehow "web3" proponents forget that there there can be decentralization without crypto at all. Web2 succeeded because Web1 protocols haven't been developed to withstand abuse. For instance, the email protocol (Web1) hasn't got an extension that would enable receiving emails only from authorized senders. As a result, email is heavily abused by spam and phishing to a degree that only a handful of large email providers can effectively deal with it. The centralization of email services is typical for Web2. RSS (Web1) hasn't got an extension that would enable access restriction and following. As a result, centralized proprietary ad-driven social networks (Web2) took over. HTTP (Web1) hasn't developed a micropayment mechanism. As a result, the current internet is monetized through all-pervasive ads (Web2) with all the terrible destructive downsides that come from ad-driven media.
  • layer8 5y ago
    Email isn’t web1. It isn’t web-anything.
• root_axis 5y ago
  I'm not convinced. People talk grand about "permissionless data" but I fail to see any practical applications. NFTs are a scam and are retroactively obsoleted by digital signatures. All of the ideas about logistics tracking, deed tracking, etc etc are all rendered pointless by the oracle problem, you can get identical guarantees with digital signatures minus the blockchain. DeFi is DOA. Gas fees are insane, "layer 2" is just a diplomatic way of saying "offchain centralization", every DeFi scheme is a money loser relative to just buying eth and waiting for a pump, "collateralized" loans where you pay coin so someone will loan you coin is not a valuable use-case to the vast majority of the population... None of this is about giving power back to individuals, it's all about making money on mining fees and cryptocurrency speculation.
  • Gravyness 5y ago
    > None of this is about giving power back to individuals Exactly, when people claimed web3 is about the individual and decentralization I knew 100% it is a power play being attempted by some stupid people who have no idea how the web works.
  • doomrobo 5y ago
    > NFTs are a scam and are retroactively obsoleted by digital signatures I'm not one to ever defend NFTs, but this is not right. Suppose I bought an extremely trendy natural number k ∈ ℤ and I have a signature σ from its inventor that says "doomrobo owns k". Suppose in a year the trend has passed and I'd like to sell k. How do I transfer ownership to someone else? Clearly sending σ doesn't suffice, since σ is public. Do I need a new signature? Ok different setup: σ is actually a signature from me and the inventor saying "the non-inventor pubkey that signed of this message is the owner of k". How do I transfer σ now? Do I send my signing secret key? Who makes sure I deleted my copy of the signing key?
    • galaxyLogic 5y ago
      Good questions. Let's say I create a piece of digital art and create an NFT out of it. The NFT somehow starts increasing in value. Then I copy my original digital art-asset and perhaps use a Photo-Shop filter to make it have a different hue. I turn that into another NFT. And I keep on doing this for all colors of the rainbow. What prevents me from creating new NFTs with the same or slightly modified underlying digital asset?
• adventured 5y ago
  > If, on the other hand, the database is an open public database that is not controlled and administered by a single company, but instead is a truly open system available to all, then that kind of market power cannot be built up around a data asset That's just so blatantly and obviously false it's rather remarkable that he wrote it. Absolutely nothing stops companies from becoming the dominant providers - aka big tech - that utilize said database at the application layer. Indeed that's exactly what will happen. You don't need to own the database to build a big tech monopoly on top of it. Microsoft didn't own the primary distribution channel for Windows 95, and they didn't own the hardware it ran on either. Google (search, circa 1999) didn't own the Internet, or the PC, or the operating system, or the cable line, or the telecom infrastructure, and so on. Consumers develop preferences, companies develop advantages (through superior products or other means), and the market dominance centralizes to one or a few providers. That's always inevitable short of government intervention. You don't have to own the database to build a monopoly on top of it. The better products (or via other leverage points) will win out and dominate and will be extraordinarily difficult to compete with, their advantage will become entrenched as their product gains in complexity and capability (ie competing with Google in 1998 was far easier than it would have been by 2012, as they scaled their capabilities and made enormous investments globally); the cost to keep up the with the winners soars and few will try (see: lack of dozens or hundreds of new competitors to Uber and Lyft, few are even trying at this point, the potential competition gives up for obvious reasons). Say hello to Coinbase & Co. We've already seen this process in action in crypto, many times over.
  • kinship7 5y ago
    I agree that statement around market power is wrong. What I'm hopeful about, is that Web3 increases the amount of the stack that is open to anyone to build on top of. That will hopefully increase competition and decrease rent-seeking by whichever dominant players emerge.
• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• jmull 5y ago
  The post this post links to a few times [1] is the more interesting one: https://continuations.com/post/671863718643105792/web3crypto-why-bother https://continuations.com/post/671863718643105792/web3crypto... Still, it's unconvincing to me. It argues web3 is about permissionless data. The problem with that is we already have permissionless data -- you can put almost any kind of data you want on a server and encourage people honor it. What they actually want is shared data, governed by rules that hard for anyone to change, and use that as scaffolding to build systems around consequential data. That's kind of interesting, but what happens when the rules conflict with reality. E.g., when the blockchain says you own the land but the law says someone else does? Now you could agree to make a blockchain database is the authority on something, even contractually, which would help it harmonize with laws to a decent degree. But that would be an individual decision and doesn't preclude scams, fraud, people acting in bad faith, etc. Ultimately blockchains about data of any consequence will have to comport with applicable laws and regulations, just like everything else. The lack of flexibility likewise makes blockchain pretty useless for softer things, like social networks. (It's kind of silly to even bring up social networks in this context, but the post brings up Facebook.)
• davidhariri 5y ago
  > Frankly, it is all too much for me. Same. I've been actively unfollowing people on Twitter every day to clean my feeds of it. I'm not anti-web3 or anti-crypto, but I definitely don't need to read the same rhetoric from 100 people a day. Decentralized trust could be great, but I wonder how much time actually needs to be spent talking about it vs. actually building it...
  • duxup 5y ago
    Crypto seems to attract a lot of high minded hot air as far as social media goes.
  • indigochill 5y ago
    > Decentralized trust could be great, but I wonder how much time actually needs to be spent talking about it vs. actually building it... And the order of operations. Traditionally, you build something great (or an MVP) and market it. The crypto community has been putting the marketing before the building. It's probably uncontroversial to say although cryptocurrency -could- do great things, right now the bulk of trade in the first world is speculation. Meanwhile there are television ads in the US aimed at football fans telling them how they can trade cryptocurrency. WTF does the average football fan need with cryptocurrency?
    • deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    • krrrh 5y ago
      This is such a good point. "Web 2.0" didn't really emerge as a term of art until there was a need to describe the widespread adoption of UGC, REST, & AJAX and blockbuster web applications like gmail replacing desktop applications.
      • pedalpete 5y ago
        I was actually thinking the opposite. I seem to recall talking about Web 2.0 and AJAX, SOAP, etc. before most apps were built using those technologies. We were using AJAX minimally, CSS was a thing, but UGC was still a few years away, from what I recall.
• opendomain 5y ago
  I am looking for anyone interested in the domain Web3.net I am the founder of OpenDomain- we have contributed domains worth millions to open source and other causes. All for Free.
  • faeyanpiraat 5y ago
    I do not understand who benefits and in what way from any of this? Could you help me out on this?
    • opendomain 5y ago
      using a domain allows people to share information easier. For example, if I wanted to tell a friend about the blockchain, I could share a link to a video I found helpful using email or Twitter. By using the domain web3.net, we can create an wiki on everything about web3. We could all edit the wiki and learn from others. I could build this site myself and slap some advertising on it, but I would rather follow the Wikipedia model. I want to work with lots of people that want to learn about Web 3 But we can do so much more than just a wiki.
      • faeyanpiraat 5y ago
        I know how domains work, what I dont get is why donating millions worth of domains make sense. Are you running a charity of some sort?
        • opendomain 5y ago
          OpenDomain is a non-profit. Some people contribute years of their time to help open source projects. OpenDomain does it by contributing domains.
• jrm4 5y ago
  The thing I find perhaps the most telling is what's missing -- namely the lack of discussion around the already-done implementations of the technologies that are being hyped as "web3" things; e.g. there is certainly quite a bit that could be learned from Second Life slash The Sims slash Roblox slash Minecraft, and yet, all hype and no grownup discussion of what could be learned here.
• jedberg 5y ago
  HN wasn't around when Web2.0 became a thing, but I don't remember Slashdot being filled with constant articles justifying Web2.0. I'm am just forgetting or were we as a community a lot less divided about it?
  • danenania 5y ago
    Web 2.0 was a label created to describe an emergent trend (ajax, rich ui, rounded corners, drop shadows) that was well underway by the time the label was popular. web3 seems to be attempting the reverse: popularize the label first and hope the trend follows.
  • codingdave 5y ago
    It was less divided, but that was at least in part because "Web 2.0" was about the web. This usage of "web3" to mean crypto/blockchain has nothing to do with the web, and therefore feels completely absurd to me.
  • rafiki6 5y ago
    I think there was less to be divided about. Back then, the best the evangelist could do was create a blog and try to game SEO to get noticed. They could post on a few popular forums, but discoverability was limited and algorithms designed to pump engagement didn't exist because social media platforms were in their infancy. It's a different world today. The barrier is lower. Blogging influentially is as easy as posting a medium article and pushing it on the social media platforms. So specific voices which tend to be controversial are getting way more amplified. Then the algorithms just creates echo chambers to keep the users engaged to pump up the ad revenue. That being said, Web 2.0 had two primary themes and business value propositions. It was social media/ads, and e-commerce. Those were pretty clear and there was no confusion about how money would be made. Out of those was born what I like to call Web 2.5, where basically every industry was getting SaaSified in one form or another. Out of this was born big data and the emergence of the most recent ML hype due to the need to create these algos to maximize ad driven profit. Crypto/Decentralization/Web 3.0 has a much much more challenging road ahead to get mass adoption. Outside of the obvious scaling issues decentralization brings about, decentralized apps have a much less clear path to monetization. That's in essence why they need to create their own economies with tokens and crypto. Really for "Web 3.0" to be successful, we are looking towards a whole scale reimagining of how economies function. This is entirely different than using the internet to create analogs to real world things like stores or newspapers. The value proposition of social media was abundant, and the path to profitability was clear. Ditto for ecommerce platforms. Ditto for the majority of SaaS applications. I think the fundamental divide here is talking about Web 3.0, (or ICOs, DApps, DeFi, NFTs, or w/e the "use case" of the day is), generally seems to be avoiding talking about the true value proposition of decentralization, which will face such tremendous resistance from powerful world governments, that it's akin to a war being fought to creating a new world order and evolution of how human society is shaped. The stakes are much higher and failure is much more likely. I wouldn't be surprised if all the most successful projects just end up being centralized layers on top of the protocols and all they really end up doing is usurping the place of some existing Web 2.0 platforms due to some network effect pushed forward by a few key influencers. That's essentially what happened with TCP/IP and HTTP. I don't see why it will be any different this time.
• nathias 5y ago
  If you don't see the problem being solved, it's you.
• intrasight 5y ago
  In fiction, Hiro Protagonist got in early and bought some prime real-estate in the metaverse. Many IRL did the same with Bitcoin and made a killing. If you think all the lucrative web2 properties have already been claimed, then it makes sense to create virgin territory in web3 and stake a claim.
  • evan_ 5y ago
    Hiro delivered pizzas and lived in a storage unit with a roommate. His metaverse "wealth" was essentially worthless to him in real life. Real-life real estate is valuable because they're not making more land. Virtual real estate does not have that limitation. (Also IIRC he helped create the Metaverse, he didn't simply buy in early.)
    • intrasight 5y ago
      "bought in early" by investing his time. Web3 will succeed if it succeeds in creating artificial scarcity - just as Bitcoin has succeeded in doing. I am pessimistic, but there are lots of people who think otherwise. I do think that it will have a "real-estate" aspect to it soas to have scarcity of place. Here's a thought: can we repurpose all the Bitcoin computation to doing something useful like rendering the metaverse?
• fleddr 5y ago
  Just relax and let it play out. The author is right. Web3 needs to deliver a killer app. Something with broad consumer appeal that would not be possible with web2. Something your mum would use. If such a thing is never delivered, skeptical you was right and you can have your "told you" moment. If it does get delivered, you were wrong, and we may be at the start of something drastically new. As tens of billions is flowing into these projects, either outcome is going to be very interesting.
• Kiro 5y ago
  I don't like how the extreme hatred toward Web3 has spiraled into "I see no practical application for decentralization". Crypto and blockchain aside, how can you not see the utility in an open firehose database/API without gate keepers? Don't conflate decentralization with blockchain.
  • moritonal 5y ago
    Because the only reason I can imagine someone wanting a open database without gate keepers is for something the society I've aligned with has decided is illegal. At the end of the day, I guess I trust the goverment I vote for and the banks I decide on more than a distributed group of strangers. Do you have an example of a DB that was unfairly limited by a gate keeper?
    • Kiro 5y ago
      Facebook, Twitter or any walled garden. I can't build any app I want on top of those without risking it being limited, restricted or shut down... If they even provide an API at all.
      • cam0 5y ago
        So don't build on FB and Twitter? You do realize you can build an application and very easily host it for the world to access on AWS/GCP/Azure - unless you're doing something illegal or highly unethical the cloud services aren't going to kick you off. It sounds like you're saying you want to build a social media app but you don't like the fact that social media is dominated by a handful of companies (because the majority of users want to use their product already).
        • mattwilsonn888 5y ago
          > Get censored off Twitter without breaking the law. "Just build your own Twitter!" > Conservative Twitter gets kicked off hosting services. "Just build your own hosting services!" > People talk about the importance of Web3 for openness and censorship resistance. "Web3 is a grift, and if its not its for illegal things then you're only getting marginal value as compared to using FB or Twitter! So just build your own Twitter!" I'm getting dizzy.
• selljamhere 5y ago
  > financial applications have been built on top of Ethereum that all share the same database and users can move from application to application, keeping their data (and their login credentials stored in their wallet) as they go. Does anyone have examples of this in the wild? I often hear data portability listed as one of the great benefits, but I don’t have a grasp on what that actually means. In my mind, the data needs to be structured to be useful, otherwise other DAPs wouldn’t be able to act on it. Who defines the structure? And who manages changes?
  • everfree 5y ago
    Some examples of dApp data sharing in the wild: For example if you have Ether, you can use a decentralized exchange (e.g. Uniswap) to swap it to stablecoins like USDC and DAI, deposit that USDC and DAI into a collateralized lending market (e.g. Compound), then deposit your deposit tickets into a stable pair exchange (e.g. Curve) to earn maker fees when others trade against your liquidity, while ALSO earning interest fees that accrue to the underlying. This is possible because these contracts are all able to share data about token balances with each other. On a side note, DAI is actually a great example to illustrate this kind of data sharing, because behind the scenes, DAI is itself a synthetic asset backed by yet other assets. DAI backing even includes derivative assets that themselves represent claims on liquidity denominated in yet other assets in external contracts (e.g. UNIV2WBTCETH). The tangled web of assets backed by other assets is insane, honestly, but it's all made possible by contracts sharing data with each other. As a second example, you could take some bitcoin, bridge it onto Ethereum (using e.g. the REN network), and deposit and earn interest on it on a collateralized lending platform. These actions all require data about ETH balances and token balances to be portable across dApps, and in this case even portability across the Bitcoin and Ethereum networks. A non-monetary example of data portability within Ethereum is the Ethereum Name Service. Like DNS, the name database is public and can be queried by other dApps. As a bonus, names in ENS also follow the ERC-721 token standard which provides a standard way to share data about who owns which names, so it's theoretically possible to write contracts that themselves write derivatives on name ownership, for example to give someone a collateralized loan backed by the value of their ENS name, or to have a contract that owns an ENS name but that requires a majority DAO vote in order to manage the name or transfer ownership. In summary, for the most part dApps are purposely written in such a way that they can be easily integrated with other dApps using open standards and without asking permission, which is why the space sometimes gets a "money legos" moniker. The data structures that allow these apps to pass data between each other are defined by the ERC-20 and ERC-721 token standards, which list standard method interfaces for smart contracts to store and query each others' token balances, and I believe were officiated as standards by the Ethereum Foundation. These standards are currently widely supported across all Ethereum smart contracts that involve tokens.
• einarfd 5y ago
  I'm flabbergasted over the web3 term, and that anyone is using it unironical. The web2.0 term, went from something that was a bit awkward but ok in the beginning, to something that you want to laugh at people using. Then someone takes that, adds one to it, and thinks it's a good name for their tech?
• throwaway984393 5y ago
  The saddest thing about all this is how much real improvement we could make to the world if nerd billionaires would stop chasing stupid ideas they don't understand. It's like rewriting a codebase. You know it's just going to be expensive, time-consuming, introduce tons of new bugs, and may not even solve the customer's problem. But it feels good, so people bumble forward, confident in their ignorance of the real outcome.
• beders 5y ago
  I still don't get the economics of this. Who is paying for the hosting and maintenance costs?
• rambambram 5y ago
  Web3 is nothing but an echo chamber. A very empty echo chamber, so it echoes pretty nice. I'm back to the worldwide web.
  • Zaskoda 5y ago
    Perhaps you mean World Wide Web. ;-)
    • rambambram 5y ago
      Perhaps I do.
• simonw 5y ago
  > If, on the other hand, the database is an open public database that is not controlled and administered by a single company, but instead is a truly open system available to all, then that kind of market power cannot be built up around a data asset. But it's a crap database. It's incredibly slow and incredibly expensive. The benefits we get from using a slow, expensive database need to be absolutely enormous for this to turn out to be worthwhile.
  • xrd 5y ago
    If you read the post he recommends from his partner, that is covered in detail by comparing it to the PC, which compared poorly to mainframes, but was cheap. And, that Clayton Christenson remarked that having a singular facet that is unique and very different, is a good starting point for a revolution.
    • tome 5y ago
      This is not very convincing though, because the cheap, but otherwise poorly-specced PC could do something useful, e.g., run spreadsheets. "Web3" can't do anything useful yet that's not already predicated on its own value, that is, sure you can "transfer value" with Bitcoin or Etherium, but that's predicated on those "tokens" actually having value. Its value is built on itself. The PC on the other hand had fundamental value.
• runako 5y ago
  This argument is simple, but forgets that the Internet has essentially had permission-less databases before, notably in IRC, XMPP, and email. Anyone can run an IRC or XMPP node, anyone can run email. The protocols are open and free (as in money) to use. But time and again the masses of Internet users choose centralized alternatives. It's interesting to see this already playing out in the Web 3 space. Users concentrate transactions on a few (< 50) sites. The space is considered investable by VMS because they expect companies to be able to create lock-in similar to what Slack did with chat or Facebook did with Web forums.
  • leifg 5y ago
    I think the argument made implicitly is that with web3 you could actually monetize your contribution. If you run an IRC server you (usually) only have cost. One part of web3 is tokens so you can actually earn some fake money by running an IRC server. I think if you look at the economics of that though I don't think it will turn out in your favor. You are either making 10ct a month from it or you'll have to heavily invest in hardware to (potentially) turn a profit. The reason some of that works now is because we have an inflated price of tokens and people are speculating on it going up. But that makes it not an appealing service for you to pay for. And all of that forgets that the vast majority of people is not willing to pay anything to use a service. No matter how often web3 people will yell "If you don't pay for it, you're the product".
    • runako 5y ago
      I remember so much of the time I spent on IRC and XMPP overlapped with the period in my life when I had the fewest financial resources. It would have been net negative for me if the popular chat spaces had been accompanied by any kind of toll.
      • malermeister 5y ago
        Big plus to this point. The idea behind web3 seems to be "the web, but everything is an attempt to gauge people for money now". How is that better? Who asked for more money to be involved everywhere? I just want an open space to hang out with people and share ideas and data, I don't want everything to become a gated community.
• mnd999 5y ago
  Enough already, flag this crap off the site.
• undeadsushi 5y ago
  Yes the marketing is annoying, but have you actually experimented with the world of Web3. Have you played with defi, bought in early any gaming tokens? The fact that all of this can happen on-chain where it's completely transparent is really unique. It's why there has been so many companies explode into the 50M-100M revenue range in 2021 - https://consensys.net/reports/web3-report-q3-2021/ https://consensys.net/reports/web3-report-q3-2021/
  • corobo 5y ago
    No, can't afford it
• verdverm 5y ago
  The biggest issue I see for web3 and permissionless data is the same issue we complain about with the Facebook debate... How do we manage the tradeoff between misinformation and censorship? Permissionless swings the pendulum to one extreme which would seem to lead to an existential dilemma.
• kkjjkgjjgg 5y ago
  I hate the name - were we not at web3.0 already? I am rooting for decentralized solutions, but I could barely muster the energy to look up what "web3" is supposed to be.
• johnpanny342 5y ago
• tarkin2 5y ago
  Build something! All this talking makes me suspect this just to increase the hype around and price of various crypto currencies.
• tfang17 5y ago
  A lot of HN hate on Web3... is the alternative to lay down and let big tech win?
• beardedman 5y ago
  The people who are advocating web3 are not the people who were part of building web1 & web2 (whatever those even mean). They're people who are idealistic & seem to disregard (or are ignorant of) the effort in building infrastructure at scale. Building things is hard. Building things that scale even harder & anybody who has worked at a company that needs to scale knows there are trade-offs between security, centralisation, reliability & making things work for the user in a nice way. Web3 is a moot point until somebody actually brings something real to the party. Otherwise, IMO, it's a hype train. EDIT: Ironically, web3 also seems to be able to rip the environment a new one. Which is pretty funny given the demographic of its fans.
  • kinship7 5y ago
    Distributed wireless infrastructure is very real and a pretty clear use case of web3. Helium Network sells wireless routers, and distributes rewards to routers that provide coverage to the network. Tokens are used to purchase network bandwidth. They have nearly 400K hotspots worldwide. It's also not using the energy-intensive Proof of Work consensus algorithm that you're referring to.
  • Zaskoda 5y ago
    I've been building for the Web since 1994. I advocate for Web 3.
    • beardedman 5y ago
      No offense, but my intention was to say people who built the web (infrastructure/protocols), not building for the web.
      • Zaskoda 5y ago
        There's basically one protocol that constitutes the web, http.
• JaggerFoo 5y ago
  I see a few ways where blockchain/token/NFT/DAO technology/structure makes sense for enterprises - unfortunately I can't elaborate. In the U.S., VC's are the only ones that can contribute and speed up projects, since the SEC has no safe harbors that allow smaller startups to innovate. So either do not innovate or try with the worry of the SEC killing your project. It's best for smaller projects to not allow any U.S. investment, but even then you may have a problem. It kind of seems as if the U.S. is protecting Wall Street from Web3 under the guise of protecting retail investors. There are a lot of players that are currently collecting "Economic Rent" that may be displaced by Web3 innovation. But there is also a lot of hype and streams of B.S. on twitter, where I had to unsubscribe to a few of the gurus, and wondered if all they did is produce fodder for the masses Aping into Crypto, so they can be brought to slaughter. Cheers
• snowwrestler 5y ago
  When thinking about web3 I try to maintain a mental distinction between the enthusiasm for new ways of building applications, and the technical capabilities available to do so now. To the extent there is something “there” in web3, I think it is mostly the former—the enthusiasm. I saw someone write that there is a whole generation that grew up in a web dominated by Facebook, YouTube, etc. and they are hungry for a new way of doing things that feels free. I grew up with the original implementation of the WWW so I feel a lot of empathy for this point of view. It felt incredibly exciting and free. That said, the “web3” technology so far seems to be a dumpster fire. NFTs are packed with wash-sale scammers, and smart contracts are super inefficient, or break in expensive ways, or both. Although to be fair the early Web 1.0 was largely a dumpster fire too. :-) I think there is a big risk that the enthusiasm gets coopted by “solutions” that are in fact still centralized and just the old rulers in new clothes. I have to say that seeing so much boosting from rich established VCs does not seem like a good signal in that regard. When I see someone whose job it is to centralize huge control and rewards on behalf of their investors shouting that web3 is freedom from control and centralization… I start to feel dubious.
• csbartus 5y ago
  The single important question about web3 is: will it be free? Can app devs just start building without paying the blockchain / network fee? The same for users; can they just use apps for free? If not, the question is: do you pay with data, and go free, or do you pay with real money and prices skyrocketing due to endless speculations?
  • synapse_soap 5y ago
    App devs can build any app they want on top of these web3 protocols, but their apps may have to pay a fee to interact with those protocols. The fee incentivizes the actors that host (run nodes for) the protocol. That fee may or may not be passed on to users. It's a bit like paying a microtransaction for certain HTTP requests. The amount of times that a user has to pay a fee can be minimized through various pieces of technology like rollups (read about zk rollups and optimistic rollups if you're curious).
  • coffeefirst 5y ago
    And second, will it be easy? Everyone forgot the key to HTML / blogs / youtube / social media was anyone could join and start doing stuff on a Sunday afternoon.
  • csbartus 5y ago
    The author has a famous quote: in the future you’ll have to pay to work. His partner Albert is pushing for the universal basic income. This pictures me a future: a playground for those who willing to pay to work, for the rich, for those pursuing wealth. The rest should rely on the UBI. I’m ok with that. A win-win for both sides. But let’s finally put the cards on the table.
  • Zaskoda 5y ago
    IMO, pay with money. End of story. Expecting services for free got is into this horrible advertising model that turned us into the product rather than customers. There are people promoting gasless, free to use chains. That model is flawed. Financial incentives is what finally made decentralized networks a real thing. For a good explanation as to where we're going with this, read "Who Owns The Future."
• rednerrus 5y ago
  Every commenter in this thread should disclose their web3 holdings as part of their comments. I have a fairly large doge holding that I mined in the very beginning and haven't felt like dealing with.
• nayuki 5y ago
  > users can move from application to application, keeping their data (and their login credentials stored in their wallet) as they go "Keeping their login credentials in their wallet" was already possible a long time ago with client-side TLS/SSL certificates. But web developers didn't want to change from the classic implementation of plaintext passwords. Porting personal data from one service to another is a problem, so I'll give the author a point for that.
• tfang17 5y ago
  Wonder what Fred thinks about having a single-shared database (Ethereum) vs. having multiple shared databases (SOLUNAVAX).
• projectileboy 5y ago
  Centralization of power and money is not a technical problem, and does not have a technical solution. Period.
• ineedasername 5y ago
  One key difference I see is that web 2.0 kind of just emerged and we looked around ourselves and said "Hey, this is different. It's basically version 2 of the web, web 2.0". It happened, and we observed it, and gave it a name, which was then hyped and buzzworded. Web3 seems to be going in the other direction: people have a vision for what the next paradigm shift might be, gave it a name, and are pushing it forward but it's not quite here yet. It might not get here, and if it does it might not be in the form that proponents are hoping for. Magic 8-ball says "situation hazy, ask again later" If we do get a newly decentralized Web3, I suspect the pendulum may then ultimately swing back yet again to centralization with Web4, and so on. So it goes.
• ncphil 5y ago
  Web 3.0 is either snakeoil, or a ponzi scheme. Or both. We'll all know soon enough. After all, it's not like any actual engineers are going to have a say in this: just the donors and their retainers.
• ncphil 5y ago
  Web 3.0 is either snakeoil, or a Ponzi scheme. Or both. We'll all know soon enough. After all, it's not like any actual engineers are going to have a say in this: just the donors and their retainers.
• tmcw 5y ago
  This seems fine. Fred’s up-front about this being a belief and a bet, not an eventuality. That’s what I expect from investors, and what they should be - along with having basic accounting sense.
• theknocker 5y ago
• rndmind 5y ago
• discardedrefuse 5y ago
  I've been noticing this web3 buzzword picking up steam on here for months now. And it all feels very manufactured (much how metaverse has been co-opted and tainted by Facebook). I suspect this web3 push is just cryptobros shoehorning their schemes into relevance. https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?q=web3 https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?q=web3 On the other hand, if you're paying attention, you might have noticed a push back to web1 and even older tech. I hope whatever is next actually springs forth from that movement. Because a platform built around extracting wealth sounds horrible.
  • christopherwxyz 5y ago
    web3.js is the name of the Ethereum API since 2017.
    • legutierr 5y ago
      First commit in this repo is 2014: https://github.com/ethereumproject/web3.js/commits/develop?after=84dc984e4225a1647f33872d8268cfa8e1f4f253+34&branch=develop&path%5B%5D=README.md https://github.com/ethereumproject/web3.js/commits/develop?a...
    • cblconfederate 5y ago
      It didnt become a marketing term until last year. At least, in public perception. And the way "web3" is used by marketers today is disconnected from ethereum's api
    • csbartus 5y ago
      It won't stay long. `web` marks a generally available, free stuff, which ETH isn't. Let's just stick with `crypto`, it suits better.
  • jakear 5y ago
    What a nice use-case for my recent web1* project, google trends for hackernews! Here's a comparison of "metaverse" vs "web3" over the past several months: https://jacksonkearl.github.io/HackerTrends/?query=%22web3%22%2C%22metaverse%22&from=2020&to=2022&bucket=30 https://jacksonkearl.github.io/HackerTrends/?query=%22web3%2... * Not technically web1. It uses `fetch`, but it's a single 100 line HTML file. Web 1.5?
• dools 5y ago
  There is no Web3 yet. Web 2.0 was a buzzword created to describe a group of technologies that made web pages behave more like desktop applications, AFTER those technologies had come to prominence. Web 1.0 was a bunch of communication protocols for publishing network accessible documents. In both cases, the technology preceded the revenue models, and indeed there are a number of disparate revenue models which publishers and developers choose when creating websites, web applications and mobile applications. Web3, however, is an attempt to turn the blockchain, which is a revenue model, into a platform to supercede Web 1.0. It is not in the same evolutionary path as the "first 2 webs" (if you could call them that), it's just a PR driven money grab.
• webinvest 5y ago
  I heard somewhere that Web2 was “Do no evil” and Web3 is “Can’t do evil”.
• Liron 5y ago
  My beef with posts like this is that they think it’s sufficient to make an abstract claim without offering specific supporting examples of the differentiation they’re claiming exists. I wrote a post trying to unpack the abstract claim using specific hypothetical scenarios [1]. I’ve never seen a single pro-Web3 post engaging at the same level of specificity. [1] https://medium.com/bloated-mvp/why-web3s-shared-data-across-applications-doesn-t-matter-e0281d3f70d2 https://medium.com/bloated-mvp/why-web3s-shared-data-across-...
• ChicagoDave 5y ago
  The current state of web3 reminds me of people building new game engines well before any reasonable game could be built on the platform. This happened a lot in the 90's/2000's in the Interactive Fiction community. Smart people would find IF, play a bunch of games, build a game or two, then decide the existing platforms "didn't fit their style or the kinds of features they wanted" and start discussing how _they_ would do it differently. None of those platforms ever saw the light of day. The few platforms that _did_ see success were the ones that were built quietly, the platform designer also became its first author and created a viable, interesting game in the platform to prove its value. I think the proponents of web3 need to stop marketing/pushing it and just go build something. If/when you have something clearly viable, then the rest of us will take a more serious look at what you've invented. And your users/customers can't just be crypto adherents. That's always going to be a limited subset of Internet users. You have to build something _easy to access_ with _clear benefits_. Until then, it's just more vaporware.
  • kinnth 5y ago
    A lot of them are happening right now. The most interesting thing about Web3 is just how much stuff is being built. Really innovative financial models, huge DAO that are beginning to work, NFT communities that actually help people. It's happening right now, just join the discords.
    • ChicagoDave 5y ago
      Discord is a non-starter for wider usage. List any usage that goes beyond crypto users. No one cares about DAO's or NFT's (scam). Give us a real world application that millions of non-crypto users would benefit from?
    • dmitriid 5y ago
      > The most interesting thing about Web3 is just how much stuff is being built The amount of stuff being built is really not interesting. > Really innovative financial models None of those financial models are innovative > NFT communities that actually help people. Yeah, right. > It's happening right now, just join the discords. Yup. The regular cultist words. "Just google it"
• synapse_soap 5y ago
  I think the focus on data openness is overly simplistic. Blockchains like Ethereum, Solana, and Tezos are attracting a lot of brainpower and capital. This is occurring because of price action, for sure, but also because of their ability to allow actors to interact with each other in a way that minimizes the amount of trust required from any single actor in the system. They do this by distributing trust among different actors in the system via an economic game that incentivizes actors to cooperate with the rules defined by the protocol. To put it another way, you're using software, cryptography, and game theory to minimize (not replace) the need for rules and rent-seeking middleman, banks for example. The promise is that this technology will mostly (not completely) replace these middlemen, thereby cutting down on the negative impacts of monopolies, and will democratize the creation and use of financial assets. Some initial use cases: Lending and borrowing. Solend automatically matches borrowers and lenders, allowing lenders to earn interest on any asset on the Solana blockchain. You can currently earn 6% on USD-backed stablecoins, and withdraw at any time. Compare that to your current checking or savings account. Purchasing and creating ETFs. TokenSets allows you to create a financial instrument, called a Set, backed by any tokens you want, in any allocation. The protocol will automatically buy/sell the underlying assets for you. Then, that Set can be traded as well. The possibilities are endless. Distributed wireless infrastructure. Helium Network sells wireless routers, and distributes rewards to routers that provide coverage to the network. Tokens are used to purchase network bandwidth. They have nearly 400K hotspots worldwide. Some more links if you're interested: https://www.preethikasireddy.com/post/what-do-we-mean-by-blockchains-are-trustless https://www.preethikasireddy.com/post/what-do-we-mean-by-blo... https://www.simplilearn.com/tutorials/blockchain-tutorial/what-is-ethereum https://www.simplilearn.com/tutorials/blockchain-tutorial/wh... https://seekingalpha.com/article/4468835-solend-defi-lending-borrowing-on-solana https://seekingalpha.com/article/4468835-solend-defi-lending... https://www.tokensets.com/ https://www.tokensets.com/ https://www.helium.com/ https://www.helium.com/
  • cycrutchfield 5y ago
    > You can currently earn 6% on USD-backed stablecoins, and withdraw at any time. Compare that to your current checking or savings account. Sure, I’m comparing an investment with high counterparty risk to an FDIC-insured savings account. Seems like apples and oranges.
• m3kw9 5y ago
  “ If, on the other hand, the database is an open public database that is not controlled and administered by a single company, but instead is a truly open system available to all, then that kind of market power cannot be built up around a data asset”. When I use a service I hardly think which fat cat I’m feeding. It just has to work good and fast for me.
• mangoman 5y ago
  The linked post in TFA (which is essentially the OP's main argument in favor of web3) describes how the PC won, even though it was deficient in almost every dimension (worse CPU, worse memory, storage, etc) than existing mainframes, except for one dimension: price. It then goes on to describe how blockchain is essentially the same thing - it's a "worse" database in every way, except one: it's not controlled by a single entity The problem with this analogy is that price is a very very different and meaningful dimension than something like memory, or storage. making something cheaper is different than making something faster. Making something faster doesn't make it more accessible. The PC was more accessible than any other computer out there. To compare price to "being controlled by a single entity" is totally wrong. Sure, the data is "accessible" in that it's public, but to use the technology is actually way more expensive than a traditional database. in fact, calling blockchain better while ignoring the price of storing data in the blockchain is like, exactly the opposite reason why the PC won! I'm actually pro making data way more accessible, and I wonder if there's a web3 app out there that isn't some sort of financial instrument, and not about hoarding tokens in the hope that the price for them goes up, but actually about distributing data ownership in a way that people who didn't "get in early" can actually have a seat at the table.
• bradgranath 5y ago
  Forget the nonsense words for a second, if someone showed up offering you an "investment" that could double your money overnight, you ALREADY know it is a scam. How does shouting "blockchain" a lot make it somehow less scammy?
  • bradgranath 5y ago
    I get the ideals of DeFi, but it all runs on physical sandblasters, in brick buildings, built inside nation states. It's a nice LARP, but it isn't real, until you can somehow decouple it from the planet and our ecosystem.
• zhte415 5y ago
  We already have Web 3.0. It consists of walled gardens of pushed content where acquiring a user means capturing a user by making it as impractical as possible to leave. But no one shouts about this. The 'new' web should be about optimism, growth, right? That's what justifies future 'value'. Web 2.0 peaked a little more than a decade. An era of 'pulling', actual recommendations from people, of bigenoughtopaybills for heavy content but sufficiently decentralised to have competition. It is easier than ever to do something and that's what petrifies incumbents into closing their gates as tightly as they can. For you are the treasure they hoard.
• 1vuio0pswjnm7 5y ago
  Why does "Web3" need venture capital. More specifically, why are VC pushing for Web3.
  • cblconfederate 5y ago
    I can only assume they have invested a lot in ETH mining because gas fees are insane
• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• tempestn 5y ago
  I agree with the comparison to the early web, but this is 1999, not 2003. I'm sure we'll find actual applications for blockchain tech eventually. Some will even be matured versions of what exists currently in DeFi and such. But just like every time people say, "This time it's different," it isn't. We're clearly in a bubble fueled by speculation and hype, and I expect it'll deflate eventually.
• tehjoker 5y ago
  This is trying to solve a social problem (capitalism concentrates power and is anti-democratic) with a technical solution. Just provision services using tax dollars with democratically accountable boards and you get "permissionless data" by posting the database online with additional support provisioned on a sliding scale based on ability to pay with a large free tier.
• arcticbull 5y ago
  > It all comes down to the database that sits behind an application. If that database is controlled by a single entity (think company, think big tech), then enormous market power accrues to the owner/administrator of that database. This is entirely a false premise. Market power accrues to the popular, no matter how structured.
• Ambolia 5y ago
  The blockchain can be interesting for a small part of a process that requires an immutable public history. For everything else needed in a distributed internet we should look at the Bittorrent / Scihub / Pirate world that has been delivering distributed content and value for decades from day 1. But that part will not make money to anybody, just value to a lot of people.
  • FireInsight 5y ago
    Is it time to start promoting this age-old and non-blockchain decentralized web? I saw an article that called it ''web4'', wouldn't that be a good buzzword to use?
• omandi 5y ago
  Before I heard about web3, I started thinking about some of the same questions that are trying to be answered by web3. How can I start using systems where I own my data and control access to it via tools? Is it possible to shift towards tools that can use my data in a common format but allow me to switch tools? What should be free and what do I pay for? What is identity - how do I prove that I am who I say I am? Those are the questions I had before hearing about web3, so to me it has become an umbrella term to loosely define the conversation space about these questions (and many other related ones that I didn't originally have).