[Air-L] [EXTERNAL] the NFT bandwagon

Sat Dec 25 03:16:36 PST 2021

Hello Thomas,

I suspect we will not resolve our differences but I do want to pursue this conversation - if only to sharpen my own thinking.

"in my previous post I linked to a project I'm working on which is all about critiquing the "crypto bro" culture and drive diversity in this space"

So for the Yes Queen Club project - what is its measure of success? How do you know if it has worked or not?

Your bringing up VRM is interesting - because for me the problem with implementing VRM is less the technical challenges and more that no one really cares - yet. Interestingly, TBL has proposed something similar with Solid: https://solidproject.org/ - People do not even see their data as their property. I don't know if GDPR-style legislation will change that (I doubt it). But I think that horse has bolted. I mean, technological change may shift those conceptual issues but there is no guarantee. My take on VRM et al is if we do get it (and that's a big if), it will not be Searls' noble vision but something seedier and trashier. Because on the internet, it always is.

The Cluetrain Manifesto (s**t, just discovered that Chris Locke died 5 days ago) is interesting. Its writers were/are baby boomer hippies - and it is piece of writing very much of that worldview. Here is my own take on that: https://tempo.substack.com/p/cyber-realism

"Surely DAOs in many ways bring to life a lot of the ClueTrain <https://www.cluetrain.com/> Manifesto<https://www.cluetrain.com/>'s principles more broadly"

Do they? The vision of the ClueTrain is profoundly humanistic. It values conversations between humans and sees the internet as the platform for those conversations. The creators of DAOs envisage an automated world run by smart contracts with no need to humans. What they share is a suspicion of traditional bureaucratic structures - but for different reasons. The ClueTrainers find them inhuman whereas for the DAOists they are not inhuman enough.

"Sure, you can dismiss it all easily" - well, yes. I would really like it to be harder to dismiss.

"The shift of the dominant political force online from the communal left to the libertarian right is one of life's greatest disappointments to me."

This is a disappointment I share (see the piece on Cyber Realism above). I'm sure you're aware of Fred Turner's From Counterculture to Cyberculture and Steve Blank's Secret History. The political history of Silicon Valley is complex - for decades it was bankrolled by government money funding anti-Communist defence projects. Yes there were hippies. But Peter Thiel has been a public reactionary libertarian since the mid-80s - long before founding PayPal (arguably the original Fintech).

BTW the biggest hippy was Stewart Brand:
https://tempo.substack.com/p/tempo-part-2-wir-fahren-the-romance
https://tempo.substack.com/p/tempo-part-3-time-travel-agents

I would note that crypto is simply one area of developing technology. I am more interested (and concerned) by current developments in the AI space. And I am more excited by the potential of quantum computing and deep tech in general. So I'm still with Eno on this.

Regards,

Matt

Sent: Saturday, December 25, 2021 6:37 PM
Subject: Re: [Air-L] [EXTERNAL] the NFT bandwagon

Sadly I'm old enough to remember web 1.0, nevermind the original definition of web 3.0 ;)

And I remember (as much as I can remember anything these days) being so impressed by what Brian Eno brought to the table as a visionary in that era. So it is doubly disappointing to see this latest interview being bandied about as if it were some proof positive that crypto is a sham. It's not, it's a poor soundbite at best.

Ironically, arguing over the definition of web 3.0 is...semantics ;) I myself was briefly perturbed that the label was being co-opted for something I thought was quite different by a new generation of digital youngsters. But when you look at how smart contracts work, for instance, they are merely an extension of this original thinking. As you say Matthew - that vision has been achieved in a rather more adhoc way than the orderly proponents of things like well documented microformats had wished for, but it has nonetheless been achieved in many ways. (Just maybe by the wrong people for the wrong reason - FAANG).

They are an extension I think, being the positive but critical person I am, can actually deliver on a lot of late '90s/early 2000s digital philosophy that otherwise hasn't been. For instance Doc Searl's notion of VRM<https://blogs.harvard.edu/doc/category/vrm/> - the flipside of CRM, where individuals own their data and put out requests to vendors, rather than being spammed by businesses... has long fascinated me. But the technology and adoption of that tech, to achieve it has not yet happened. Till now... e.g. I'm working with a company who are exploring how NFTS can help achieve it. Which is slightly more worthy than "hustlers looking for suckers", which would be Eno referring to the BoredApe et al collections of overpriced pixels I assume.

And speaking of Searls - surely DAOs in many ways bring to life a lot of the ClueTrain <https://www.cluetrain.com/> Manifesto<https://www.cluetrain.com/>'s principles more broadly? These were completely trodden on by web 2.0's Facebook et al but are now being lived by people who I doubt have heard of ClueTrain but share many of its sentiments in their writing. (Spend a day or two in a DAO discord I recommend anyone reading this for some serious digital ethnography).

Sure, you can dismiss it all easily - NFTs are overpriced pixels, IDOs are ponzi schemes, Bitcoin is too volatile to be a currency, A DAO tried to buy a copy of the constitution...it's all easily reduced and parodied. But what in life isn't these days?

The shift of the dominant political force online from the communal left to the libertarian right is one of life's greatest disappointments to me. I see a lot of very smart, very interesting people disengaging from the next generation of digital technologies because it's currently in the hands of people whose ideologies they disagree with. But that's precisely why they should engage - and see past the mainstream media's coverage and the basic arguments and try and help point it in the right direction. Because it's here, its happening and we need it not to go the way of web 2.0

Again to emphasise, don't get me wrong - I see _a lot_ I dislike about web 3.0/crypto/metaverse/call it what you will... in my previous post I linked to a project I'm working on which is all about critiquing the "crypto bro" culture and drive diversity in this space. It would be easy just to accept Eno's soundbite and turn away from it all. But I'm not, and I hope other smart, interesting, people on lists like this aren't either. The future needs them.

Stop waiting for crypto get "boring" Matthew - by then it'll be shaped entirely wrong for anyone _but_ crypto bros.

- thomas

p.s. Matthew, Thanks for "not" accusing me of being a cryptobro, as a non-binary, neuro-atypical, queer individual that probably would have rankled me somewhat. Very generous of you. 😂

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Thomas Scovell

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