Is web3 Overhyped?

Now’s about the time that people with tangential awareness of web3 sink into the feeling that the whole thing was overhyped and it’s going nowhere.

It wasn’t overhyped. It never has been.

It’s been, and still is, prehyped. 🧐

2️⃣0️⃣1️⃣4️⃣ Bitcoin was a digital currency on fancy technology. Some people felt it would change the game in terms of borderless transactions and that new blockchains would dramatically expand the possibilities from blockchain tech. Others thought it was all a pipe dream.

2️⃣0️⃣1️⃣7️⃣ It was clear that borderless payments were both useful and proven. Ethereum and other blockchains had matured and hundreds more were being created. NFTs, while not popularized, existed. Virtual land existed. Decentralized Finance (DeFi) was born. Some people felt that sovereign ownership of assets on decentralized protocols would lead a new era in terms of digital economies and that new thinkers would continue to build on what exists. Others said that blockchains were slow and expensive and that there weren’t any use cases ready for mainstream use.

2️⃣0️⃣2️⃣1️⃣ NFTs took over the world, Metaverse market projections captured global attention, 81 of the world’s 100 biggest companies were using blockchain, and new business models emerged across infrastructure domains, gaming, fashion and more. Some people felt that it was just the beginning. That the notion of new ways to create, measure, and exchange value – backed by reliable tech that is now extremely fast and extremely cheap while still secure – will draw even more talent and more resources and further expand the possibilities of the future. Other said it’s still a useless tech without a use case.

In every cycle, some people felt that blockchain and cryptocurrencies were overhyped. 😬

Every time, they were wrong. Every time, it was prehyped. 💥

Again, it’s prehyped. The momentum is really just starting. 💯

Here’s the challenge for many – some people are experienced in enterprise scale operations while some people are crypto-native.

Crypto-native folk have lived in the wild for years. They committed to the future long ago. They’ve partially detached from ‘reality’ and chose to live in a world ‘fake’ money, broken technologies, terrible UIs, scammers and ponzi-makers. And a world with genius entrepreneurs, new ways of establishing financial value, new ways of defining ownership, and new R&D-stage mental models that evolve by the hour.

web2 folk understand what a hardened business or technology looks like. They’ve seen big and small business and everything in between. They’re steeped in experience building teams, forming partnerships and optimizing operations. This experienced can’t be faked or replaced.

There aren’t many who are both.

Those who are both – who have done real stuff in web2 and have done real stuff in web3 – are valuable assets.

They are your eyes, your ears, your interpreters, your advisors, and eventually your strategists and senior leaders.