Is Web3 a Scam?

[Kovah]

Can anybody tell me why so many people think that Web 3 = NFTs + crypto currencies? NFTs and crypto currencies are a part of what people think the Web 3.0 will be, but they are definitely not synonyms. The author, however, seem to have did that.

[stephen_g]

Because cryptocurrency and NFT people are the ones who came up with the current "web3" concept and are the ones pushing the whole thing. Personally, I expect the real "next-generation" of the web will turn out to be something different (who knows exactly what at this point though!), but this small set of people are trying to tie cryptocurrency and NFTs into the very definition of next-generation web.

[jasode]

>NFTs and crypto currencies are a part of what people think the Web 3.0 will be, but they are definitely not synonyms. The author, however, seem to have did that.

Regardless of the original or intended definitions of "Web3", it will end up being whatever the masses think it is. To recap some history:

- "web3" circa ~2014 when coined by Gavin Wood covered 3 concepts without mentioning NFTs : (1) hash-ids of static content instead of urls (2) p2p encrypted messaging (3) consensus engine. (One of the earlier essays from 2014: https://gavwood.com/web3lt.html)

- "web3" circa ~2021 emphasizing the "token economy" (e.g. NFTs) popularized by Chris Dixon (a16z VC): this is the current news mania with celebrities selling jpgs, etc

Therefore "web3==NFTs" narrative has overtaken the original Gavin Wood narrative.

Analogous situation of evolution of terms was the "internet". In the 1980s, "internet" included Gopher, telnet, USENET, ftp. (E.g. I used to be able to telnet into public computers before all firewalls and Linux configs shut off telnet access.) But Gopher/USENET/etc faded and HTTP became the dominant idea of what "internet" is.

NFTs now have constant press coverage of eye-popping sale amounts from celebrities and OpenSea founders are now paper billionaires. Therefore, NFTs dominate the meaning of "web3" because getting rich is more sexy to talk about than encrypted-p2p-communications-based-on-hash-identities.

[paganel]

Not the author, but an article on web3 from earlier today that was shared in here was almost only focusing on NFTs + money (I guess crypto). I haven't followed the subject all that close but I can't say that I have read other descriptions of it, i.e. something that wasn't focused on how to make money.

[mypastself]

Yeah, the other article critical of Web3 currently on the frontpage (written by Moxie) tries to understand the technology and develop an actual thesis. This one is comparatively extremely shallow, and the author seems proud of his ignorance of the topic.

[chrisco255]

The term Web3 was coined by Gavin Wood, Co-founder of Ethereum and Polkadot as well as the Web3 Foundation (https://web3.foundation/about/).

The crypto community is the biggest part of the push for it, so it's natural that people would make that connection.

However, I consider any web tech that has user ownership or decentralization as a principle to be Web3. Some non-crypto examples would be Mastadon, Matrix, GunDB, and IPFS (although IPFS does have crypto-backed pinning services, such as Filecoin and Arweave, IPFS itself is agnostic to crypto).

[cblconfederate]

web3 is a marketing term, and this is absolutely how it is marketed.

TBH i think it is a good thing. Web3 and the finance bros that popularize it should die with it, and we should keep working with the truly decentralized fundamentals, not with intermediaries.

[omgtehlion]

Because this is how "web3" is marketed (pushed) to masses...

[amelius]

Let's skip to Web4, where power consumption reduction and overconsumption reduction are the main drivers, not money.

[nudpiedo]

Here is the why:

At the moment NFTs + crypto cover up to 95% of web3’s marketing visible functionalities.

Additionally no killer “app” has been shown to the public where it demonstrate an intangible value over previous technology, at least that the public understands it.

[grey-area]

Can you tell me what you think web3 is in concrete terms? What problems does it solve?

[i386]

If you have to ask, then it is a scam.

[capableweb]

This seems incorrect very quickly. When the internet and the web was first encountered, lots of people asked themselves that question. Turns out, protocols and concepts aren't scams, it's people who do the scamming.

[yawnxyz]

most things are scams to some degree (the US educational system, degrees from mediocre institutions, US health insurance, corporations like Amazon and Facebook, the meat industry, the prison industry), yet we have to live with them

[kburman]

When did web3 became cryto? I have seen a recent push on us about web3 being crypto. Is this some kind of propaganda?

[heckerhut]

It’s a rebranding that’s underway mostly driven by US actors having decided to make this mainstream in the next 3-5yrs. It’s pretty well executed, look at eg recent senate hearing with crypto high rollers

[factorialboy]

Where may I see the source code for the "Web3" TODO app?

How complex is that source code?

Are centralized APIs used in order to access the "decentralized" Ethereum blockchain?

[jstanley]

> Are centralized APIs used in order to access the "decentralized" Ethereum blockchain?

(I was looking at this stuff a few years ago, it may be different now).

"web3" is an object provided to JavaScript by either the browser (e.g. Brave[0]) or a browser extension (e.g. MetaMask[1]). In the case of Brave it uses a local ethereum client to access the ethereum blockchain. In the case of MetaMask it uses MetaMask's centralised servers, but the API presented to the web page is the same in either case.

Re the complexity of the TODO app: I don't know that a TODO app is particularly a good use case. But for comparison, I once wrote a toy Dapp that would handle escrow (i.e. person A makes a payment to person B, but it only goes through when person C allows it, alternatively person C can send it back to person A). It was maybe 20 lines of code for the smart contract and a similar amount for the user interface.

[0] https://brave.com/

[1] https://metamask.io/

[galaxyLogic]

Web3 will be a web where everyone has anonymous identity, meaning they are identified by their crypto-wallets. There is no need to authenticate yourself except once, to your crypto-wallet. You don't have to create accounts anywhere, your crypto-account is all you need.

Of course you can have multiple separate identities, meaning multiple separate crypto-wallets, if you wish.

[wruza]

Is that different from just having a keypair on a stick? I mean without this crypto currency appendix.

[adflux]

Is that authentication watertight and if not, who will make sure that I can obtain a new password if I forget or lose the old one?

[soupshield]

I find it a bit strange that in this system my identity is conflated with my wallet.

[pintxo]

whats preventing you today to be anonymous on the internet?

[pintxo]

Could someone try to explain to me what "keep our digital identities sealed" even means?

[aaccount]

Yes! and so is anything based on blockchain

[quickthrower2]

Why web3 not Web 3.0?

[fivefifty]

I remember Web 3.0 was first a thing maybe 15 years ago when talking about the 'Semantic web', i.e. interchangeable meta data standards etc. That was mostly boring data stuff to 'normal people', so never really took off into the mainstream like 'Web 2.0' did when referencing social media/user generated content.

Then several years later I heard about 'Web 3.0' again, but this time most referring more to the 'internet of things', which seemed to get a bit more traction for a short time, usually around mundane household devices like internet connected fridges and toasters before also disappearing as most of those things never really took off with consumers.

Now for whatever reason it's come back again, but this time rebranded as 'web3' probably to sound more contemporary as web 3.0 sounds very mid 2000s now. This time whoever is driving this is trying to make it about crypto/decentralization etc. as if it's a new thing even though I feel that's kinda been a thing for a quite while now.

[thinkingemote]

Web 2.0 was the crowd - all about people contributing and talking together online.

Web3 is all about people buying and selling things.

The bad smell is strong.

[egeozcan]

Because we never used the minor version and it doesn't have any practical value?

I mean I dislike the giant ponzi scheme but they do have a cool name, I'll give them that.

[IshKebab]

Why `web` at all? As far as I can tell it has nothing to do with the web. Has anyone made a "dApp" that actually lets you run websites?

[tudorw]

Personally I like WW3 :)