The Past, Present, and Future of the Web: A Journey to Web3.0 | 👀 |
and why understanding our past key to shaping our future.
GM. 🫶
This is Web3 Espresso ☕-your weekly cup of everything Web3 designed to educate, entertain, and inform.
If you’ve just arrived, start here to understand why education is key to helping you stay ahead in Web3 ✨
What’s in store today:
🥡 The Weekly Roundup
🎡 An introduction to Web3
🌊 This week’s Maverick making waves is Cathy Hackl
🚀 NFT Rockets - Cryptobees 🐝
Let’s go! 🥤
🥡 In the News …
What caught my attention in the Web3-Sphere this week
Hermès wins case again the Birkin NFT collection - here
Metaverse Trends shaping the future - here
Paris Blockchain Week - 20th-24th March 2023 - here
🎡 The Past, Present, and Future of the Web: A Journey to Web3.0
Have you ever wondered what the term "Web 3.0" means, or thought, like me, how it was possible to have missed Web2 or even Web1?
We are not alone. So I decided to do a little digging.
The Early Web (1990-2004)
The early web—think the 1990s—is what we call Web 1.0.
At that time, the internet was read-only, and companies would put up static websites that we could use to find information. I found a few nuggets that are still live today (shield your eyes):
It was basically a one-way system where we would consume information on the internet. The Web 1 era lasted roughly from 1990 to 2004.
» It was the birth of SEO
We can consider this era the birth of SEO. At the time, the search algorithm was fairly straightforward, and the aim was purely to get clicks. For example, if your website had a blog, you could insert keywords and phrases related to whatever was popular at the time and expect to see a somewhat significant boost in traffic regardless of what your site was all about. Back in the early days, SEO was all about site traffic, not quality of content, conversions, or sales. It was all about getting clicks.
Old-school SEO tricks included things like keyword stuffing, hidden text, buying links to send people to your site, making low-quality content, or spamming ads.
As new websites quickly started to populate the web, there was a real need for structure and a way to retrieve the information that was being searched for. Google saw an opportunity and began working on algorithm updates that would reward quality, relevant content to connect users with what they really wanted to find.
This period is known as the "information economy." Websites were static, text-based, and the user experience would be considered primitive.
The Social Web (2005- now)
As technology changed, new websites like MySpace (2003), Facebook (2005), and Twitter (2006) made it possible for users to post their own content on the internet. From 2005 to 2009, MySpace was the largest social networking site in the world, boasting over 60 million users (source: Wikipedia). MySpace was generally known as a meeting place for kids and a marketing venue for bands and celebrities. It was a space where users could be creative and create an online identity through a customisable online space.
Facebook proved to be the demise of MySpace and tapped into our inherent desire to connect with friends and friends of friends,
The web moved from a read-only environment to an interactive environment where we could communicate and exchange text messages and files. This era of the internet is known as the platform economy.
This evolution of the internet has allowed us to connect digitally. This era gave users a voice and, more importantly, an opportunity to create their own content and showcase it to the world. It has created limitless opportunities to be visible and earn money online.
Web 2.0 is where content became king, and social media became its queen.
» The birth of digital marketing - but who owns your data?
In this era, marketing tactics became truly digital, and targeting became intelligent. The power of digital marketing campaigns relies on data collection, testing, and reiteration. The ability to collect data for analytics has changed marketing forever. Marketers can now rely on data to make better marketing decisions, and by finding what works, they can copy and scale quickly.
Beats mail order advertising.
Social media platforms have evolved into effective tools for increasing brand awareness. Brands and entrepreneurs invest a significant amount of time and money into creating content and building a community on these channels.
But one of the biggest problems with the platform economy is that the people who make digital content do not own their data.
However, one of the main failings of the social web has been data ownership. In Web 2.0, we, the users, effectively give our data in exchange for "free" services, and whatever we produce online doesn’t belong to us.
In the early days of Web2, no one cared too much about giving their information to Facebook, Google, or Instagram in exchange for using those sites. But as people learned more about the web and how their information was being used to make money, and as big data scandals (remember Cambridge Analytica) started to pile up, control over our personal data went from being something we didn't think about to being a real worry.
Even though there have been efforts to make things more clear and give us more control over privacy policies, today, a small number of big companies own most of our data. Google and Facebook are the most visible and well-known of these companies.
Introducing the decentralised internet: Web 3.0
A revolutionary shift is happening as we transition into Web 3.0. The phrase "Web 3)" has come to represent the idea of a new, improved internet. The premise of Web 3.0 is to give control back to the user and operate a decentralised version of the internet.
In Web 1.0, the internet was one-directional, where a user would only use the internet to retrieve information.
In Web 2.0, centralised social networks are the norm. Infrastructure for well-known websites and social media platforms is almost always owned by corporations and, to some extent, governed by laws. We can either pay to use it or get away with using it for free as long as we follow the terms of the provider.
In Web 3.0, all of the networks are decentralised and owned by the community as a whole. In this phase of the internet, we stop using centralised platforms (like social networks) and embrace blockchain technology.
Web3 relies on interoperability, openness, and collaboration. It uses blockchains, cryptocurrencies, and NFTs to return ownership and authority to consumers.
This also means that people who use the networks will have a stake in them and will share in any value they create. They will also be able to have a say in how they are run and governed.
In practise, this means that a content creator on a decentralised version of Facebook or YouTube can keep more control over their digital identity while also getting paid for the activity and value they create on the network.
It's a big change from Web 1.0 and Web 2.0, where corporations have all the power. Now, the power is back in the hands of the users.
In Web3, the internet is interoperable. Users can move platforms without logging in, and any digital content that is created is owned not by the platform but by the person who created it.
This is opening up new opportunities for businesses, technology, and marketers.
🌊 Mavericks Making Waves
This week’s Maverick making waves is Cathy Hackl. She is the founder and CEO of Future Marketing, a marketing and communications agency that specialises in virtual and augmented reality.
I discovered her through the book she co-wrote called “Navigating the Metaverse” which I found to be an excellent introduction to the worlds of Web3, the metaverse, and blockchain technology. It's a quick read that takes what could be fairly complicated concepts and simplifies them. It gives different views on why businesses should care about the metaverse economy and explores how the metaverse will be transformative for businesses.
Although it focuses a lot on augmented reality environments, it was an excellent introduction to Web3.
🚀 NFT Rockets - Cryptobees 🐝
Cryptobees is an NFT (Non-Fungible Token) collection created by Guerlain, a luxury cosmetics and fragrance company. The Cryptobees collection features a series of digital bee characters that are based on the iconic bee motif used by Guerlain in its products and packaging.
Guerlain's first attempt to get into Web3 by making an NFT collection was the Cryptobees collection. This was a low risk strategy as the utility of the project was limited to funding an ecological reserve in France.
Learn about the first collection of NFTs I put money into and why—the Cryptobees by Guerlain. I also share my 6 tips on how to make the right decisions when buying NFTs.
That’s all for this week… but see you in a 7-day jiffy.
I hope you enjoyed this newsletter, and I couldn’t end it without a little humour from our friends at Nowhere.
If you have any questions - drop’em here! And let me know your thoughts
If you have any questions, let me know by leaving a comment. I'm happy to answer!