What is Web3.0 ? What will it look like? Is it going to change our lives? So many questions, yeah? Im here to answer all of them in an easy-to-understand language.
But before we get into web3, let me tell you where did the web1 and web2 go?
History Of Internet
Web1.0
From 1994-2004, we saw the first generation of the Internet, also called static web. It was much much different from that of current Internet.
Internet was just like a newspaper. You could only see a static page on your screen where you could only read text and do nothing else. Internet was a one way communication tool and we were the consumers. Creating user pages or even commenting on articles weren’t a thing.
Image of Google in 1998
Web2.0
Web2.0 or the social web changed the internet. Now, people can provide content to websites and a lot of interaction. The power of Web2.0 can be imagined by asking yourself these questions:
- How many videos do youtube make?
- How many reels do Instagram make?
- How many songs do Spotify make?
- How many webpages do Google make? and so on...
Out of all the content created in Internet is 85% by consumers and not by those big companies.
How Web3.0 can change the Internet?
We will discuss the challenges in Web2.0 and how web3.0 can help us to over1. come it.
1. Identity/Privacy
Suppose I searched on google "How to create a pizza" , Google already knows me, my location and various data. Google gets a soft signal to show me more pizza ads after my searches. And then you see a number of ads everywhere about pizza in Google.
Your search history can be erased from your device, but the Internet always remembers your Identity and it can be misused.
Web3.0 gives you a different identity.
2. Censorship
The second obstable in Web2 was Censorship, No matter how much all social media platforms give lectures about importance of freedom of speech. Ultimately, only a few people control what content is visible on their sites and what not.
For example, Twitter suspended Donald Trump's account permanently. Only a few people in Twitter administration decided that they dont want Trump in their platform and they banned him.
What do you think? Should social media companies have these powers to decide who is right and who is wrong?These companies and platforms can even take political sides and ban all opposition from their platforms and even worse .
Big CEOs are trying to force their ideologies on people. They have became gatekeepers of Information.
WEB3.0 has no any CEO. All the decisions will be done by code. These are called Decentralised Autonomous Organisations (DAOs).
In DAOs, the rules of platforms are cleared through smart contracts. So that, no any human but a code will decide whats against the policies and what not, what is offensive and what not. Hence, helpful for people for freedom of speech.
3. Ownership
Third obstacle is ownership. I am creating this blog on hashnode. You think this blog is mine? No, its NOT, this blog is of the platform: Hashnode.
Hashnode can decide whether to show ads on my blog or not. Hashnode can even decide the cost of ads and what the ads context is. The ads rate wont be decided by me, but by the platform. How much revenue will I get and how much revenue will the platform get from those ads?
These all things will be decided by Hashnode and not the user.
*While in WEB3, you are the owner of the content you create.
- Who can watch your content?
- What should be the cost of your content?
- Whether to show 3rd party ads or not? and so on
These all things will now be decided by you. Quite futuristic and interesting right? Well, it is.
Is WEB3 a Scam?
There are some problems of web3 as well.
1. More privacy, more online theft
Too much privacy can also give rise to crime. The police can catch the theifs and track them easily, but when things will be completely private and anonymous, then the cybercrime will also increase and police cannot track theifs and enemies easily.
2. Who will be responsible for scams in web3?
When the facebook-cambridge analytica scandal broke out, the US government questioned Mark Zuckerberg mercilessly.
If no one is the owner in web3 and can not be tracked. Then who will take responsibility of crimes and scams that will happen in web3 world?
3. Blockchain is not 100% secured
Recently, crypto.com admitted that worth of over 30 million dollars crypto has been stolen from their site by hackers.
Crypto.com is not a small company, its a big company. But then too, It was impossible for them to trace the hackers.
Blockchain is not perfectly secure, it is too early to shift 100% on blockchain
Due to all these problems, there was a twitter warn between Jack Dorsey and web3 developers on WEB3 .
Tesla CEO Elon Musk has also been sceptical of the Web3. In recent tweets, he raised doubts about Web3 being "real". "I'm not suggesting that Web3 is real. Seems more like marketing buzzword than reality right now".
Has anyone seen web3? I can’t find it.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 21, 2021
My opinion
Web3.0 is an idea and saying it right or wrong at an early stage is not a good move at such an early stage. The more freedom people get , the more it will be abused.