Previous | Next | Contents1.3. Pragmatic solutionism, total commodificationWeb3 practitioners often portray their own activity as taking part in, and contributing to, a post-political order, stemming from a wholly non-ideological drive. In our interviews, it’s notable that there was scant mention of contributing to existing public initiatives (in fields such as healthcare, education, social welfare, cultural heritage, or even technology and innovation). A majority of our interviewees declared...

Previous | Next | Contents1.3. Pragmatic solutionism, total commodificationWeb3 practitioners often portray their own activity as taking part in, and contributing to, a post-political order, stemming from a wholly non-ideological drive. In our interviews, it’s notable that there was scant mention of contributing to existing public initiatives (in fields such as healthcare, education, social welfare, cultural heritage, or even technology and innovation). A majority of our interviewees declared...

Previous | Next | Contents2. Making lies, making valueJust counted my cash, 452 marks. No idea what I’ll do with all that money – the only things left to buy cost no more than a few pfennigs. I also have about a thousand in the bank, again because there’s nothing to buy. (When I opened that account, in the first year of the war, I was still thinking of saving for peacetime, maybe even taking a trip around the world. That was a long, long time ago.) Recently people have been running to the ban...

Previous | Next | Contents2. Making lies, making valueJust counted my cash, 452 marks. No idea what I’ll do with all that money – the only things left to buy cost no more than a few pfennigs. I also have about a thousand in the bank, again because there’s nothing to buy. (When I opened that account, in the first year of the war, I was still thinking of saving for peacetime, maybe even taking a trip around the world. That was a long, long time ago.) Recently people have been running to the ban...

NextHis book begins with the realisation that ever less humans will remember the first time they went on the Internet. He writes that there will no longer be memories of what people saw or looked for, if one was alone facing the screen, what actual place one was in when first surfing the web. I know where he was, mid-nineties, back in that central library of the grey city where he began using the name Elyashib. I also know that he cannot mind that I pasted all his words here. 0x837dD6E84E5C8D...

NextHis book begins with the realisation that ever less humans will remember the first time they went on the Internet. He writes that there will no longer be memories of what people saw or looked for, if one was alone facing the screen, what actual place one was in when first surfing the web. I know where he was, mid-nineties, back in that central library of the grey city where he began using the name Elyashib. I also know that he cannot mind that I pasted all his words here. 0x837dD6E84E5C8D...

Previous | Contents Adorno, T. W. (1964 / 1993). “Messages in a Bottle”, in New Left Review, 200(7). Adorno, T. W. (1969). “Society”, in Salmagundi, 10/11. Adorno, T. W. (1975). “Culture Industry Reconsidered” in New German Critique, 6. Adorno, T. W. et al. (1977 / 1969) The Positivist Dispute in German Sociology, London: Heinemann. Adorno, T. W. (1994). Introduction à la sociologie de la musique, Geneva: Contrechamps Editions. Adorno, T. W., Horkheimer, M. (2002 / 1944). Dialectic of Enlight...

Previous | Contents Adorno, T. W. (1964 / 1993). “Messages in a Bottle”, in New Left Review, 200(7). Adorno, T. W. (1969). “Society”, in Salmagundi, 10/11. Adorno, T. W. (1975). “Culture Industry Reconsidered” in New German Critique, 6. Adorno, T. W. et al. (1977 / 1969) The Positivist Dispute in German Sociology, London: Heinemann. Adorno, T. W. (1994). Introduction à la sociologie de la musique, Geneva: Contrechamps Editions. Adorno, T. W., Horkheimer, M. (2002 / 1944). Dialectic of Enlight...

Previous | Next | Contents1.4. Superficial contradictionsThe question however remains open as to what degree this project of absolute commodification can be equated with an explicit political agenda, as David Golumbia wrote in his Politics of Bitcoin, and indeed with the far-right politics that now dominates in many Western nations. Admittedly, one could argue that the slogans and beliefs advanced by Web3 agitators – small community ties, decentralisation and disruption, pragmatic technologic...

Previous | Next | Contents1.4. Superficial contradictionsThe question however remains open as to what degree this project of absolute commodification can be equated with an explicit political agenda, as David Golumbia wrote in his Politics of Bitcoin, and indeed with the far-right politics that now dominates in many Western nations. Admittedly, one could argue that the slogans and beliefs advanced by Web3 agitators – small community ties, decentralisation and disruption, pragmatic technologic...

Previous | Next | Contents1. The Internet of blockchains, a brand new web of contrary accountsThe August 2022 edition of Fortune magazine exhibited the pinched-lipped grin of a young man, above the caption: “The next Warren Buffett?” Then at the head of FTX, one of the most ‘reputable’ crypto exchanges, the young man is presently serving a 25 year prison sentence. For persons involved in this peculiar field of human activity, his name will usually trigger a smirk (alternatively, a shudder, if...

Previous | Next | Contents1. The Internet of blockchains, a brand new web of contrary accountsThe August 2022 edition of Fortune magazine exhibited the pinched-lipped grin of a young man, above the caption: “The next Warren Buffett?” Then at the head of FTX, one of the most ‘reputable’ crypto exchanges, the young man is presently serving a 25 year prison sentence. For persons involved in this peculiar field of human activity, his name will usually trigger a smirk (alternatively, a shudder, if...

Previous | Next | Contents1.2. Disruption, or perfecting capitalismIn their article ‘Expansive and extractive networks of Web3’ Jathan Sadowski and Kaitlin Beegle critically observe that blockchain advocates propose not simply “the democratization of data ownership – since that is a very Web 2.0 premise”, but “the creation of entirely new kinds of assets, infrastructures, markets, organizations, and social relations with decentralization at their core, which will replace their nondecentralize...

Previous | Next | Contents1.2. Disruption, or perfecting capitalismIn their article ‘Expansive and extractive networks of Web3’ Jathan Sadowski and Kaitlin Beegle critically observe that blockchain advocates propose not simply “the democratization of data ownership – since that is a very Web 2.0 premise”, but “the creation of entirely new kinds of assets, infrastructures, markets, organizations, and social relations with decentralization at their core, which will replace their nondecentralize...

Previous | Next | Contents2.1. Intense communication and cultural labourWhy not begin with memecoins? It’s 2025 and possibly over a million have been launched. Even if roughly 90% are failures in terms of attracting value, consider how their – indeed wholly abstract – existence requires real material resources: from the intellectual labour of the humans involved in their inception, to the equipment and electrical energy needed to mint them, to register transactions and store this value, and m...

Previous | Next | Contents2.1. Intense communication and cultural labourWhy not begin with memecoins? It’s 2025 and possibly over a million have been launched. Even if roughly 90% are failures in terms of attracting value, consider how their – indeed wholly abstract – existence requires real material resources: from the intellectual labour of the humans involved in their inception, to the equipment and electrical energy needed to mint them, to register transactions and store this value, and m...

Previous | Next | Contents1.1. The ethos of communities, and blatant individualismIt comes of no surprise that crypto-assets are perceived as a vehicle for personal enrichment. Somewhat more intriguing is however the extent to which the ‘small hands’ of Web3 idealistically associate personal growth and fulfilment with their own belonging to small-scale ‘communities.’ This vision is evident in the declaration of a San Francisco based Web3 product manager: “I think blockchain empowers smaller g...

Previous | Next | Contents1.1. The ethos of communities, and blatant individualismIt comes of no surprise that crypto-assets are perceived as a vehicle for personal enrichment. Somewhat more intriguing is however the extent to which the ‘small hands’ of Web3 idealistically associate personal growth and fulfilment with their own belonging to small-scale ‘communities.’ This vision is evident in the declaration of a San Francisco based Web3 product manager: “I think blockchain empowers smaller g...