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Alex Tapscott on the Promise of Digital Disruption
When you think of modern technologies that aren’t gadgets and gizmos, you probably think of the Web, and with it, the Internet.
If so, you aren’t really thinking of modern technologies.
We are entering a new age. We’ve moved from the “Read-only Web,” which had little functionality for interacting with content, to the “Read-Write Web,” which offered seemingly endless collaborative opportunities, from sharing things with friends and family to shopping at your favorite brands. But the profusion of cyberattacks, data hacks, and online profiling have left many of us to view digital life as a Faustian bargain in need of a major rethink.
That rethink is Web3, the “Read-Write-Own Web” — a decentralized Internet where individuals own their own identities and can securely trade assets like money, securities, intellectual property, and art, peer to peer. Made possible by blockchains, the foundational technology of bitcoin. Web3 promises the biggest shake-up of business since the invention of double-entry bookkeeping in the Middle Ages. It is the Internet’s new frontier.
It brings with it a new lexicon and vocabulary for concepts and tools like blockchains, the metaverse, NFTs, DAOs, decentralized finance, and self-sovereign identity. In this episode, Alex Tapscott will serve as our guide and…