With the crash and fraud committed by FTX, blockchain technology has become a contentious topic right now. Currently, the anti-blockchain people are probably at an all time high in terms of personal pride, but that is an unnecessary side comment. Overall, both sides, specifically the vocal minorities in each group, are frankly acting like a bunch of babies throwing nagging points at each other.
With all this talk and debate, you think people would have conversations on how to determine when blockchain technology has succeeded. However, these talks have sparsely happened. Fortunately, I am here to give my thoughts on this question along with my thoughts on how the relationship between blockchain and the web systems society uses today will evolve.
Determining when Blockchain has Succeeded
Your belief on when blockchain has succeeded all depends on your thoughts on the technology. If you are one of those people who think everything will eventually become decentralized until that happens blockchain has not succeeded. On the other hand, if you are one of those people who think it is useless and impractical, maybe only a few large companies using it for specific use cases for the long haul will be enough for you to believe the technology has succeeded. Personally, I fall in the middle of a neutral mindset towards blockchain and thinking everything is going to eventually be on the blockchain.
For me, blockchain technology has succeeded when people interact with it daily without even knowing they are using it. This does not mean that centralized web systems and databases will become dead or legacy technology. It means that most companies and applications will use the blockchain for implementing at least one core value proposition or feature respectively.
What could this Future Look like?
The best way to understand my perspective on the future of blockchain is through an example. Let's suppose I want to create the next Linkedin. People can create accounts on this site and all their referrals, experiences, and other professional accolades are given out as non-transferable NFTs. These NFTs are special in terms of the fact that the information has been proven to be completely accurate (remember do not trust, validate). So obviously, the actual NFTs are stored on the blockchain and the metadata or information on the NFTs is stored decentrally, for instance on IPFS or Arweave. However, not all of the information on the site needs to be stored on the blockchain or decentrally. For instance, static information like the website’s landing page and about us page information does not need to be stored decentrally. Also, do I need to store information like a user’s bio decentrally? That is something that is prone to change often and does not need to be validated since all the NFT accolades should provide enough validation.
Final Thoughts
As much as people might try to predict what the future will look like concerning blockchain, the reality is that no one knows how much it will change the way the Internet functions. All we can do is make educated guesses. Ultimately, I believe that the future of the internet will be changed drastically by blockchain but there will still be plenty of use cases for centralized web systems. But what are your thoughts?
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