Silicon Valley is betting big on DAOs. First round funding saw $2.5m in seed money raised for Layer3, an SaaS startup slash tool belt for decentralized autonomous organizations. (On the on-chance you’re as sick of crypto acronyms as me.)
In theory, DAOs mark the end of centralized power, period — in markets, government, friend groups where one alpha dude dominates the conversation. In practice, they’re Discord channels where the owner of the most tokens or NFTs gets the biggest say in how the community spends its money. The future of democratic institutions? Remains to be seen. But the new boss sounds a hell of a lot like the old boss to me.
Twitter would have you believe there are only two warring schools of crypto thought. Either it’s the key to a utopian society where furries will be free to live out their fantasies as digital hot Simbas — or it’s a fascist-with-a-small-F shit show and the latest sign that late stage capitalism is ringing the last dribble of our collective soul’s essence out of its ass sweat towel and doomsday’s just around the corner.
Well, we believe the truth, as always, is a little more nuanced. We want to be clear that, in reporting biweekly on the state of the blockchain and crypto community at large, we are not guzzling lion-spit-flavored Kool Aid, nor sharpening up our hatchets. We’re undecided. Probably like most of you. So, if so, here are the top 5 things we know so far about the technology that’s made headlines for the better part of a year. We encourage you to take in the facts and draw your own conclusions.
NFT technology presents the potential to democratize the art market. But currently it’s being used to shill fetish fan art and Hitler profile pictures.
The environmental impact of crypto is not not abysmal. Then again, check out the EIR on Web 2.0 big data server farms.
Web 3.0 is more transparent, permissionless, and independent than Web 2.0 — and by and large accessible only through Web 2.0 platforms.
Crypto exchanges are entirely unregulated and anonymous, which is great for drug dealers, tax dodgers, Ron Swanson wannabes, and rugpull ‘business’ models. (Or, if you’re Lil Uzi Vert, all of the above.)
There is a single point of failure to blockchain security — the passcode to your crypto wallet. For hackers, bad news. For scammers, just great.
Bottom line, it’s hard to believe crypto’s sole point of entry will ever be consumer friendly enough for the sweeping adoption some foresee, and the aforementioned concerns would never play in mass markets.
As refreshing as it is to see people get unduly excited about the future (or maybe it’s just the sexy lions again) it’s doubtful that centralization is going anywhere. But, in an ideal world, we could see answers to some current issues solved by blockchain technology. Transparent, publicly available data transactions in particular may be key to returning privacy rights to consumers and holding elected politicians accountable.
Although the future’s not ours to see, we will be seeing more of it, so we’ll keep you posted, because it’s our job. But for now? Banks are too big to fail, your life decisions will be made my old white men, and Chad still gets the last say. So sorry, beta bros, Nazis without borders, and libertarians. Pay-to-play fetish Discords are all you get.
