WHAT IS WEB 3.0?

There is a lot of talk about Blockchain, Metaverse, Cryptocurrency, NFT’s and many other fancy technology terms. But what are they, what do they mean for consumers and how will it change the way we use the internet?

In short, Web 3.0 is the next generation of internet and will replace what we currently use and know, Web 2.0.  Web 3.0 will bring the change in how users are connected around the world and how their data is stored and used.

 

WHAT ARE THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN WEB 2.0 and WEB 3.0?

Web 2.0

  • Users are used as the product, with no personal gain
  • Is Data Driven or Information Centric
  • All policies, storage and processes are managed by a single entity and users are used as a product
  • Comparatively less secure
  • Ambiguous on how our data will be used
  • Data can be used to manipulate us as users
  • Data can be sold to third parties
  • Less secure and prone to hackers
  • Damage caused by hacking can have significant impact on enterprises and the economy

           Examples of Web 2.0 giants – Google, Facebook, Youtube

 

Web 3.0

  • Is User Driven or User Centric
  • Has Decentralised Autonomous Organisation (DAOs) 
  • Everything is open source
  • P2P Connections
  • Users control their data
  • How it works is public
  • Identity safe
  • Users use the product, not visa-versa
  • No central entity storing or using the data
  • Managed by millions of nodes across the globe
  • Reduced risk with copies of data on additional nodes
  • DOAs have a cryptocurrency token
  • Incentives for any contribution
  • Mainly uses blockchain technology

 

Blockchain

WHAT IS BLOCKCHAIN?

The definition of Blockchain according to Wikipedia is;

“A blockchain is a growing list of records, called blocks, that are securely linked together using cryptography. Each block contains a cryptographic hash of the previous block, a timestamp, and transaction data (generally represented as a Merkle tree, where data nodes are represented by leafs). The timestamp proves that the transaction data existed when the block was published to get into its hash. As blocks each contain information about the block previous to it, they form a chain, with each additional block reinforcing the ones before it. Therefore, blockchains are resistant to modification of their data because once recorded, the data in any given block cannot be altered retroactively without altering all subsequent blocks .


WHAT MAKES BLOCKCHAIN SO SECURE?

Blockchain, which is by far one of the most secure protocols, mainly due to the following things;

  • Ability to Hash check
  • Proof of work/stake/etc
  • P2P Network 

WHAT IS CRYPTOCURRENCY ?

  • It is the currency of Web 3.0.
  • 17000+ Crypto Tokens are out in the market till and it will keep on growing.
  • Crypto Currency is equivalent to Stocks as a digital asset, but unlike stocks it can be used as a currency on Web 3.0 Network.
  • Cryptocurrency is also a way of incentivising users working or just using the network. One great example for Incentivising is the BAT token.
    • BAT token is used in the BRAVE BROWSER  { 50M ACTIVE users}
    • In Brave Browser you can turn off Ads and if you enable the Ads coming from Brave Private Ad network {not google}, you get paid in BAT tokens.

WHY CRYPTOCURRENCY and NOT FIAT CURRENCY?

  • FIAT Currency are highly regulated by govt, 
  • As  Web 3.0 is a Decentralised network communicating with many different platforms across the globe and following different governments, guidelines like KYC or any other depending upon the country which can take upto 24 hours or more to get approved slows and limit the network.
  • Creating compatibility according to guidelines across thousands of networks is not efficient and it becomes centralised again, which completely defeats the purpose.
  • DIGITAL WALLETS like METAMASK, which work on standardised protocol of Web 3.0 and accept standard tokens like ERC20, ERC71 etc. These wallets do/can follow the govt guidelines. An equivalent example in Web 2.0 will be PAYTM Wallet.

WHAT ARE DAPPs : Decentralised Apps?

  • These are like the normal Web and Phone apps that we use, but their backend is running on blockchain and works in a decentralised manner, therefore no centralised entity’s server.
  • Censorship Resistant – DAPPs work on P2P Networks, so there are no govt or any centralised agency {Play Store/App Store etc} controlling the working of Dapps.
  • It can never go offline with zero downtime, as it is run by millions of computers around the globe.
  • Some major sectors that these DAPPs are covering;
  • DeFi {De-Centralized Finance}
  • AAVE, CRV, UNISWAP, SUSHISWAP
  • DEXES {Decentralised exchange}
  • Binance, WazirX, CoinDCX

METAVERSE 

  • De-Centraland, Sandbox, Axie Infinity, Roblox

GAMES
 

  • Crypto Kitties
  • NFT, Breeding, Buy/Sell 
  • Zed Run 
  • Horse racing, Bets, Information

NFT MARKETPLACES

  • OpenSea, Crypto Kitties, Rarible, Bidali

HYBRID APPS

  • Zapper Fi
  • Gets data from blockchain wallets and show it on the dashboard

STORAGE

  • SIA, FileCoin, STORJ, ARWEAVE, LAMBDA
  • Odysee, LBRY, D-Tube {web 3.0 alternative for Youtube}
  • Works on IPFS {Inter Planetary File System}, kind of protocol on which BitTorrent works in web 2.0 and in web 3.0
  • Avg. Cost – $0.01 /Gb/Month
  • Costing centralised platforms
    • AWS – $0.021 Gb/Month
    • Google Cloud – $0.018/Gb/Month

 

WHAT ARE WEB 3.0 VULNERABILITIES?

  • WEB 3.0 is just beginning to gain attention, so it is not that mature yet.
  • It is not standardised and regulated until now.
  • These DAO codes are open sourced, even for giants like AAVE, Ethereum etc, which makes them a target for Hackers, as they know how everything works.
    There had been attacks on Crypto Exchanges in the past where hackers managed to steal a few million dollars from users’ accounts. A recent attack was on CoinBase.
  • Cryptocurrencies are highly volatile.

 

WHY IS WEB 3.0 THE FUTURE?

  • Higher Adoption Rate – This new version of Internet “Web 3.0”, has a higher adoption rate than Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 combined from the day it started.
  • Cryptocurrency reached a Market Cap of 2.8 Trillion Dollars from 18 Billion dollar in just 4 Years.
  • NFT {Non-Fungible Token}, another Popular part of Web 3.0 has a total Market Cap of 31.4 Billion, out of which 19.6 Billion was collected in 2021 alone.
  • BTC vs FIAT
  • In value BTC ranks 16 based on the current circulating supplies of all the digital and fiat currencies combined.
  • Fiat Currencies has unlimited supply, so no-one can really tell the value of the FIAT currency, as it will keep on changing based on the Inflation Rate and Circulating Supply. On the other hand, BTC and many other digital currencies have Fixed numbers of supply. BTC max supply is 21M out of which 19M already minted.
  • BTC follows the concept that other FIAT currencies used to follow till late 1970’s until the US discarded this concept and started printing unlimited currency and other countries followed.
  • Total Market Cap of crypto is more than India’s GDP {Gross Domestic Product} and many other small countries combined GDP.
  • If we start comparing per capita GDP, it will be even less.

These numbers give us a clear picture of where the world is heading towards and it is not just Enterprise Monkey who believes in Web 3.0.  There are many common people investing their money in Web 3.0 Projects and these projects are raising millions of dollars in funding in just a few weeks. World leaders, Web 2.0 tech giants and countries all around the world are trying to be the pioneers in this technology.

If you have any questions about Blockchain, NFTs, Web 3.0  or anything else in this blog, and how you can incorporate this into your business or start-up, please get in touch with our friendly team to make an appointment to discuss further.

Here are some links to news articles with more information and evidence of what big entities have already done or planning to do in the near future.

NEWS ARTICLES