Fabernovel, expert in digital transformation and the development of innovative products and services, and Arbevel, independent management company, publish the first chapter of their study on Web3 “Web3 and its promises“.
Web3, NFT, Metaverse, Decentralization… This study aims to highlight, in a didactic and pedagogical way, the peculiarities of this new iteration of the current web, explaining its different terms and analyzing its promises.
“Lost in the desert in search of a new black gold, that of data, crushed by the GAFA sun, we await the next wave of Web 2.0, we seek an oasis.
A decentralized oasis that puts the user and their experience back at the center of the model, allowing the emergence of a new generation of solutions and actors, capable of satisfying the desires of millions of people who bring harmony to their lives Earn it and have fun.
Is Web3 that oasis or is it just a mirage? »
Questions in the preamble, Stéphane Distinguin, President and Founder of Fabernovel.
The web continues to evolve
While Web 1.0 democratized access to information, the user experience it offered users was very limited.
In order to react to this low functional depth, the GAFAs structured the so-called Web 2.0 around isolated and proprietary platforms, which then strengthened the centralization of the Web.
A model that users and developers want to challenge.
“There is a general trend in Europe and around the world that users want to take back control of their data. They want that too a fairer distribution of value because it’s too concentrated at GAFA today.
With the blockchain coming of age, these are the foundations of a new iteration of the web, the Web3, possible and being built today.
explains Arthur de La Brunière, Web3 analyst at Fabernovel and co-author of this study.
Towards a decentralized, immersive and community-based web
Even if the “Web 3.0” initiated on the basis of the Semantic Web never really saw the light of day, the coming of age of blockchain technology offers solid foundations to meet other expectations: a decentralized web.
Decentralization is a concept as old as the web (see a review of the web here), which used to seem utopian, but is now taking on very real contours with the blockchain.
This technology enables a range of information to be secured and verified in a transparent and tamper-proof manner, freeing itself from intermediaries that users often had to de facto and inevitably trust.
“This promise of Web3 decentralization is shaking the market as it requires a shift from a model of companies wanting to use data to one where companies need to drive quality of service first.”
comments Alexia Guillard, strategist at Fabernovel and co-author of this study.
In fact, a whole universe of decentralized and blockchain-based applications has multiplied in recent years: NFT, smart contracts, cryptocurrencies…
For example, NFTs are units of data stored on a blockchain that are unique and non-interchangeable and digitally certify the authenticity of the digital or physical product to which they are linked.
They are based on smart contracts in which it is possible to set the terms of exchange, ownership and royalties for its creator.
This smart contract is automatically executed according to the terms previously set during a resale, while ensuring the transfer of ownership.
If many applications of NFT develop in the creative industries, we also find its rise in digital real estate, where it is possible to guarantee its ownership in the proto-metaverse like The SandBox like a notarial deed in the physical world, which itself may eventually become an NFT.
It’s true, the Web3, which is gaining a foothold in the digital world, should also reach into physical life to make our experiences more immersive.
The endless scroll of social flows in Web 2.0 (see “GAFAnomics Quarterly: Towards New, More Virtuous Experience Standards?“), which represent timelines, shifts into spatial-temporal space with Web3.
In other words, the Web3 integrates an immersive geographic dimension into the virtual world or into the physical world connected to augmented reality.
It’s the immersion space of Web3, the famous metaverse that doesn’t exist at the moment based on the 7 core principles of Matthew Ball.
What exists today are virtual worlds, often derived from the video game industry — Fortnite, Roblox, Decentraland – but also ongoing projects shaped by the Web 2.0 giants, which are largely centralized, proprietary and non-interoperable, dividing them into embryos that we call proto-metaverse.
“We must not simply stand still with the fluctuations in cryptocurrencies, just as we had to overcome the slowness of the internet 20 years ago.
In the same way, the Web3 revolution is already being built on land and through uses that are still unknown to us.
There is still a long way to go, the promises are big and the imagination is limitless. It’s up to us to use it to define the desirable uses of this new digital technology.”
concludes Sébastien Lalevée, Managing Director of Arbevel.
NB : The full study is available here
