Every time we grab the cell phone we are losing money. We are voluntarily providing our attention and information to some private company which then exploits, manipulates and monetizes it without our consent. Each platform owns all of our digital information and we cannot exercise any rights over it.

On the internet that we know, modern digital banks (Facebook, Google, Apple, Microsoft and Amazon) took advantage of timing and their unlimited resources of investment funds to offer us convenience (cheap software) in exchange for our attention and information. Their valuations are directly proportional to the information they store. It is very similar to Banks in the sense that they control and exploit our money.

Luckily web3 changes the paradigm. In this new era, users have control of their information, there are no centralized databases that can be sold or exploited. No need to fill out useless registration forms.

For example Login.xyz is trying to bridge web2 and crypto by offering interfaces to integrate wallets authentication with traditional applications. The wallet implies that our information is public, portable and protected by cryptography. If we interact with a certain network or dapp the accumulated information is ours and we can use it in a new network just by logging into it.

The Lens team created a specific protocol for human digital networks that allows developers to program decentralized applications with basic social functionalities such as uploading content (posts), sharing, likes, creating your profile and generating connections (the social graph). Theoretically, networks like Twitter or Instagram could be built on Lens. All the information of each app that we use will be associated with our wallet.

POAP.xyz issues an NFT (a Poap) for every event we attend. The Poap remains in our wallet and therefore it becomes part of our identity. If we choose to log in with our wallet into other applications they could offer us something based on the type of events or communities that we attend.

It will be interesting to see how technology evolves in the social & identity. Undoubtedly, better applications and digital networks will be generated where users participate with rights over their information and the economic value generated is better distributed among its participants.