A new way to use the Internet

Now is the time to start learning about Web3. Richard Conway explains what it means for you and your business.

One thing that is hugely important to me as a business owner is to understand and utilise new technology in order to evolve our product offering and maintain a competitive advantage.

It is for this reason that I recently started a new business in the Web3 space called Toru Creative, alongside Wendy Thompson, the founder of Socialites, and Omer Hazar (Web3 maven). 

Since we have launched the business, I have realised how many people have no idea what Web3, NFTs (non-fungible tokens) or DOAs (decentralized autonomous organisations) even are. Therefore, I have put together a brief summary of some of these concepts.

Web3, or Web 3.0, is a new way to use the Internet. It’s decentralised and puts the power back in the hands of Internet users through data ownership. That may sound complicated, but a few basic principles to Web3 can make it more digestible. 

What is Web3?

Web3 differentiates itself from Web2 (the Internet’s current iteration) by allowing full data ownership. Instead of merely creating content on an existing server, Web3 uses blockchain technology to build a creator economy distributed across computers and networks.

Web3 is trustless and permissionless. Transactions do not depend on third parties. Freedom from the chains of a server grants users control over their data and the potential to monetise it. Web3 has made data king rather than the owners of servers and platforms.

This is a far cry from today’s content creation platforms, where any content users dream up must abide by the platform’s rules. The server owns the data. Users created content, yet their data was stored and potentially ‘mined’ by a third party.

Given data is a commodity, Web3 gives users the power to monetise their own data. 

How does Web3 work?

Web3 is built upon blockchain technology, which stores data by distributing it across numerous servers and computers. This is called ‘distributed computing’ and decentralises ownership. Power over data and trading in Web3 is malleable. It doesn’t conform to server regulations often dictated by corporations or governments.

Encryption makes blockchain secure, acting as a safe that can only be opened by those with the key. All data must remain the same, with data added to the ‘chain’ rather than replacing it. If the chain breaks, the data is unusable.

Those operating within the Web3 space, especially e-commerce operators, have set up funds and exchange systems such as Bitcoin. These systems allow for recognisable trading to occur without the need for governmental or financial institutions.

Need to know Web3 terms

Here are some terms associated with Web3 that you might want to read up on.

Decentralised Apps, or dApps, are applications built to cut out the middleman. They run on peer-to-peer nodes via blockchain technology rather than relying on a server such as Android or Mac.

Decentralised Autonomous Organisations (DAOs) are groups, companies or collectives bound by rules and regulations coded into a blockchain. They are essentially a new-age company unto itself.

A Decentralised Exchange (DeEx) is a peer-to-peer marketplace using Decentralised Finance (DeFi) ledgers to trade cryptocurrencies directly, without an intermediary to facilitate the exchange.

To learn more, refer to the hyperlinks below.

Mined:https://www.techtarget.com/searchbusinessanalytics/definition/datamining#:~:text=Data%20mining%20is%20the%20process,make%20more%2Dinformed%20business%20decisions.

Bitcoin: https://bitcoin.org/en/

Decentralised Apps: https://decrypt.co/resources/what-are-decentralized-applications-dapps

Decentralised Exchange: https://www.coinbase.com/learn/crypto-basics/what-is-a-dex 

Richard Conway is the author of ‘How to Get to the Top of Google’ and founder and CEO of Pure SEO. www.pureseo.co.nz