Web3 has a lot of money going for it, well yes, a lot less than a few months ago, but it’s still hard to argue that mainstream consumers have lined up to adopt web3 Internet services. There have been some unexpected successes so far, but investors are still looking for consumer use cases that take full advantage of blockchains, tokens, and NFTs, beyond simply trading them. Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) GP Sriram Krishnan believes web3’s incentive structures make the space a natural fit for social media, he told us on the latest episode of TechCrunch’s crypto podcast. Chain reaction. Krishnan has extensive experience in web 2.0 social media companies; he served as an executive at Twitter, Facebook, and Snap before joining a16z, which notably just unveiled its latest $4.5 billion crypto fund. “People ask me, ‘What are you spending a lot of time on that really interests you?’” says Krishnan. “I think the intersection of social media and web3 is really fascinating.” While web3 has yet to see a platform equivalent to Twitter or Facebook take off, Krishnan believes that the structure of blockchain-based platforms offers some interesting incentives to attract creators to their networks, which could in turn attract their audiences. . He points out that some of the most popular existing social media services have been indexed on the sale of providing content creators with a platform with reach, but that doesn’t necessarily give them the financial advantage of the network itself, something he believes NFTs and tokens could. rectify. “With web3…the people who add value to the platform now have a part of the economy that happens on the platform itself,” says Krishnan. “In some of the web3 social networks, you could actually have the spiritual equivalent of a place on the cap table.” Beyond tokens and other crypto assets, Kirshnan alluded to mechanisms such as decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) that allow stakeholders in a platform or protocol to make decisions about how that project matures, something he notes as quite foreign to existing ideas. about how Big Tech companies interact with their most popular content creators. “[With web3], now you also have a say in the governance of said platform, which is really very interesting. It opens up a whole new toolbox and a new power dynamic between creators and social media platforms,” says Krishnan. Krishnan says that the open nature of the protocols that operate on web3 means that clients will be more committed to the interests of their users, because users could more easily bring their assets and content to a new platform if they feel their interests are not being served. represented. something that rethinks the idea of ​​exporting data from social networking services. “That ‘right of exit,’ that right to build alternative clients is one of the social things about web3 that I find really exciting,” he says. Social Web3 is pretty theoretical at the moment, and while some startups have tried to make a splash, the onboarding issues for users getting wallets, buying tokens, and joining a platform are still much more challenging than experiences on more streamlined sites. like Twitter. Investors are hoping that some of these problems are just growing pains that developers will get over, developers that venture capitalists like Krishnan hope they can fund. Subscribe to Chain Reaction on Apple, Spotify, or your alternative podcast platform of choice to stay up to date with us every week.
