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> Web3 has decentralization, freedom of speech, anti-gatekeeping, permissionlessness and inclusiveness, at its core. We already have all of that in the existin

> Web3 has decentralization, freedom of speech, anti-gatekeeping, permissionlessness and inclusiveness, at its core. We already have all of that in the existing web infrastructure, and have had it since the very beginning. I can spin up a HTTP server on a raspberry pi running in my basement right now and anyone on the internet can access it for free and without any hinderence. With web3 there is gatekeeping and centralisation as I cannot spin up my own server any more without buying crypto and then paying someone on a centralised database just so that I can do everything I could do before for free on my own.

chrisco255 5y ago
> With web3 there is gatekeeping and centralisation as I cannot spin up my own server any more without buying crypto and then paying someone on a centralised database just so that I can do everything I could do before for free on my own. Web3 includes all of the previous web technologies and adds optional layers on top. It is a superset of all web tech. You can totally setup an HTTP server on a Raspberry Pi, that's totally still Web3, but good luck building a truly scalable multi-million user application and competing with AWS on that. If your app is such that it relies on user-generated content, it wouldn't be Web3 for you to host it exclusively on your Pi, because the users generating the content would not own it, or have guarantees that the data on the Pi was not being manipulated or misused by you. The key idea of Web3 is user ownership and community ownership. > With web3 there is gatekeeping and centralisation as I cannot spin up my own server any more without buying crypto and then paying someone on a centralised database just so that I can do everything I could do before for free on my own. You can set up your stack however you like. You don't even have to be using cryptocurrency for payments to be "Web3". You could, for example, allow someone to login with their Ethereum wallet and use their ENS domain name as a username in your chat app rather than adding Google Auth. That doesn't even require a transaction on the blockchain, it's just verifying a cryptographic signature.
- root_axis 5y ago
  > allow someone to login with their Ethereum wallet and use their ENS domain name as a username in your chat app rather than adding Google Auth You're basically describing OpenID, which predates cryptocurrency by several years.
  - chrisco255 5y ago
    Any tech that embraces decentralization and user ownership is considered Web3, in my mind. And any website or application that leverages that technology as a first-class citizen is considered to be Web3, in my mind. It does not have to be cryptocurrency related. That being said, I think EVM-compatible wallet login will be stickier and have broader network effects as there are exclusive services you cannot access without it (unlike OpenId, which is merely an alternative to other logins). There is also a major economic incentive to build user-friendly wallet experiences (such as Rainbow, Argent, and Dharma mobile apps) as well as browser plug-ins (Metamask, Coinbase Wallet, etc) and hardware devices (Ledger, GridPlus, etc) and I think that ecosystem of competition is going to produce some big UX wins that OpenId will never really be able to compete with.
  - robryan 5y ago
    Which has basically failed, probably because of complexity for regular users. I don't know much about the crypto version of this, but it is probably more complex for a new user to get started with.
- kortilla 5y ago
  Using certificate identities for logging in has been a thing since the 90s. It was (and is) still way better than passwords. The problem is that someone loses the cert and getting new ones is a usability disaster. Websites intentionally switched to passwords because it was easier for users to understand. Web3 offers no breakthroughs here.
  - chrisco255 5y ago
    Yes, when combined with ENS, I believe it does. An Ethereum wallet linked with an ENS domain name is: 1) human readable 2) has an on-chain history that is verifiable and reviewable (important for establishing reputation in social applications) 3) benefits from UX improvements in Ethereum wallets, such as Argent's social recovery feature (https://www.argent.xyz/blog/argent-secure-decentralised-ethereum-wallet-recovery/ https://www.argent.xyz/blog/argent-secure-decentralised-ethe...) as well as secure hardware wallets (which address the concern about losing a cert) 4) builds on the network effects of EVM-compatible wallets which makes the experience more familiar to more users 5) can integrate other features such as ENS-linked profile pictures, NFT verification, payments, crypto-based crowdfunding and donations seamlessly 6) user-owned Can also drop the ENS altogether and embrace anonymity if the user or application desires. Still benefits from most of the above.
- lewispollard 5y ago
  > If your app is such that it relies on user-generated content, it wouldn't be Web3 for you to host it exclusively on your Pi, because the users generating the content would not own it, or have guarantees that the data on the Pi was not being manipulated or misused by you. The key idea of Web3 is user ownership and community ownership. Aren't most NFT assets hosted on cloud platforms? OpenSea on GCP for example
  - chrisco255 5y ago
    No. OpenSea is a centralized NFT marketplace not unlike how Coinbase is a centralized marketplace for fungible cryptocurrencies. OpenSea uses GCP for hosting. But OpenSea does not own your NFTs nor choose where NFTs are hosted. OpenSea does use GCP as a caching layer for NFTs, since it's not scalable to fetch from thousands of different sources at load time. An NFT is created by deploying a smart contract, and the creator of that contract is free to choose how that asset is hosted. Some NFTs are made entirely of on-chain (typically SVG) assets. Some choose IPFS and post the verifiable hash of the file on the blockchain (much smaller footprint and particularly important for large files). IPFS content must be pinned or hosted in order to guarantee availability and a lot of projects will rely on Filecoin or Arweave for decentralized archival of these assets. They may also host a pinning service on one of the big 3 cloud platforms for additional availability and responsiveness. In that case, even if the content was booted from the cloud co's site, the community could easily fall back on Filecoin or Arweave pin and move their content to another caching layer, with users having guarantee that the data matches the IPFS hash. And then again, some NFT projects do centrally host the content and metadata, and do so intentionally so that they can add interactivity or upgrades. For some NFTs, that's perfectly fine. It really depends on the goals of the creator. Not everything has to be perfectly pure. It's a spectrum of choice and optionality for users and makers. If you only want to purchase decentralized NFTs, then check the baseURI and contractURI of the contract (https://etherscan.io/token/0x1CB1A5e65610AEFF2551A50f76a87a7d3fB649C6#readContract https://etherscan.io/token/0x1CB1A5e65610AEFF2551A50f76a87a7... as an example).
    - lewispollard 5y ago
      Thanks for the clarification.
int_19h 5y ago
> and anyone on the internet can access it for free and without any hinderence. Well, right up until their ISP blocks your website. Or the DNS root removes your record.

chrisco255 5y ago

> With web3 there is gatekeeping and centralisation as I cannot spin up my own server any more without buying crypto and then paying someone on a centralised database just so that I can do everything I could do before for free on my own. Web3 includes all of the previous web technologies and adds optional layers on top. It is a superset of all web tech. You can totally setup an HTTP server on a Raspberry Pi, that's totally still Web3, but good luck building a truly scalable multi-million user application and competing with AWS on that. If your app is such that it relies on user-generated content, it wouldn't be Web3 for you to host it exclusively on your Pi, because the users generating the content would not own it, or have guarantees that the data on the Pi was not being manipulated or misused by you. The key idea of Web3 is user ownership and community ownership. > With web3 there is gatekeeping and centralisation as I cannot spin up my own server any more without buying crypto and then paying someone on a centralised database just so that I can do everything I could do before for free on my own. You can set up your stack however you like. You don't even have to be using cryptocurrency for payments to be "Web3". You could, for example, allow someone to login with their Ethereum wallet and use their ENS domain name as a username in your chat app rather than adding Google Auth. That doesn't even require a transaction on the blockchain, it's just verifying a cryptographic signature.

root_axis 5y ago
> allow someone to login with their Ethereum wallet and use their ENS domain name as a username in your chat app rather than adding Google Auth You're basically describing OpenID, which predates cryptocurrency by several years.
- chrisco255 5y ago
  Any tech that embraces decentralization and user ownership is considered Web3, in my mind. And any website or application that leverages that technology as a first-class citizen is considered to be Web3, in my mind. It does not have to be cryptocurrency related. That being said, I think EVM-compatible wallet login will be stickier and have broader network effects as there are exclusive services you cannot access without it (unlike OpenId, which is merely an alternative to other logins). There is also a major economic incentive to build user-friendly wallet experiences (such as Rainbow, Argent, and Dharma mobile apps) as well as browser plug-ins (Metamask, Coinbase Wallet, etc) and hardware devices (Ledger, GridPlus, etc) and I think that ecosystem of competition is going to produce some big UX wins that OpenId will never really be able to compete with.
- robryan 5y ago
  Which has basically failed, probably because of complexity for regular users. I don't know much about the crypto version of this, but it is probably more complex for a new user to get started with.
kortilla 5y ago
Using certificate identities for logging in has been a thing since the 90s. It was (and is) still way better than passwords. The problem is that someone loses the cert and getting new ones is a usability disaster. Websites intentionally switched to passwords because it was easier for users to understand. Web3 offers no breakthroughs here.
- chrisco255 5y ago
  Yes, when combined with ENS, I believe it does. An Ethereum wallet linked with an ENS domain name is: 1) human readable 2) has an on-chain history that is verifiable and reviewable (important for establishing reputation in social applications) 3) benefits from UX improvements in Ethereum wallets, such as Argent's social recovery feature (https://www.argent.xyz/blog/argent-secure-decentralised-ethereum-wallet-recovery/ https://www.argent.xyz/blog/argent-secure-decentralised-ethe...) as well as secure hardware wallets (which address the concern about losing a cert) 4) builds on the network effects of EVM-compatible wallets which makes the experience more familiar to more users 5) can integrate other features such as ENS-linked profile pictures, NFT verification, payments, crypto-based crowdfunding and donations seamlessly 6) user-owned Can also drop the ENS altogether and embrace anonymity if the user or application desires. Still benefits from most of the above.
lewispollard 5y ago
> If your app is such that it relies on user-generated content, it wouldn't be Web3 for you to host it exclusively on your Pi, because the users generating the content would not own it, or have guarantees that the data on the Pi was not being manipulated or misused by you. The key idea of Web3 is user ownership and community ownership. Aren't most NFT assets hosted on cloud platforms? OpenSea on GCP for example
- chrisco255 5y ago
  No. OpenSea is a centralized NFT marketplace not unlike how Coinbase is a centralized marketplace for fungible cryptocurrencies. OpenSea uses GCP for hosting. But OpenSea does not own your NFTs nor choose where NFTs are hosted. OpenSea does use GCP as a caching layer for NFTs, since it's not scalable to fetch from thousands of different sources at load time. An NFT is created by deploying a smart contract, and the creator of that contract is free to choose how that asset is hosted. Some NFTs are made entirely of on-chain (typically SVG) assets. Some choose IPFS and post the verifiable hash of the file on the blockchain (much smaller footprint and particularly important for large files). IPFS content must be pinned or hosted in order to guarantee availability and a lot of projects will rely on Filecoin or Arweave for decentralized archival of these assets. They may also host a pinning service on one of the big 3 cloud platforms for additional availability and responsiveness. In that case, even if the content was booted from the cloud co's site, the community could easily fall back on Filecoin or Arweave pin and move their content to another caching layer, with users having guarantee that the data matches the IPFS hash. And then again, some NFT projects do centrally host the content and metadata, and do so intentionally so that they can add interactivity or upgrades. For some NFTs, that's perfectly fine. It really depends on the goals of the creator. Not everything has to be perfectly pure. It's a spectrum of choice and optionality for users and makers. If you only want to purchase decentralized NFTs, then check the baseURI and contractURI of the contract (https://etherscan.io/token/0x1CB1A5e65610AEFF2551A50f76a87a7d3fB649C6#readContract https://etherscan.io/token/0x1CB1A5e65610AEFF2551A50f76a87a7... as an example).
  - lewispollard 5y ago
    Thanks for the clarification.

int_19h 5y ago

> and anyone on the internet can access it for free and without any hinderence. Well, right up until their ISP blocks your website. Or the DNS root removes your record.