Anyone trying to keep up with tech these days has been assaulted by a blaze of new jargon, “world-changing” new models and unbridled absurdity.
What started with Bitcoin and the blockchain has become Web3. That’s the fresh new term for all the latest blockchain nonsense like DAOs, NFTs, Blingos, DeFi and the ICOs that seem almost traditional today. (See the explainer below.)
It’s all the hype and pie-in-the sky promises of the internet right before the dot-com bubble popped and the Pets.com dog went to a nice farm upstate.
With the absurdity of it all in full view, it’s easy to become a crotchety old fogie about Web3. There is, however, plenty of value within the hype.
Thomas Flaherty, chief development officer at Wings and Rings, laid the foundation for the company to accept Bitcoin for its $40,000 franchise fee. Nobody has utilized it yet, but it helps start the conversation. He put up a little coin at one expo and a sign that read, “Now accepting Bitcoin.”
“You had people look at the booth—there are a million booths—and they normally would have walked right on by. But they saw Bitcoin as a franchise fee, and they’d stop,” said Flaherty. “It makes them scratch their head and ask what else we’re doing and we can talk about our new prototype, our pickup lane and all these things we’re doing.”
It’s quite an ice breaker for the younger, digital natives coming into the franchise space. It also got him spots on television and coverage in scores of articles—an incredible windfall of earned media exposure.
It’s worked on the NFT side as well. Bojangles created a handful of NFTs, partnering with creators from its own social media networks. Does a stoned-looking sloth smoking a joint move the sales needle? Maybe not, but it puts the brand in the conversation.
Applebee’s took it a step further and provided some actual utility, selling an NFT that came with burgers or steaks for a whole year. A burger image went for just $25, but the steak image netted $1,337 from NFT enthusiast Josh Smith. He and some friends run a podcast, “Appleboys,” that loosely mimics conversations had at the neighborhood bar over a couple beers.
“I did the math and that was going to be about a $1,600 gift card, so outside of just buying the NFT, I was also going to be pre-paying my bar tab for the next couple of years probably. Additionally, having an original NFT for a company that we are loosely affiliated with is neat,” said Smith. “I will definitely get my money’s worth out of the investment over time.”
Smith is exactly the kind of customer Applebee’s wants: young, techy and brand evangelizing. And maybe vastly wealthy if someone wants his steak image.
Sure, Web3 is pretty crazy, but the line between brilliant ideas and madness is razor thin. “Cars are a crazy idea until they’re not; electricity is a crazy idea until it’s not,” said Flaherty. “Everything is insane until it’s not.”
WTF is Web3?
Web3 is the new term to encompass all things built on the blockchain.
Blockchain: The distributed ledger system, i.e., a big spreadsheet in the sky, that transfers and authenticates information via math.
DAO: A distributed autonomous organization is a business built on the blockchain without hierarchical management structures. There is potential here, but most DAOs are financial organizations that trade cryptocurrency. Watch as they evaporate.
NFT: Non-fungible tokens are a way to show you paid to be recognized as the owner of something that anyone can easily save to their computer. The industry is plagued by scams and egregious IP theft.
Blingos: I made this up. You can make up almost anything in this space. Try it and maybe you’re the first Web3 trillionaire.
DeFi: Decentralized finance is about the only blockchain use that makes sense so far and is more time (not energy) efficient than traditional protocols.
ICO: Initial coin offering is when you mint a new blockchain-based currency, like Bitcoin.
