Original Title: "Web3 Critique Revelation"

Author: ROBIN SLOAN
Translator: DRD

In recent months, you may have seen people describing "Web3" with excitement (or curiosity, or astonishment). This term implies that many future internet services may transform into forms centered around virtual assets. The ownership and control of these services allow them to be divided among holders, including different users and different groups. Virtual assets also have exchange value, so as a user, you might understand it as: cashing out?

Kvindedansen i Megara, 1888-1889, Niels Skovgaard

Ethereum is at the center of most of the work------hey, who named the client library web3.js? So interpreting "ao" as "Ethereum-driven internet" makes sense.

This message was sent via email to the Media Lab Committee. The target audience is those who have a rough idea of what Web3 should look like but are unsure how to view it. (Here’s more about the target audience.)

If you are already convinced that Web3 is the future of the world internet computer system: then this article is not for you. Look elsewhere!

Instead, this is for those who are still somewhat cautiously curious.

To be frank: I am not only a skeptic but a full-fledged enemy of Web3. I hope my hostility doesn’t disappear immediately: "He’s a hater; he’s old-fashioned; he doesn’t understand technology." In fact, I’m 41 years old! However, as evidence of mitigating circumstances: I write science fiction; I am deeply curious about the future of the internet; I even created a popular NFT project.

I do not intend to achieve any grand rhetorical effects with the article below; I just want to provide them with a slight counterweight to the growing hype. I think Web3 can impress those who are interested in or concerned about the future of the internet… so, in a sense, I am publishing this article for other versions of myself (feeling a bit split personality \^_\^) Hello everyone!

Here’s my understanding of Web3:

It’s for the kids. I mean that in a good way! I think Web3 resonates strongly with young people because it feels like something entirely new, and it might really belong to them. Who would dispute that feeling? Not me, anyway.

I believe the drive behind Web3 comes from both excitement and fatigue. This isn’t immediately obvious, but I believe it’s there, lurking beneath the surface. If you are 22 now, Twitter has existed since you learned to read. YouTube has been as constant as the stars. I can hardly imagine what it feels like to grow up with these new things at such a young age, but I guess it’s a bit like claustrophobia?

I clearly remember the tumult of the late 2000s, with a new social network bursting onto the scene every week! I lived in San Francisco, where people were doing things in the city’s South Park. This amusing bubble turned into a series of dramatic figures stepping onto the historical stage, which have fundamentally remained unchanged over the years. So, Web3 has arrived------the allure of NEW OPTIONS cannot be overstated.

Many supporters of Web3 see themselves as disruptors, but "tokenizing everything" is nothing more than a continuation of "marketizing everything." "Marketizing everything" began in the 1970s, achieved great success, and has been ongoing. To some extent, the internet is a breakthrough------"Where’s the money?" web 2.0 has been evasive, while Web3 attempts to seal it completely.

A large part of Web3’s appeal comes from the value of underlying cryptocurrencies. Therefore, a good question might be: if these assets are worth nothing in dollars, would you still be curious about Web3? For some, the answer is "yes, of course," because they still find the puzzle appealing. For others, if they answer honestly, the answer is "unlikely."

My NFT project wasn’t completed in 2019 or 2020; I created it in early 2021 because a wave of hype made me feel like my screen was exploding. I wanted to strike it rich! That’s my honesty!

"I’m brainless, but money is the real brain of everything. But how can the owner of money be brainless? And with money, he can hire smart people for himself; isn’t the one who controls the smart people smarter than the smart people? I, with money, can do everything humanity desires; don’t I also possess all human capabilities? Therefore, can’t my money reverse all my incompetence?"

Money confuses the evaluation system; it’s like observing a star next to the sun. Of course, the internet in 2000 was the same; if this is a cycle, what should we do?

The term Web3 is derived from "web 2.0," which became popular in the 21st century to describe a new generation of websites and online platforms. Philosophically, the success of Web 2.0 is incomplete, at least to say: the ambition to exchange data between platforms in a modular, permissioned manner has effectively died------or been stifled. With that in mind, I think Web3 is a great term to describe a series of new ideas because it will certainly function in the same way: influencing the direction of the internet, but incompletely and unpredictably.

Even in their respective stages of development, the internet and Web 2.0 are no more than that… relying on self-reference? They are other things outside themselves, like science, coffee pots, links, and camera lenses. And Web3, broadly speaking, is about Web3 itself.

Web3 is best understood as a game, or a game within a game. I’m not being sarcastic: it really is a great game! Vast and open, highly social, with many points to count, and you can win real money? I mean, that’s fantastic.

Web3 promises to reward "users"------it might even just be a fairness, but Ethereum knows nothing about this for users, only wallets. A user can control multiple wallets; a scientist can control multiple wallets; Ethereum cannot distinguish and does not particularly care. Therefore, the governance tools of Web3 are suitable for approaching the decision-making process of a limited liability company, but not for true democracy. True democracy should be equitable and respect non-labor contributions------the value of a person!

The cryptocurrency Worldcoin, with its retinal scanning spheres, is one attempt to address this issue. There’s a group of people in the world. They are tangled up, trying to find their identity in the universe of wallets.

A world full of wallets.

I have a hunch that there’s something akin to Gödel’s incompleteness theorem in Web3 governance. Remember: The DAO------it was the first of its kind, and all existing DAOs derive their name from it------it was such a failure that it required a fork of Ethereum. The active Friends With Benefits "social token" was hacked, and its restructuring was not conducted through Web3 governance mechanisms, but through "external" management via Twitter, Medium, and Discord. This situation will continue to happen!

Is a "Web3" that relies on Twitter for marketing and coordination channels truly legitimate? You might say, "Oh, wait; Web3 will create its own Twitter." No, it won’t. Such platforms are useless for Web3 because no one will recruit?

I feel there’s a simple fundamental question that often disappears in the fog: the Ethereum Virtual Machine, the core of Web3, is a computer that charges you a lot of dollars to execute a very small program, and it’s very slow. It operates in an environment with special properties, some of which are worth paying for. In other cases, it’s like running your website on a TRS-80 (the world’s first laptop).

TRS-80 Computer

A key feature of most, if not all, blockchains is actually an aesthetic------immutability. After all, they are essentially ledgers. However, these days, in terms of the internet, I find myself more interested in the opposite; wandering between volatility and transience. I like things that can change and grow, and then disappear.

I am a super fan of deleting things, which is an operation contrary to Web3.

When we lose the ability to delete, what else do we have to lose?

At this point, Ethereum will continue to exist (at least for 10 years), which means Web3 might too. I hope to see it break through various barriers into finance and finance-related fields: speculative hype games.

Here, I will conclude with appropriate praise: Ethereum should inspire everyone interested in the future of the internet because it powerfully demonstrates the possibility of implementing new rules. I do not believe Web3 is an ideal or even acceptable path for web development, but I will take its lessons well. "Less talk, more code!" Clubs and cults are the same; let’s wait and see.

Source link: society.robinsloan.com