A recent Twitter thread about whether ‘Web3’ is something worth fighting for, or if it’s simply a term made up by venture capitalists as a way to make money, is taking the crypto community by storm today. Everyone from Jack Dorsey to Elon Musk and well-known venture capitalists joined the online battle, sharing their views on the future of the web.
The discussion was sparked by a series of Tweets from Jack Dorsey, the CEO of digital payments company Block and former CEO of Twitter. In the tweets, the CEO criticised the term Web3 and explained that he has nothing to do with it.
The tweet was inspired by a newspaper article from the Wall Street Journal which was published last weekend. In the article, Dorsey was mentioned as one of the most prominent members of a group of tech leaders who are working to shape Web3.
However, Dorsey does not consider himself an advocate for what some people call Web3. Instead, Dorsey claims that the term has been made up by venture capitalists as a new way of generating money.
“You don’t own ‘web3’. The [venture capitalists – VCs] and [liquidity providers – LPs] do. It will never escape their incentives,” Dorsey wrote, adding “I have nothing to do with ‘web3’.”
However, it didn’t take long for VCs to hit back at the remarks, with Chris Dixon, a general partner at venture giant Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), saying that “all the code, data, and ownership is an open source” in Web3.
Dixon added, “VCs (including a16z) own very little of it.”
Dorsey then proceeded to respond directly to a tweet from Dixon where the latter said he hopes the former Twitter CEO will eventually come around from being only a Bitcoin proponent to also embrace Ethereum (ETH) and other blockchains.
Dorsey responded to this:
“I believe in you and your ability to understand systems. It’s critical we focus our energy on truly secure and resilient technologies owned by the mass of people, not individuals or institutions. Only that foundation will provide for the applications you allude to.”
At the same time, Jack Dorsey also took another subtle hit at the influence of venture capitalists like a16z in the shaping of a Web3 narrative. This was in response to Tesla chief Elon Musk.
“Has anyone seen web3? I can’t find it,” Musk wrote, to which Dorsey replied, “It’s somewhere between a and z.”
Not everyone in the crypto space agreed with this tale, with many also arguing that dismissing Web3 also means ignoring all of the use cases that exist in the crypto space outside of Bitcoin.
Others also argued that although “It’s easy to be dismissive of web3,” and that people should keep an open mind to possibilities.
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