A viral video highlights some very real shortcomings in the next-generation internet
Last weekend, it felt like everyone I knew was sending me the same link. “The Problem With NFTs,” a long video essay by the Canadian media critic Dan Olson, ricocheted around all corners of the tech world since it was uploaded on Friday. (It now has 2.6 million views and climbing.) Over 138 meticulously researched minutes, Olson traces the history of the 2008 financial crisis, the creation of Bitcoin and Ethereum, and the rise of NFTs and DAOs, and reaches the conclusion that what we have taken to calling “web3” is effectively beyond saving: the technology is too broken, and its creators too indifferent to its failures, for it to ever to live up to the promise of its most starry-eyed backers.
Few of Olson’s criticisms are entirely new, and on my Twitter timeline this week, I saw many crypto enthusiasts dismiss them out of hand. Few people working in the space will be surprised to learn that crypto3 is awash in grifts; that current blockchains are energy inefficient and expensive; or that digital wallets are difficult to use and fraught with danger. Many web3 builders will also bristle at Olson’s tone, which is smug and hectoring in the house style of the YouTube video essayist; his audience is not people working in crypto, but rather everyone he thinks ought to be afraid of those people.
And yet the collective force of Olson’s arguments is substantial. His essay explains the rise of cryptocurrencies through the lens of rising inequality; pandemic-era isolation and loneliness; self-dealing venture capitalists; and a desperate sense among young strivers that the future is only ever getting smaller. All of which feels particularly timely, given this week’s crash in crypto prices. Read More
Tag Archives: Metaverse
The False Promise of Web3
I didn’t anticipate how much I’d appreciate a @Jack of fewer trades. Key to progress is class traitors: Generals warning of a military-industrial complex, product managers who narc on mendacious management, and tech leaders who violate the Silicon Valley code of the white guy — never criticize each other or your noble missions to save the world. Jack Dorsey has drawn his sword and taken aim at colleagues attempting to centralize control and gain from the promise of decentralization. Specifically, “web3.”
What is web3? It’s a hazy/vague term describing a crypto-powered internet, and a font of yogababble. Its promoters would say something akin to:
Web3 is a decentralized version of the internet where platforms and apps are built and owned by users. Unlike web2 (the current web), which is dominated by centralized platforms such as Google, Apple, and Facebook, web3 will use blockchain, crypto, and NFTs to transfer power back to the internet community.
Sounds good. Most of us buy the down-with-Facebook-and-Google narrative. Cut out the middleman, and we all win — especially the little guys. The dispersion of theaters, doctors offices, and bank branches to our homes, smart speakers, and phones offers enormous potential to provide elemental services with reduced friction. Smart contracts could, among other things, reduce agency costs and iron systemic biases out of the process. That’s the promise of decentralization. But does the music match the words? Read More
Meta has built an AI supercomputer it says will be world’s fastest by end of 2022
Social media conglomerate Meta is the latest tech company to build an “AI supercomputer” — a high-speed computer designed specifically to train machine learning systems. The company says its new AI Research SuperCluster, or RSC, is already among the fastest machines of its type and, when complete in mid-2022, will be the world’s fastest.
… The news demonstrates the absolute centrality of AI research to companies like Meta. Rivals like Microsoft and Nvidia have already announced their own “AI supercomputers,” which are slightly different from what we think of as regular supercomputers. RSC will be used to train a range of systems across Meta’s businesses: from content moderation algorithms used to detect hate speech on Facebook and Instagram to augmented reality features that will one day be available in the company’s future AR hardware. And, yes, Meta says RSC will be used to design experiences for the metaverse — the company’s insistent branding for an interconnected series of virtual spaces, from offices to online arenas. Read More
What’s the metaverse? Whatever companies want it to be.
IN NOVEMBER, FACEBOOK announced that it was rebranding itself as Meta, sparking a lot of credulous media coverage of “the metaverse,” a somewhat nebulous concept comprising virtual reality, 3D gaming, and a number of other trends. Interest in the metaverse deepened earlier this week, after Microsoft announced plans to acquire Activision Blizzard, a leading game developer, for almost $70 billion. Microsoft stated near the top of a press release that the acquisition, which still needs the approval of the Federal Trade Commission, will “provide building blocks for the metaverse”—a claim repeated in more than one news story about the deal, though not universally taken at face value. Read More
Meta has a giant new AI supercomputer to shape the metaverse
Meta, the tech giant previously known as Facebook, revealed Monday that it’s built one of the world’s fastest supercomputers, a behemoth called the Research SuperCluster, or RSC. With 6,080 graphics processing units packaged into 760 Nvidia A100 modules, it’s the fastest machine built for AI tasks, Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg says.
That processing power is in the same league as the Perlmutter supercomputer, which uses more than 6,000 of the same Nvidia GPUs and currently ranks as the world’s fifth fastest supercomputer. And in a second phase, Meta plans to boost performance by a factor of 2.5 with an expansion to 16,000 GPUs this year. Read More
Cryptocurrency Is a Giant Ponzi Scheme
Cryptocurrency is a scam.
All of it, full stop — not just the latest pump-and-dump “shitcoin” schemes, in which fraudsters hype a little-known cryptocurrency before dumping it in unison, or “rug pulls,” in which a new cryptocurrency’s developers abandon the project and run off with investor funds. All cryptocurrency and the industry as a whole are built atop market manipulation without which they could not exist at scale.
This should surprise no one who understands how cryptocurrency works. Blockchains are, at their core, simply append-only spreadsheets maintained across decentralized “peer-to-peer” networks, not unlike those used for torrenting pirated files. Just as torrents allow users to share files directly, cryptocurrency blockchains allow users to maintain a shared ledger of financial transactions without the need of a central server or managing authority. Users are thus able to make direct online transactions with one another as if they were trading cash.
This, we are told, is revolutionary. But making unmediated online transactions securely in a trustless environment in this way is not without costs. Cryptocurrency blockchains generally don’t allow previously verified transactions to be deleted or altered. The data is immutable. Updates are added by chaining a new “block” of transaction data to the chain of existing blocks.
But to ensure the integrity of the blockchain, the network needs a way to trust that new blocks are accurate. Popular cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Dogecoin all employ a “proof of work” consensus method for verifying updates to the blockchain. Without getting overly technical, this mechanism allows blockchain users — known as “miners” in this context — to compete for the right to verify and add the next block by being the first to solve an incredibly complex math puzzle. Read More
How AI will shape the Metaverse
As different visions of the future digital world known as the Metaverse emerge, what role will AI play in it? Will it improve inclusivity, or will it help create an even more discriminatory digital world?
The Metaverse has become one of the hottest technology and socioeconomic topic. Combining different technologies like VR, 3D animation, blockchain and many others, lots of companies are already working on creating services for this new digital world. Even tech giant Facebook changed its name to Meta, demonstrating that the Metaverse is truly targeting to become the next big mainstream technology.
While a lot has been said about the role of blockchain in the Metaverse, thanks in part to the big NFT hype, I was wondering what was being said about the intersection of the Metaverse and AI. But first, let’s try to answer the question “what is the Metaverse?” or at least, try to point out several visions about it. Read More
Design principles for web3
So everyone and their cat seems to be talking about blockchain. More importantly, it’s on the radar of huge companies, and we know that where there’s money, there’s traction. However, as a designer what I really wanted to know was what this meant for user experience and design in web3. For the record, I’m mainly concentrating around the blockchain space — specifically, design around dApps (which stands for decentralised applications and are basically apps as we know it, but built off the Ethereum blockchain)
This article is formed from an analysis of design case studies from DeepWork+ a lot of consuming various content (podcasts, videos, articles) of experts + my own opinions based off my journey breaking into the space and experience with dApps. Read More
Countdown To Bitcoin’s End — Crypto-Breaking Quantum Computers Are Closer Than You Think
Born on January 3, 2009, bitcoin is a little over one decade old. Yet a surprising number of people believe this first-generation cryptocurrency is immutable and indestructible. A little over a decade in, and some are proclaiming its the new gold. But with the accelerating growth in quantum computing power, how long can bitcoin’s reputation remain untarnished? Truth is, the threat to bitcoin’s integrity may be approaching far faster than most people realize. From a 30,000 foot perspective, bitcoin might just be a short blip in the history books, just like many of the fiat currencies that have come and gone.
… Many crypto enthusiasts are proclaiming that bitcoin is the new gold. Bitcoin is a legitimate store of value because its unbreakable. After all, it has an entire 12 year track record behind it.
… But a whole 12 years into “immutable” and there’s already a slight glitch in bitcoin’s armor. Algorithms that can decipher bitcoin’s private keys already exist. Shor’s algorithm and Grover’s algorithm, devised in 1994 and 1996 respectively, can be used to challenge asymmetric cryptography and hashing — the two mechanisms that secure a blockchain. And although we still don’t have computers powerful enough to execute these algorithms, most experts believe its not a question of if, but when this day will come. Read More
Why Many Web3 Startups are a Farce
One cannot disintermediate what, by design, is meant to be disintermediated (DISCLAIMER: I’m not talking about builders of Web3 services/protocols or augmentation services.)
Ifyou’ve at all been keeping up with the ever-evolving tech landscape (and institutional investment activity swarming it) you’re likely familiar with the following buzzwords: Web3, Creator Economy, Blockchain, Tokenization…the list goes on-and-on.
However, and the growing sentiment that the startup and investment activity into Web3 supports this, is that the notion of Web3 (centrally-managed) startups is, at best, a bubble; at worst, it’s a total farce. Read More
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