(#44) The opportunity to make it

A shift to web 3 will open doors for many

Nov 13, 2021

Welcome to The Yellow Summarin - collecting the most interesting ideas, topics, and tweets from the past week at the intersection of tech, media, and commerce.

In today's edition (13.11.2021), I share thoughts on the shifting attention to web 3 and the opportunities that come with it.

Read and listen:

A friend of mine (who is also my co-founder and a reader of the newsletter) noted this week that the focus of the newsletter over the last few editions has greatly shifted towards the topics of the metaverse, NFTs - subsets of what is termed web 3.

What is Web 3?

While I would insist that the topics and narratives I share here sit at the intersection of tech, media, and commerce, it is not incorrect to say that the focus has been predominantly on the aforementioned trends.

The main reason for this is my personal curiosity. Second, I think the most interesting things at the intersection of tech, media, and commerce are happening around brands' exploration of the metaverse, NFTs, and the new operational and reward models being devised in web 3.

Third, and this again I have to credit to my friend - the ship to build something significant from scratch through web 2 (social media, blogs, search engines, marketplaces) has sailed. Pursuing the opportunities arising from web 3 (decentralization, shared ownership & rewards, NFTs, metaverses) is where the real potential lies.

In our journey of building DULO, the brand of biodegradable performance apparel, we've missed the boat that is web 2 - social media, SEO, influencers, digital ads - we started at a time when the opportunities to do something notable and organic were few and unaffordable for an upstart. A self-funded, bootstrapped business could only do so much before it runs out of money and energy to keep up with the level of content production and optimization required to have even the slightest chance of moving the needle.

Scaling the unscalable is a great mantra, but is pretty damn hard when the unscalable corresponds to an immovable object. Today, in web 2, without resources and unique talent, it is almost impossible to make it. In web 3, however, the atmosphere is different.

A digital-first strategy, tailored around shared ownership and mutually beneficial incentives for creators and audience makes for a level playing field where you can have your own piece of the pie and decide how to distribute its unique parts to everyone involved. You can preserve and reward ownership.

It seems that today all major brands are entering the field and are coming up with their own interpretation of a web 3 model. For established businesses, the challenge and risks involved in adopting a strategy fit for web 3 are quite a few and some can be voiced by asking these critical questions:

Does a large enough pool of people exist that makes this economically viable?
Can we afford to shift our organization models so drastically and how quickly can we do it?
Are we willing to commit for years and carry the torch for other players in the industry?
If the public's interest shifts to a new, shinier toy, are we willing to fight? Are we true believers?

For small businesses and those with strong organic communities, the barriers are fewer and less scary. The risk of not going down the web 3 route is much bigger than sitting idly and mimicking what established players are doing.

Over the next few years, we are going to see a ton of announcements around initiatives and campaigns that involve the words metaverse, NFT, and web 3. Today, this is quite evident on Twitter, where accounts that used to be expert voices on e-commerce and direct to consumer, have rebranded to web 3 experts and are all proudly "gm"-ing each other shamelessly. No harm in that, as long as you are inherently interested in the field and working on ways to benefit the community. Ironically, my journey of learning about all these things has shaped my online voice, contributing to the pool of commentators.

OK, enough with the musings... Here's the list of notable articles for this week.

Drip is the new drop (The Sociology of Business)
Drips are not micro-drops. They are a new cultural, social and economic paradigm. As a strategy, drips mean shifting budgets and actions from seasonal campaigns and product releases to investing in the continuous interactions with customers, across all touchpoints. In this scenario, FOMO and excitement are not given, but earned. Read story

To Build the Metaverse, Meta First Wants to Build Stores (NYTimes)
The aim of the stores is to make the world “more open and connected,” according to the company documents viewed by The Times. They are also intended to spark emotions like “curiosity, closeness,” as well as a sense of feeling “welcomed” while experimenting with headsets in a “judgment free journey.” Read story

Nvidia lays out its own vision for the ‘omniverse’ at its AI conference (Emerging Tech Brew)
For Nvidia, metaverse buzz is misplaced—it’s all about the omniverse. The tech giant centered its annual AI conference, GTC, on the idea of “digital twins” for virtually everyone and everything. The term essentially refers to simulation software—in goes the real-world data, out come the performance predictions. Read story
10:22PM Forms KINGSHIP, The First-Ever Group Consisting of NFT Characters from Bored Ape Yacht Club (Universal)
10:22PM, a next-gen Web3 label that discovers and develops artists, intellectual property, brands and digital creators, today announced the formation of KINGSHIP, a group consisting of four characters from the Bored Ape Yacht Club, one of the most successful non-fungible token (NFT) projects of all time. Read story