A revolution is brewing... Web3 adoption will come from the community

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

Margaret Mead

A revolution is quietly brewing between the worlds of web2 and the promise of web3. The legacy incumbents of the current internet, the Meta's, Amazons etc. all make a good show that they are embracing this new technology.

These moves will help the space move forward towards adoption, but on their own, they will continue the monopolistic dominance of a few large companies over the teeming masses.

It comes as no surprise when I say that in web3 we are somewhere between the innovators and early adopters on the adoption curve.

We are still a long way to bridge the gap to the early majority and beyond.

The common narrative is that we are all waiting for the big players to adopt the technology. The Meta’s, the Googles the Amazons

This is crucial to the web3 adoption journey. The big players, the incumbents are key to educating the mass users by making certain terms common, such as digital assets and the concept of digital ownership.

They are also important in the distribution of technology, allowing millions to interact and see what ownership can mean. The owners of the first Starbucks stamps rewards suddenly being offered $2,000 for these rare and historical NFTs.

However, each of these incumbents is only showing parts of this technology that they want you to see, the parts of the technology that will allow them to keep you inside their walled garden.

Here are a couple of examples

Instagram

The move by Meta to allow NFTs to be displayed on Instagram, minted and sold is a great move for the space as a whole, as it helps onboard the 1 billion-plus users. This is needed to gain an understanding of the space.

The issue comes that this just continues to fuel the dominance of the social media giants, forcing you to continue the endless rat run of creating content and engagement for reach on their walled garden platform.

This goes against the hopes and dreams of web3. Decentralised ownership and marketplaces. Where you own your data, you own your relationships and you own your community. The true value of NFTs comes when users port their NFTs from the main platforms and see the value of the technology that powers web3.

Ticketmaster

Ticketmaster and its parent company Live Nation, are the biggest ticketing and event-hosting companies in the world. Once again their NFT strategy focuses on bringing the power of NFTs to the mass market, deepening relationships between event organisers and their audience.

However once again just like Meta, Live Nation and Ticketmaster hold a monopoly on the large entertainment event industry. If you are an A-list star you have no choice but to choose a Live Nation stadium as your performance arena due to their stadiums being the only ones that have the capacity.

Once you choose Live Nation you also have to choose the Ticketmaster platform for your tickets, and all the corresponding charges that they levy on tickets and merch.

Once again the true power of web3 comes not from the monopolies but actually from what the technology allows once you remove the legacy middle-person organisations, the organisations who have been holding back the whole industry due to the monopolistic hold.

So what is the alternative if not the big players?

As I have said I know that the legacy businesses who hold monopolise on our attention will have a big part to play in the future of the web3 space.

Where I believe we will see the true adoption of this technology, in not only the practical use of blockchain rails but the adoption of new ways of seeing and interacting with the world. Will be the small communities.

The true change for this technology will come from the builders, the creators, and the individual influencers… it will come from a million small communities all pushing the technology and how we think and interact with ownership in a digital economy. These will be leading a revolution of how we wish to see our new world

We will see these small communities, and businesses draw money away from the legacy industries. We are already seeing this in so many ways with the communities that have already grown➖

• Bands and artists no longer being dependent on Spotify for their revenue but selling directly to their true fans
• The brave browser automatically blocking web tracking and advertising. It also allows users to be paid in $Brave tokens for their attention if they do decide to see ads.
• Stay365 which is allowing you to own your reviews as both a host and a guest, thereby allowing you to take your reputation with you to another platform. Rewarding the top hosts and guests with $STAYS tokens for their support in building a better way to travel.
• Lens Protocol is an open-source social network infrastructure. Anyone can build a social network on top of the framework. You as a user of the network own your profile, your followers and your content. If you do not like something the platform does you can move everything to a new social platform.
• Decentralised Finance (DeFI) removes any middle person or organisation from financial transactions. Peer-to-peer lending, borrowing, and betting are all done through smart contracts opening up a whole new financial market typically restricted to only the most wealthy.

This groundswell of support and understanding of what true distributed and decentralised digital ownership means will be the driver that pushes the incumbents to lower their walls or find themselves becoming obsolete.

We think that this time it is different, that the tech giants are too big. But we forget that it is the user who has the power in the end. This is true more than ever in a web3 ownership-driven economy.

The challenge and opportunity the legacy organisations have are how fast the change comes. It will happen but it is a new revolution.

A revolution where we say enough is enough, where start to be compensated for the massive profits made from our data, where we stand shoulder to shoulder with creators for fair compensation of their work, where we support the small businesses to create a level playing field of opportunity.

The question for how long it will take is how courageous will we all be to join the revolution and forge a new fairer world.