Often in the crypto space, we find ourselves interacting with dynamics that don’t have names yet. We know something is different. We know we’re playing by new rules. But we don’t necessarily now what “it” is or what those new rules are.

One of these concepts without a name, I am beginning to call “community capitalism”. In essence, this means that the lines between business owner, employee, and customer are blurry in web3.

This means that if you create a business, your customers buy what you sell, but they also benefit directly from your success. They’re also critical to your marketing. They also may end up doing work for you. It means they may buy your product for reasons other than to buy your product -- like to speculate on its future value, to gain influence over the future of your product, to gain access to your community, or to gain access to you.

In other words, the difference between businesses before and after web3 dynamics become pervasive is going to be like the difference between the original cellphones and modern smart phones.

We use our phones for 100 different things, and only one of them is “phone” in a way someone from 30 years ago would understand.

In the future, when you go into a coffee shop, there will be 100 ways you interact with that business, and only one of them will be “buy coffee”. Instead you’ll likely be buying coffee coin to speculate on the future value of a cup. You might be buying into a share of that shop’s revenue. You might be buying an NFT to represent that you are a local in that community and you want to vote on their furniture choices for next quarter. You might be researching the secondary market value of using that location as an event space for a particular day. The list is endless.

In other words, we are rapidly heading toward a future where in your hometown, you will be able to tie yourself to the economic engine of your community--favorite stores, businesses, groups, and individuals--much more directly.

Why would we do this? Well I think it’s a way to divide risk and help each other take more chances so that our communities can make economic progress and bounce back from missteps faster.

If I start a coffee shop in my local area (I use coffee shops as examples a lot), it helps if I can raise money to do it directly from the community by releasing an NFT. I’m forgoing other income while I build this store, but maybe I reduce that risk by collecting some income from revenue share I make by investing in other local area businesses. And maybe if that business fails, the loss falls partly on me, but also on the community members who invested in its creation. So I, as an entrepreneur, am more encouraged to simply find and pursue my next idea (probably not a coffee shop) about what my community might want.