Hello readers, and welcome back to Week in Review!
I spoke with Kimbal Musk, the brother of Elon Musk, about the environmental impacts ofcryptocurrencies. I'm talking about the future of the web this week.
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I have a secret to share that I have been sitting on for a few months.
I will be sending out the first edition of Chain Reaction, my new newsletter focused on cryptocurrencies, web3 and the metaverse, with all of its opportunities, hype, scam and controversy. The weekly newsletter will be co-hosted by me and my fellow techie, Anita Ramaswamy. We'll talk about the hot news, trends andcryptocurrencies while interviewing high-profile investors, entrepreneurs and skeptics.
You can subscribe to Chain Reaction on our newsletter page.
The sad part is over.
Greg Kumparak will take over Week in Review when I step aside from writing it a couple weeks after the newsletter launches. I love sending out this newsletter every weekend, it gives me a chance to clear my brain, reflect on the state of the tech industry and voice my opinions on where it is headed.
The future of the tech industry will be embracing an internet with more complex economic models attached to its platforms, ones which can do good and bad things for consumers but should ultimately open up the web and give users more agency in how big platforms operate. The future that tech's founders and investors envision is not the one we find ourselves living in.
Over the past year, the backlash has been interesting. There is a lot of that to be found in the videos and messages that have been posted on the internet. Many consumers are discovering through the use of NFTs that high finance and the concept of economic value are not the rational institutions they had thought they were.
The idea of spending millions of dollars to own a link to an image file in a distributed database should not seem crazy to most, but if it seems reasonable to enough buyers, then its value is a product of the owners' collective delusions. Getting access to this uncomfortable realization is a gift in and of itself, but there are constructive and destructive places to take it.
I find the criticism concerning that NFTs rein in the possibilities of a boundless and unfettered web. The idea of digital scarcity and hyper-capitalism in fantasy is something that is very upsetting to the gaming community. No one can have it all on an internet where the experience is gated from users based on their economic class in the real world. It's a conversation that's particularly concerning as massive companies like Meta begin talking about the idea of the metaverse so earnestly.
At this point, the space has a couple trillion dollars tied up in it, but it feels like it's been there for a long time. It's part of the reason that highlighting informed criticism is so worthwhile right now, because the industry can still change.
There isn't much critical discourse happening on a regular basis in the informed middle ground. Most existing newsletters are from institutional players or retail investors who have projects to shill and disclosures to ignore. The majority of tech media critiques seem to be from people who cover several things and are less incentivized to spend time analyzing a confusing industry.
I have been at TechCrunch for seven years. I have worn many hats, having been the go-to reporter for topics like gaming, artificial intelligence and virtual reality. Over the past year, I've devoted a lot of my time to understanding what's going on in the world of digital currency. I've talked to investors, played with platforms and spent a lot of time on social media. A high barrier to understanding the basics is what I have found in the industry. I want Chain Reaction to be a place where readers can learn from me as I talk with stakeholders and skeptics and try to get to the heart of where this all is headed.
Please subscribe and join me on this journey!
I think you should take a closer look at these stories.
Russia will block Facebook.
There’s a new kind of iron curtain going up between Russia and the West, as sanctions intensify, internet platforms grow more emboldened and the Russian government gets more defensive. After announcing last week that they would limit Facebook’s service due to the platform’s restrictions on state media, Russia has changed course and announced that they plan to outright ban the service.
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