14 Comments

I don't understand why cryptocurrency is important here. If somebody subscribes to a Substack newsletter, they're paying directly for content in the same way as in your web3 diagram, but there's no blockchain involved. What does a blockchain let you do that you couldn't do with classic Internet technologies? And if you could do this stuff with classic technologies, then why should we expect the emergency of cryptocurrencies (or other changes?) to lead to a deep change in the economic structure of the Internet?

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You can do a lot of aligned types of things with subscription models + web2, for sure. I'm have a followup post with concrete examples of the kinds of possibilities distributed ledger tech opens up.

My short answer, though, is that on web3 the money and the messaging are integrated. There's no moment where you get out a credit card and enter a number and do a little hoop jumping and pay. The friction is lower because there's no necessary boundary between sending money and sending comms.

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Another way to put it:

Web2: If one of Alice, Bob, or Carol has some coding skills, a credit card, and a Stripe account, they can set up any kind of arrangement they want for sending money and messages around.

Web3 right now: If one of Alice, Bob, or Carol is an elite nerd coder, and all three of them can figure out how to buy crypto and send it around, then they can set up any kind of arrangement they want for sending money and messages around.

Web3 one day: Alice, Bob, and Carol are mildly tech-savvy normies with some crypto in their wallets, and they can set up any kind of arrangement they want for sending money and messages around with a few clicks -- sort of like Zapier but for money.

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You're describing front end solutions that the vast majority of people will offload to whatever front end offers better features / pricing. Those front ends will get paid via ads or SaaS just like email, podcasts, web pages, and rest of decentralized web1. I don't get what about the specific technology of web3 means it doesn't end up with centralized front ends monetizing users just like today.

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I'm curious who's going to develop the "Zapier"-like infrastructure, and would they get paid for developing that? If so, how?

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whats the price of a tweet? a second of video?

I can assure you, whatever it is, your bank won't allow it, so everyone has to work around that by dealing in wholesale quantities

whereas on lets say btc, a single user can pay 0.000000001 for its tweet of the day, no need for a million others to collude on this action

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If cryptocurrencies were more about a reasonable way to do micropayments, and less about scammy techbros spruiking get rich quick schemes with a side-order of guns & prepping libertarianism, it'd be so much more interesting.

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someone has a perception of crypto that hasn't been updated since 2014.

Imagine someone proclaiming the internet to be nothing but chat rooms, porno, and bulletin boards in the year 2006. That's your comment, sir.

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Very interesting article, and I agree agree with Jeff’s comment. I just can’t see how enough people are going to care about this to make any difference. If you’re saying that the millions of Americans who are getting their news from Facebook are going to be even remotely interested in Web3 and all of its benefits, I find that very difficult to believe.

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O.K....I will admit I'm a novice reader....but having a web content that has block chain gives me the freedom to send monies..or communication without being a slave to the way Facebook...Google...and others manipulate and control my present content and decide what or how I can move said money and view content..under the control of thier algorithms. I'm for it. AM I BEING Simplistic???

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this subject is complicated by Crypto. most folks cant afford to buy a $60,000 crypto coin or partial coin when the value is SOOO volatile i.e. risky. A majority of Americans hate inflation. Crypto currency is the primary roadblock to a successful Web3.0 rollout.

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Another question — I understand that regulations and censorship are not universally good, but in some cases, such as the spread of conspiracy theories or false rumors (in pre-capitalist society, there were still fake news/rumors/false accusations, not for the sake of getting views/unique audience, but for the sake of shifting the public opinion. people will spread fake news not to get unique audience * conversion, but to spread fake news), what does web3 have in place to regulate those content? Who's there to identify and intervene in money laundering activities, or child pornography?

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as with every hard problem in web3 and blockchains, carefully designed incentives will take care of this. You can achieve literally anything if you design a system where it's in the token holders' selfish interest to maintain X trait (eliminate fake news, money laundering, child porn, etc)

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Nov 11, 2021
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The minuscule proportion of the <0.5% of the people who are working on how to roll out these gains to the billions of people who are about to come online will have the answer to your question.

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