Down the web3 rabbit hole we go
"Oppressive product building is dead," and other lessons from watching early web3 themes unfold
Hello and welcome! If you’re getting this email you’ve likely subscribed to Builders, a “semi-regular” newsletter on building products by moi, Nickey Skarstad. In each drop I’ll dig into interesting themes and share anecdotes to help you build better products, teams, and companies! Drop me an email to share what you’d like to read next and subscribe if you enjoyed what you read today:
Sup builders!
Are you sick of me yet? When I set out to write this newsletter many moons ago, I quickly developed a newfound appreciation for folks who set and stick to a writing/publishing schedule. It’s not easy! A long time ago, I went to university and came home with a journalism degree and ambitions to become a working journalist. I planned, and the universe laughed. I fell backwards into technology and honestly haven’t looked back.
One thing that’s stuck with me since my J-school days tho, is the propensity to teach myself by writing about concepts that I need to work through myself. As a builder, this is a common forcing function for thinking, take writing a product brief for example. You start to articulate the what, the why, and the how of what you want to build, and through the process of writing you uncover big holes in your logic that you need to work through. Convince yourself first, and only then others.
Down the web3 rabbit hole we go
In this spirit, one thing I’ve been paying more and more attention to is web3. Much like what we discussed a few weeks ago, ie. the pandemic and how it continues to change your day to day job as a builder, web3 will eventually do the same. Unlike remote work and how it impacts your process more practically, web3 is less concrete and more abstract. It’s more of an emerging set of principles that are still being shaped. Its only stable truth is that it’s going to change how we work and what we care about … again. If web3 is a rabbit hole, then I am Alice juuuuust after she fell down the hole.
web2 vs. web3
Here’s a super simplistic explainer on the different phases of the web:
web1 → Read
web2 → Read, write
web3 → Read, write, own (You are here 😜)
Early on in the pandemic, I stumbled on this World 1.0 vs. World 2.0 comparison table that I enjoyed. It argued that there are decades where nothing happens each week, and then weeks where decades happen. Decades of web3 work are happening each week right now, and it somehow only seems to be speeding up. In this spirit, here’s my web2 vs. web3 version:
I could go on but to synthesize even further, web3 twists the idea of traditional ownership and governance (founders, investors, board, etc.) and puts the right to own back into the hands of creators and communities in ways that are far more decentralized than before. It’s built on blockchain so it’s more secure, albeit dangerously more energy consumptive (double entendre alert). Whether or not you agree with each layer of this complex onion, a truth that I just can’t shake is that it is here and it will shift consumer behavior in new ways. Therefore you should pay attention.
Pay attention & adapt
So, to the point Skarstad, should you drop everything and completely change how you’re working today to embrace web3, in most cases NO. That said, you should pick your nose up and start to pay attention, and get involved if you’re interested. Developing new skills, while you’re waiting for the world to catch-up, has never hurt anyone. Here are some things to consider as you’re building:
→ Double down on your community. The best product builders I’ve worked with are ALSO community builders. They know not just how to ship gr8 products, but also how to build meaningful relationships around that product. In web2 this was already important, but it is even more so in web3. ⏱ Thirty-second anecdote time:
Back when Etsy was a tiny newborn bb company, the then CEO built out an early community team. The team’s mandate was to hit the streets and preach the good Etsy word, and that’s what they did. They went to craft shows, met and developed community leaders in the handmade/craft world, and brought people back to the platform as a way to connect online in community spaces designed for them.
Etsy’s early growth flywheel was built entirely off its community, where sellers who needed supplies for their products to sell, would buy them from other sellers who sold supplies. This was only possible because they had established a true sense of community where sellers trusted each other (this was before reviews were really a thing).
Years later when I was a brand new APM, the only way I got anything done was to work closely with the community. Those skills have stayed with me, I still apply them over ten years later.
This type of investment is even more important in the web3 world where vibrant and healthy communities power early growth. Communities will come to expect being heard, fostered, and supported. They’ll have cutting edge tools that track neatly back into the products they use. Builders who do this best will have a unique competitive advantage. Be like early Etsy.
→ Start future proofing now. Squint at the future, takes some guesses at how a shift towards web3 impacts what you’re working on. How can you future proof today? Don’t go down an irreversible path that will be hard to undo later.
→ “Help me own my share.” I can imagine many user stories that will read something like that in the coming years. Take a closer look at how you’re baking ownership into your offerings. Reevaluate how you write your TOS, how you let your users manage their profile, their data, their earnings, and beyond. As the idea of “ownership” becomes more prolific, dated tech that doesn’t play to this principle will feel yucky really quickly. Kinda already does to be honest, you don’t own me Facebook! /me clicks on another algorithmically generated ad 🤦🏻♀️
→ “To create is to live twice.” Wow someone mint me a clown NFT for using a quote from a French philosopher (Camus) in an article about web3 🤡. But seriously, we already know that the creator economy is here and thriving. Creators have more and more options (on tools to use, platforms where they can take their followers, ways to engage and grow themselves and their bases) than ever before. The tools are only going to get better. Same point as above, find new ways to push back control to creators, oppressive product is dead.
→ You’re wrong about the metaverse. As the world shifts to more remote work, and as GenZ/Alpha grow up online, the metaverse will absolutely be a thing. If you work remotely, you’re already in it, a place where you connect with your coworkers online. The metaverse will impact products differently, but brands will need to find new ways to meet their consumers where they’re at, which is increasingly online. Layer on the first point, re: community being increasingly important, and you’ll want to find better ways to connect with and grow your community (enter: new tools in and around the metaverse, espesh in regards to fostering community).
→ Play the great online game. This piece from Packy of Not Boring has stuck with me, about how we’re all living inside the online game. A lot of people who thrive online are givers and learners (or alternatively trolls, but we can talk about that in a future article). They learn and share what they’re learning with their larger community, which puts them out there and opens them up to new relationships and opportunities. It’s a virtuous cycle. Write, create, think out-loud, this is great for your personal brand as a builder!
Ones to watch
If you’ve made it this far, I’ll leave you with three examples of web3 projects that are doing interesting things to get your wheels turning:
1. Braintrust
From their business case:
Braintrust is a decentralized talent network that replaces our outdated, fragmented labor market with a liquid, algorithmically controlled marketplace governed by network participants.
To ditch the biz-speak (which feels like a sportsball metaphor), it’s a professional services marketplace with no fees. You can exercise your control by proposing changes and having the larger community vote. You vote using BTRST tokens, and the more you have the more voting power you can control. Imagine a world where there are no fees on marketplaces and you earn by selling your products or services, and by helping grow the marketplace yourself. As a long-time marketplace builder, this has me incredibly excited because it ditches the model we all interact with today.
2. Mirror
No, not the yoga mirror you hang on your wall. Mirror.xyz is a community-owned publishing platform. To become a member of the community, you need to “win the $WRITE race” which is a “game” where $WRITE token holders vote new members in each week. Honestly, writing this piece about web3 felt wrong NOT on Mirror and I’m not even on Mirror. My brain breaks.
3. Dune as NFT
The most troubling part of the web3 speed-up IMO is invariably the amount of energy it consumes. Because web3 is powered by crypto and crypto uses Blockchain/proof of work, it consumes an insane amount of energy per transaction.⛽️💨
In October Legendary Pictures will release Dune starting Timmy Chalamet and Zendaya. As part of the upcoming release, they were planning to mint NFTs that people could buy, own, sell to generate buzz for the movie. If you’ve actually read Dune (I’m literally reading this right now, book/nerd club!!!) you’ll understand the hypocrisy of the environmental focus of the book with NFTs and how much energy they consume to buy and sell. Legendary killed the NFT program after backlash from Dune fans.
I thought this was interesting cultural pushback on one of the larger challenges with web3. There will be lots of work to bring down energy usage and it will hopefully fall drastically over time, and there are already interesting projects in flight that are doing this already. Perceptions bake early though, and I’m curious to watch how this conflates with the urgency of the climate crises that we are undoubtably living in today.
How are you paying attention?
Phew, that was … a lot! But you made it, congrats! I’m curious to hear from you. How do you think web3 will impact the work you’re doing? What are you reading? Who are you following? Any interesting projects/launches to watch? Send me an email or respond to my tweet below, I want to know!