There are so many fiascoes in Web3 — the stupefying realm of cryptocurrency, non-fungible tokens and blockchain — that you could compile a blog and Twitter account made up entirely of Web3 fails.
And Molly White has done just that.
Digital currency, the encrypted computer code it is built on, and unique digital media known as NFTs have had a rough time of late, as you may have heard. Bitcoin, the most widely used cryptocurrency, is worth a third of what it was valued at in October 2021. Some experts believe 90% of NFT collectibles will be wiped out by the current downturn. And the industry is shedding jobs in what is a leading edge of tech layoffs.
White is applying a wry and encyclopedic approach to the industry, collecting news items and comical screwups in the industry for a growing audience of fans.
The blog “Web3 is going just great” (web3isgoinggreat.com for you print readers) is made up of items with headlines like “Senators Lummis and Gillibrand work across the aisle to please cryptocurrency industry with their proposed legislation,” mixed with news of hacks, price plunges and fraud.
White, a Massachusetts software engineer, says there is no shortage of items. “Every day there are a couple of things I could add to the site,” White says. “And I get a lot of tips.”
Who from? Crypto workers and users are a good portion of her audience. I learned of her blog from an employee at a crypto startup who is a fan of its Twitter account. The crypto employee asked me, “Do you follow @web3isgreat? You don’t? Oh my God,” and immediately called it up on his phone. That kind of loyal following has grown the Twitter account to more than 93,000 followers in six months. A lot of journalists follow the account, which is an impressive curation of crypto news, but so do some famous names.
Chris Krebs, the federal cybersecurity official who was fired by Donald Trump for accurately reporting there was no election fraud, is a follower. And so is Harry Shearer, the actor who voices a bunch of characters on “The Simpsons,” including Mr. Burns and Principal Skinner.
The blog has an interesting origin story. White is an avid volunteer editor of Wikipedia, and in November she created the Wikipedia entry for Web3. Working on that page sparked her interest in chronicling the ongoing tumult of the crypto world.
“There’s a lot of hacks. There’s a lot of projects that were just fraudulent from the get-go. Recently, there’s been a lot of projects that are collapsing as a result of a crypto downturn,” White says. “And yes, there’s some cultural stuff of just people doing really dumb things within the Web3 space.”
White has a favorite example of that kind of item.
“Cryptoland was probably the most ridiculous,” she says. “That was a project where some people were hoping to buy a real physical island in Fiji and create this sort of crypto paradise for where people would actually live.”
A video promoting the project enthusiastically describes a “first-class crypto lifestyle” in a “paradise made by crypto enthusiasts for crypto enthusiasts.”
It is challenging to determine whether the video is satire, White says. “I spent hours trying to determine if it was parody. It would have been the best parody of crypto that anyone could dream of making.” But, her research suggests, “It was actually quite authentic.”
To give you an idea of the participation and engagement of her posts, her tweet about the isle of Cryptoland was retweeted more than 2,000 times and liked more than 10,000 times. “Join me in hell as we watch this together,” she said in the January tweet.
In case you’re wondering, White does not own any cryptocurrency. White points out that she also doesn’t “short” crypto, selling before a downturn to make a profit. Her disclosures are posted on the blog.
“I don’t hold any crypto and I don’t develop in Web3 or anything like that. It’s not something I particularly want anything to deal with.”
Except being a favorite chronicler of the good, the bad and the ugly of the crypto world. Well, two out of three ain’t bad.
