To understand Web3, let's take a look at the features of Web1 and Web2.

Web1: Just read The Internet has been around since the 1980s. Content creators have a place on the Internet, but most of the people who used it in the 1990s were consumers of static web pages and produced little content. Perhaps as a result of the shift from print to the Internet, professional writers, journalists and reporters dominate content creation. There are very few content models, and people are coming to the Internet to consume or just to read.

Compared to print, we see less (though still dominant) censorship of content during this period. As a result, people are questioning the credibility of the rapidly growing information database. Web1 has loose social networks, and a handful of "Internet companies" control the content on the Internet. Web1-style sites still exist today, but not typically. Craigslist is an example you might be familiar with.

Web2: read-write Next up was Web2 or the web as we know it today. It took over Web1 in the early 2000s.

Created by Tim O'Reilly, Web2 was driven by server upgrades, developer skills, and faster Internet speeds -- the leading way for interactive Web applications. Some attribute its beginnings to the dotcom boom.

While there are many companies that dominate Web2, there are also some giants that we are all familiar with. In essence, Web2 provides space for everyone to be both a content creator and a consumer - although not everyone actually makes money from what they create. Users make media on social networks, such as Facebook, and they are then able to sell their personal data to generate substantial revenues. This is perfectly permissible because centralized companies own user data and all user-generated content. Censorship is somewhat removed in Web2, but it is largely platform dependent. Although users are both suppliers and consumers on the network, they devolve power, subject to where they create and consume.

Platforms are isolated in Web2, and users need to create an identity between each platform in order to interact, because platforms don't "talk" to each other. In addition, capital accumulation is at the top. Privacy is also a huge issue, although agents have a responsibility to protect our privacy.

Web3: Read-write-own Ownership is one of the biggest features of Web3 -- participants have full ownership of their content, data, and assets.

Launched in 2009, the Bitcoin network offers the spirit of the Web3 pioneers. It is important to note that the Internet is not yet what we think of as Web3, but the products and services being built are considered "Web3". It just means that, to varying degrees, they adhere to the principles of openness, decentralization, resistance to censorship, immutability, no trust and no permission.

We are slowly seeing Web2 platforms think about what it means to start building products and services that fit Web3, such as Twitter's Bluesky project, which aims to develop decentralized standards for social media. As with the shift from Web1 to Web2, the shift from Web2 to Web3 is mainly due to infrastructure advances, but there will also be a shift in the mindset of builders and developers as governance becomes more user-centric. With the man-in-the-middle removed and the data on an immutable infrastructure, the data cannot be controlled, so there is no censorship and the risk of data loss is lower.

Interoperability is a major theme for blockchain as it will apply to Web3-based platforms. Almost like the description of the meta-universe, different platforms can be pieced together to form a fluid space where one's identity can remain unchanged, i.e. there is no need to create an account across different platforms.

Many claim that joining Web3 is as simple as setting up your encrypted wallet, or MetaMask. There is a wallet that connects to a decentralized application for interaction and transactions.

Examples of Web3 tools may help shape thinking. This is an excellent mapping of the Web3 protocol and its Web2 equivalent: Take Medium, a centralized tool for authors to publish and earn some income, but have no say in its governance. Mirrors, by contrast, allow writers to take full ownership of their work, have a say in its governance (being treated as co-owners), and make money directly from their audience. That's what we'll continue to focus on as we all move to Web3. Like Web1, Web2 will always exist in some parts of the Internet, but will not dominate the space where we spend most of our future online.