The Current Stand
The furor over any given tech breakthrough is justified, and quite visible on the pages of history. The most intelligent beings have indeed brought drastic changes in all fields of interest, but the feasibility and safety of execution still puts a question mark on many of the innovations. It is indeed necessary to weigh in all the potential benefits and drawbacks of any piece of tech before making it a part of the current position of mankind.
The yet-to-be adopted Web 3.0 is no exception from the doubts of the naysayers. The internet has witnessed a drastic change in the number of its users since its advent. The number of internet users in 2000 was estimated at 413 million globally, but 2016 saw the presence of around 3.4 billion users. While the numbers may be huge, so has been the impact of Web 2.0. With dynamic websites, better graphical content and faster speeds, the average internet user saw more in the era of web 2.0 than it could be ever imagined with 1.0. While the users multiplied in number and were busy consuming content on the new wave of connectivity, huge corporations set up their attention-based platforms. These tech giants then used their users as product for their dealings with businesses looking to market their product.
As Google’s former design ethicist and Co-founder of Center for Humane Technology, Tristan Harris puts it:
“If you’re not paying for the product, you are the product”.
But the rapid growth of Web 2.0 has witnessed the highlights of its own drawbacks. With works like Netflix’s The Social Dilemma, the world got an air of just what is going on inside massive tech giants’ offices in Silicon Valley and California. Not only this, other films like HBO’s Brexit: The Movie and Netflix’s The Great Hack, bring the practical uses and harms of these tools in the global and national political arena.
But the identification of flaws of one technical entity paves way for others to come in and offer their solutions. With Web 3.0, the new entrepreneurs aim to provide data safety and interoperability on such a level that it completely takes out the third party. It’s more like moving from a cash and carry to a vendor-based market, everyone is responsible for the direct interaction with the seller, or in the case of data, the provider. The user gets more and more privacy with cryptocurrency, as the distributed ledger technology enables smooth monetary transactions throughout the world.
Web 3.0 has already brought interested parties into the game with Breaker Browser and Brave among the browsers, Filecoin, Storj and MaidSAFE in decentralized storage and of course Bitcoin, Ethereum and Dogecoin in the market of cryptocurrency. The very existence of these businesses and their insight into the applications are the perfect reply for the naysayers, as well as those who doubt the new era of internet. But new changes as Apple’s Siri and Google’s collaboration with NFT startups point towards the imminent presence of old players on the new grounds.
Bitcoin enjoys the benefits as the market leader as companies like Stacks have taken the responsibility of expanding the decentralized currency’s development environment. While the internet users remain skeptical about the new tides, there are those that are already in business.
Stacks, carrying the flag of user-based internet, remains in a rather interesting position on the Pakistani startup scene. The company has been around for a whole year and continues to gather developers for blockchain and at the same time, spreading awareness regarding the era to come.
While, new startups continue to stem under the umbrella of Web 3.0 and with doubts about the new tech tools looming over our heads, we move towards a time of user freedom.
Written By: Humza Noor
