This post is pretty esoteric and borderline taboo but that is precisely why it’s needed right now.
The transition from Web 2.0 to 3.0 is really about adding another layer on top of all the existing pieces. When added up over the course of a decade, it’ll be a seismic shift in how the world exchanges value with people on an individual level.
Dare I say it will coincide with a psycho-spiritual evolution of people.
Technology has a habit of doing this when the need arises. We appear to co-evolve with it. Look at the printing press. Information now in the people locus of control to be interpreted by and for the people. With it came a new power balance between people and the church which was the power of the time.
The industrial revolution proved that mere mortals could create and shape the world through invention and group effort. The new world was forged with individual freedoms as central to the narrative. What followed was arguably the greatest leap in the planetary quality of life and life expectancy ever seen.
The information age we’re living through now spread innovation out 1000 fold and then reshaped our collective society. The first layer of the internet called the world wide web was built and for a short time, people began to exchange information freely and see eye to eye.
Maybe it was a glimmer of 90’s optimism mixed with science fiction dreams of cyberspace, but eventually, we began to speak in the common language of Meme.
The web seemed like it would unite us. Socially the walls began to come down, and progressivism and equality became mainstream. It started to level the playing field. Incumbents and large businesses needed to stay relevant or face rapid extinction.
That leads us to today, where the virtues and morals a person or organization holds can be feigned with a colorful logo, acting as almost a camouflage to say, “I’m part of your tribe”. The reality is often different, and the business models are just catching up to a point where the bottom line is affected by whether the business is genuinely aligned with the target customer or not.
We’re seeing the companies with their ethos baked in “The Why”, are the ones who succeed as larger older corporate entities struggle to make sense of the consumer battlefield. Look at Allbirds, or any XYZ eco-friendly, socially conscious, upcycled material, perfect niche product X. They resonate, they have a mission, they know why they are in business and the people they serve.
Web 3.0 will only make this more apparent by putting the individual more in control of their consumer experience. Starting with personal data locked away, connected to highly encrypted wallets, anonymized when needed to be, and unmasked when unneeded. You decide.
Using your divining rod
NFT’s, Crypto, Blockchain, and the “Metaverse”, all just buzzwords for additional layers of the information age that when put together over a relatively short span of time are inverting the consumer power pyramid.
With great power comes an increase in responsibility of the individual.
How we use our technology to better inform and come into coherence with one another to build a better civilization is still a challenge of epic proportions. But what were the last 30 years of self-help guides for if not a primer for allowing you to have your power back? We are the government, we are the news media, we are the innovation in the health care sector. What we truly want, and need, we invent, we get.
Increased transparency, community engagement, and decentralization will show us this more starkly.
It might do us well to take a step back and pick up some history and philosophy books. Understanding language better, logic, natural laws, and having the same sense of inquisitiveness philosophers of ancient times had would serve our society well. We need fresh eyes and first principles thinking. It seems to work for the current richest person on the planet.
Because information flow is moving from centralized sources to smaller estuaries, you may encounter people who have a completely different set of data points than you. Chances are you have both been exposed to mainstream narratives data points, but you may have your own set and perspective on them, having a conversation and being open-minded to new information can help broaden an understanding of any topic. Like early-day explorers, you may discover land which is new to you (metaphorically), and with it comes new cultural experiences.
Don’t believe me? Try diving headfirst into the early world of NFT’s. Get a crypto wallet going, connect it to the world’s largest Non-Fungible Token Marketplace. Find a collectible set of art, join that community’s Discord channel. There you’ll find a whole new lingo and subcultures coming together around this new blend of ownership, technology, and art
Panning for gold
Whether your first NFT purchase rises or falls in value over time is really like predicting a change in wind direction. All you can know is it will change. You can really do your best to judge the community by taking part in it. Will you get “rugged”, or have the floor price skyrocket is largely going to be an educated guess at best. But if the artwork speaks to you, and if the community resonates with you, and you got in low enough, chances are you won’t regret the experience.
If you still don’t see the point of ownership of these unique digital assets, the upsides and utility to them haven’t really kicked in just yet. Eventually, you’ll see it paired with tickets and entry to VIP events, access to other products and services, and generally cross-promotion that would make sense to benefit the community and demographic of the asset.
It’s mostly not a scam, but not all communities and nft’s make it to crypto punk or bored ape yacht club levels of notoriety and value.
We live in a world…
One doesn’t need to be wrapped in tin foil to understand the world is full of people who scheme and conspire, but it’s also a world of sheer incompetence. It’s a world where sometimes profit motive throws caution to the wind. Combined this can be a terribly destructive recipe for the quality of our information, and the health of people and our planet.
Personal responsibility, rediscovering our inner philosopher, scientist, or artist. These latent traits will help us steer clear of groupthink and conjure a better future for everyone including ourselves.
More perspectives are more potential futures unfolding
In the context of the decentralized Web, or more specifically the blockchain, nodes function as validators of information. Having a strong grounding in philosophy lets you function as a more useful “node” for information. You can weigh information empirically, or intuitively, or you can use the scientific method to investigate something yourself.
You can act in a way that influences or positively impacts the political or ecological environment around you. One by one, decentralization will help empower all of us to contribute to a greater and more resilient world that we can all bring our best selves to.
Hang on Marty, where we’re going, we don’t need roads.
ahem, "hang on" Marty, not hand on. That's a totally different movie isn't it
It from bit. Enjoy your articles please keep up the great work