A16z Partner’s New Book: Read Write Own – Blockchain Overcoming Early Disadvantages of Open Source Projects, but Requires Overcoming Speculative Culture

Stanford University blockchain blog editor and well-known crypto venture capitalist a16z partner Chris Dixon recently discussed his new book “Read Write Own,” which primarily describes the long-term significance of Web3 in the digital industry and the development challenges it currently faces due to speculative culture.

Table of Contents
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Understanding the value of Web3 requires an understanding of the internet architecture
Protocol Networks
Corporate Networks
Corporate networks win with strong funding
Opportunities and challenges of Web3
Opportunity: Blockchain allows protocol networks to compete
Challenge: Conflict between computer culture and speculative markets
Blockchain will reshape the digital industry

The book “Read Write Own” begins with stories commonly heard within the community – that most of the value on the internet is now dominated by tech giants like Google, Meta, and Amazon, and blockchain will be a turning point. To understand the technological and cultural significance of blockchain, a broader understanding of internet history is needed.

Because most of the value on the internet, including social networks, financial history, and medical records, is recorded and captured on these interconnected networks. Therefore, to understand the modern internet, one must first understand network design, as it directly affects how money and power flow within the network system.

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Before the emergence of blockchain technology, there were two main designs in the internet economy: protocol networks and corporate networks.

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There are primarily two types of network architecture: protocol networks and corporate networks.

Protocol networks are defined by a set of open-source rules that describe how different participants interact within the network. Since the protocol is completely open-source, any participant can launch the same application, and all the value belongs to the participants of the protocol, rather than any centralized entity that charges high fees.

One of the most classic examples of a protocol network is RSS. RSS is a truly simple aggregation protocol that allows users to subscribe to content of interest.

On the other hand, corporate networks are closed networks, such as Facebook or Twitter, designed and maintained by a single company to promote its own interests.

Although many corporate networks support APIs and ecosystems for external developers and creators on their platforms, the interests of users are secondary to the company’s interests. Therefore, the vast majority of value for creators, developers, and other users on the network belongs to the platform, rather than the users themselves.

Closed corporate networks, such as Facebook or Twitter, have defeated open protocol networks like RSS. Twitter was initially designed as a frontend that supported RSS and was easy to use, but gradually users became completely dependent on Twitter’s platform and network, rather than RSS. Twitter eventually decided to end support for RSS in 2013 and capture user value.

One of the core reasons why these corporate networks can replace open protocol networks is because they have strong funding and are carefully designed to present their strategic interests. Platforms like Amazon, YouTube, and Uber are willing to burn money in the early stages to subsidize users’ growth.

On the other hand, many protocol networks lack systematic funding to sustain the development and maintenance of projects due to their decentralized nature. Many developers maintain these networks out of pure goodwill, forming a strong contrast.

Open protocol networks cannot compete with the funding of corporate networks. This greatly disrupts the founding spirit of the internet as an open public space for sharing and advancing knowledge for everyone.

Blockchain introduces a new form of internet economy that combines the openness of protocol networks with the funding mechanism of corporate networks, which may help fundamentally address the above-mentioned problems.

Blockchain can achieve the business model of open protocols through “tokens,” which represent ownership and value units in open-source programs.

Unfortunately, blockchain and tokens often have a negative connotation due to their speculative and gambling nature, which is actually because the blockchain industry is currently filled with two cultural aspects:

Computer culture: Developers, entrepreneurs, and visionary individuals place cryptocurrencies in the broader context of internet history and understand the technological significance of blockchain in the long run, pursuing ideals.

Casino culture: Speculators, traders, and others focus on short-term gains and profit from price fluctuations in the trading market.

Dixon believes that it is possible to alleviate the short-sightedness and harmful effects of casino culture through stronger regulation and increased legal clarity. One potential solution may be to fully utilize vesting plans and timeframes, locking tokens for a specified period through techniques such as staking or through traditional legal means such as contracts. This can promote longer-term thinking in the field and help blockchain technology become a force for social welfare.

In fact, this is the culture of Web3 pursuing freedom and value, and the conflict between capital and speculation as the motivation of crypto culture, which fundamentally differs. Others believe that speculation is the main obstacle to the development of Web3.

The existing internet culture is dominated by corporate networks, where users, developers, and participants are relatively deprived of value, while the network structure of blockchain has the opportunity to bring back the culture of protocols to the market and improve this situation.

For blockchain to truly change the current internet culture, it needs to reduce the proportion of casino culture. Through the flexible design framework of computer culture and tokens, open-source projects have the opportunity to complete cold launches in the early stages with a completely new business model and eventually emerge as competitive long-term open-source projects, taking advantage of network effects.

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Blockchain and token architecture make up for the disadvantages of early-stage open-source projects.

With the completion of infrastructure, the aforementioned situation may occur, and killer-level applications may soon emerge in the crypto field, becoming a truly practical industry.

(Read Write Own is currently not available in Chinese)
a16z
Chris Dixon
Read Write Own
Web3

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Further reading
Protocol Guild, a funded project, sees what problems? How to ensure the long-term development of the Ethereum ecosystem
Daifang recognizes that Web3 wallets of Binance are still “incomplete,” and He Yi’s tweet recruits developers.