It’s Web 2.5, actually
I’ve spent the last 18 months examining blockchain as an information technology. My journey went from gleaning as much as possible podcasts to conducting my own interviews with software engineers, startup founders, academics, researchers, and even consulting firms, commercial cloud platforms, and credit card companies with a blockchain practice. I encountered a small number of civil servants from across city, state and federal agencies in the US, Latin America, and Europe running pilots to full blow IT solutions with a blockchain involved. I’m incredibly appreciative of their time and patience with me.
I’m especially grateful to the Philadelphians who workshopped technical poofs of concept with me, giving up a few evenings for thoughtful conversation transcribed onto white boards in exchange for pizzas and sodas. You’re all amazing. Thank you for sharing some of your time and professional expertise in the blockchain/distributed ledger tech space with me.
There are several take-aways from these conversations to share I’m excited to share (and have already to some degree with researchers already from Harvard Kennedy School, Cities Institute, and Urban Institute). My most meta learning is this — there is no application for blockchain that entirely replaces what we have today with cloud, open APIs, and relational databases — be this public, private, proprietary or open source. There is no rip and replace. The blockchain was never conceived to replace relational databases entirely. A blockchain’s main features of immutability, limited record content (size), and public/distributed and trustless architecture don’t meet the requirements from the thousands of use cases we have today for relational databases. Blockchain is designed for specific uses, not a universe of uses.
So is there a Web 3?
Well, not really, IMHO, not as described in social media as the usurper and replacement for all of Web 2. To be of value, blockchain must be layered into existing IT ecosystems, aka Web 2. A blockchain becomes a component within Web 2, and purpose driven one at that. Think of it a service among many services. Its complimentary to, not a replacement for, some database or cloud platform operations. And APIs — are still a critical necessity! So, when there is a blockchain derived barer or identity token, or immutable public ledger as a component to a business solution, we’re talking Web 2.5, if we need a catch phrase.
Web 2.5. Not exactly the type of branding that gets you a wad of VC cash (or is that crypto). Yet a lot more helpful in setting the context for blockchain — as a purpose driven function within an information technology solution. Also, blockchain is a additional tool and compliment to the open source / open systems movement.
Three other key learnings that I’ll explore in subsequent posts, which are relevant to public sector and some of which will get discussed on panels with my good friend Mike Sarasti (and former CIO for Miami) and I are hosting at the Smart City USA Expo on 9/14–9/15/22.
- Scale matters — not all purposed blockchain enabled solutions work at or provide value at a city or county operational scale, like verified credentials.
- Token economics or Who Can Own the Wallet? — governments will need policies to manage IT solutions that generate a tradable cryptocurrency as part of the operation (Helium’s wireless gateways) or when transacting with a Web 2.5 system requires ownership and management of digital tokens.
- Enterprise or permissioned chains are the most applicable to public sector business cases and not trustless and distributed chains — KYC is too important.
