Tech Brew Ride Home - Tue. 12/21 - @Jack And The Tech (Cold) Civil War Over Web3

Episode Date: December 21, 2021

I do my best to give you all the angles on the cold tech civil war concerning Web3 that has been bubbling under the surface for a while now but burst out in the open overnight. Interesting raises in the crypto space and interesting data on investment in the space. An interesting CEO departure and a CEO who maybe never really stepped down. And a look at satellite internet speeds. Sponsors: Schwab.com/plan Directtoconsumer.co Links: Jack Dorsey Stirs Uproar by Dismissing Web3 as a Venture Capitalists’ Plaything (Bloomberg) The New Get-Rich-Faster Job in Silicon Valley: Crypto Start-Ups (NYTimes) OnlyFans Names Marketing Chief Ami Gan as CEO; Founder Steps Down (Bloomberg) Zhang Yiming Still Oversees ByteDance, Despite Stepping Back (The Information) Starlink Expands but Q3 2021 Performance Flattens in Some Areas (SpeedTest.net) The article featuring Chris and I talking about the Twitter Spaces: How the Copycats Came for Clubhouse (NYTimes) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On April 4th, 2023, around 2 in the morning, a man was found stabbed multiple times on a sidewalk in downtown San Francisco. Hey, who did this to you? What happened next turned the story into a political firestorm. Reports have identified the victim as Bob Lee, the founder of Cash App. From Bloomberg Podcasts, this is Foundering, the Killing of Bob Lee, beginning April 16. Welcome to the Tech meme right home for Tuesday, December 21st, 2021. I'm Brian McCullough today. I do my best to give you all the angles on the cold tech civil war concerning Web 3 that has been bubbling under the surface for a while now but burst out into the open last night. Interesting raises in the crypto space and interesting data on investment in the crypto space, an interesting CEO departure, and a CEO who maybe never really stepped down. And a look at satellite internet speeds. Here's a lot. what you missed today in the world of tech. So forget the war between the NFTs and the gamers.

The whole Web 3 thing has caused a cold civil war to simmer within VC and founder and general tech circles over the past few months. And I've been avoiding talking about it because of my usual, it's probably too inside baseball sort of thinking. But last night, things bubbled to the surface in a very public way when Jack Dorsey caused controversy by criticizing Web3 tweeting, You don't own Web 3, the VCs and their LPs do. It will never escape their incentives, end quote.

And look, all the usual caveats here, I don't have skin in this particular debate, as we discuss at length on the Twitter space that will come out later this week. I think Web 3 is the future, even if it doesn't end up being exactly the future that a lot of people think it will be right now. That's natural for new things.

And at the same time, there are a lot of people overly pilled, in my opinion, into Web3 advocacy to the point where it feels like, I don't know, it's a religion, a cult. Yeah, I think that's true too. I think both things can be true at the same time. But anyway, look, let me just give you all sides here so you can get a sense of how this debate is playing out, quoting Bloomberg. Fresh off relinquishing the chief executive reigns of Twitter, Bitcoin enthusiast Jack Dorsey has taken to the service he co-founded to voice.

his displeasure with so-called Web3 technology and the involvement of venture capital firms like Andresen Horowitz. You don't own Web3, tweeted Dorsey. The VCs and their LPs do. It will never escape their incentives, end quote. The post drew more than 16,000 likes and thousands of retweets. Many pushed back with comments like Highly Disagree and Dead Wrong, though. Many others chimed in with support. Tesla, Chief Executive Elon Musk, got in on the discussion by asking if anyone has seen Web 3, to which Dorsey replied, quote, it's somewhere between A and Z, end quote, hinting that it's held under the control of the VC firm

founded by Mark Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, commonly contracted to A16Z. Earlier in the day, Dorsey, whose block company includes Spiral, a project, quote, aimed at making Bitcoin the planet's preferred currency, tweeted in response to musical artist Cardi B, that Bitcoin will replace the U.S. dollar. The series of tweets and responses from the former Twitter boss on Monday stirred disagreement and debate on the service with A16C general partner Chris Dixon offering an olive branch by saying he is a huge fan of Dorsey, end quote, hoped we can eventually bring him around to ETH and other blockchains, end quote. I believe in you and your ability to understand systems.

It's critical we focus our energy on truly secure and resilient technologies owned by the mass of people, not individuals or institutions. Only that foundation will provide for the applications you allude to. Dorsey tweeted to Dixon in response, end quote. Now, a ton more tweets, actually. And this is just a sampling of the debate, but I'm trying to grab from all sides. To Jack's original tweet, Mike Dutas, founder of The Block, tweeted, quote, dead wrong. And also dangerous because you preemptively stifle the hopes and dreams of the many brave people shaping a truly independent Web 3, end quote. To which, Jack responded, quote,

We have bigger issues if a tweet stifles hopes and dreams. Currently, it's not wrong. Critique can help fix or divert energy to something more important, end quote. Dutus later tweeted, quote, hilarious to see Uber, ETC Angels, who champion regulatory arbitrage in the early 2010s, S on crypto in the 2020s. Talk about pulling up the ladder behind you. Stop, fighting for good once you've made it. And quote, indeed, a lot of the back and forth has been, and I know I overuse this as an analysis lens for things, but a lot of it has been generational. Folks are accusing other folks of being old fogies, Web 2.0, I don't know, elites.

While others accuse Web3 folks of being naive, I guess. That side's argument seems to be this Web 3 revolution folks are speaking of is just a hustle dreamed up by the usual big pocketed money folks. the better to make more money with. Yes, there is also clearly a lot of animosity toward Andreessen Horowitz bubbling up here, too. Parker Thompson tweeted, quote, what he's called out is that VCs are buying Web3 securities while telling the market users actually own these networks. All I know is that generally the people using plain language are correct in a debate with those using actively confusing language to make their case, end quote. Here's Balaji

Srinavasin, quote, everyone is becoming an investor. And so investors are declining in power. You have countless options to raise money today from full crypto to traditional VCs to Republic. The point of tech is to self-disrupt and Sandhill has less power than ever. Jack, I respect you and everything you've built. I also disagree here. Twitter started as a protocol. The free speech wing of the free speech party. Then corporate and political incentives led to de-platforming and censorship. Web3 offers the possibility, not the guarantee of something better, end quote. In perhaps the saltiest exchange I saw, Chris Dixon, again, of Andreessen Horowitz, tweeted, quote, first they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, we are here,

then you win, end quote. To which Jack responded, you're a fund determined to be a media empire that can't be ignored, not Gandhi, end quote. Antonio Garcia Martinez tweeted, quote, bitching about Web 3 while a Web 2 Tycoon is the new I Got Rich off of Facebook or Google or Amazon, but I'm going to tell you how it's evil without giving any of it back, end quote. To which Jack responded, quote, I'm giving it all back, end quote. Joe Wisenthal tweeted, quote, so much Web3 tweeting is just posturing and trying to sound like a rebel and attacking people you don't like. This framework is obviously nonsense since apparently Jack is an institutionalist, but Andreessen Horowitz, Pepsi,

Will Wilkinson, and the Planet Money hosts are all red-pilled. Folks like M. Doudas, Balagie, Chris Dixon, Antonio, GM, seem riven by perceived slights. Who is against them? Who is in disagreement with them? Who isn't sufficiently respecting their work? Who hasn't joined them or invested yet? End quote. David Pierce tweeted, Right now Web 3 is whatever you want it to be, which is why it's so compelling to so many people, I think.

Also all the money. But at some point, we're going to have to decide what the future is and then build it for everybody, end quote. And wrapping up, once again, Joe Wisenthal tweeted, quote, Bitcoiners and no-coiners have the same view of Web 3. I think it was Nick Carter who said, Bitcoins and no-coiners are actually pretty similar. They're only one coin apart, end quote. He's referring as Chris Dixon did above to Jack being a Bitcoin maximalist,

but not necessarily being into any of the other blockchains. Matt Zeitland tweeted, quote, This is a classic atheist line about religious believers. They're atheists about all gods, but their own, end quote. To which friend of the show and the person who taught me everything I know about crypto, Aaron Lamer tweeted, quote, the religious metaphor holds because the first century of most religions

starts with fighting other religions and ends with fighting fork sects, end quote. Just as a chaser to that previous segment's shot, there was a bunch of news in the crypto space this morning. For example, a new study says that stablecoin supply has reached more than $140 billion, which is up 388% in the year 2021 from a mere $29 billion at the start of the year. This has largely been driven by defy and derivatives markets. And that is the thing about this Web3 stuff. Is it Defy? Is it NFTs?

Is it Solana and stablecoins and yield farming and Dow's? Is it AR and VR? The answer is, all of the above? That's why I say on the Twitter space later this week, there's so much energy in the space, something is going to come of it. guarantee. We just have no idea what that something will end up looking like in the end or how many ups and downs there will be along the way. Again, look for that Twitter space later this week for more in-depth discussion of all of this. Also, multi-chain, which offers interoperability tools for

blockchings, including Ethereum, Binance, Smart Chain, and Avalanche has raised a $60 million seed round by Binance Labs. If you know anything about VC investing, a $60 million seed round, that's It's massive. It's either insanity or a sign of a bubble or sign of how big the opportunity investors see in the Web 3 space. You want more. According to Pitchbook, crypto and blockchain startups raise more than $28 billion in venture capital in 2021, up 4x year over year. As large tech companies are also losing executives and engineers to crypto startups, yes, there is coincidentally a big article about that in the New York Times. this morning about this very thing, about this excitement, about, shall we say, the generational divide again?

Remember what we said around the Facebook name change to meta? One of the things people, to use this term, in Web 2.0 companies, fear is losing all of the talent, all of the young people coming into the industry, fearful that they will not work for their existing Web 2.0 companies and will instead do their own Web 3 startups. Remember, hello, fellow kids is the joke analogy I made. in terms of Mark Zuckerberg's probably overriding motivation for changing to meta. Quoting the times, Ms. Carter is part of a wave of executives and engineers leaving cushy jobs at Google, Amazon, Apple,

and other large tech companies, some of which pay millions of dollars in annual compensation to chase what they see as a once-in-a-generation opportunity. That next big thing is crypto, they said, a catch-all designation that includes digital currencies like Bitcoin and products like non-fundgible tokens or NFTs that rely on the blockchain. Silicon Valley is now awash with stories of people writing seemingly ridiculous crypto investments like Dogecoin, a digital coin based on a dog meme, to life-changing wealth. Bitcoin has soared around 60% this year, while Ether, the cryptocurrency tied to the Ethereum blockchain, has increased more than five-fold in value. But beyond that speculative mania, a growing contingent of the tech industry's best and brightest sees a transformational moment that comes along once every few decades and rewards those who spot the seismic shift before the rest of the world.

With crypto, they see historical parallels to how the personal computer and the internet were once ridiculed, only to upend the status quo and mint a new generation of billionaires, end quote. Some interesting executive moves. OnlyFans, co-founder Tim Stokely, is apparently stepping down as CEO of that company and has named the head of communications and marketing Amy Gann as his replacement. Stokely will apparently remain as an advisor. But the news here is, remember, Remember how we talked about how OnlyFans was struggling to raise money from traditional VCs despite all of their success? Might this have something to do with that? Quoting Bloomberg, Gann said it was Stokely's decision to step aside and name her as his successor. The two have worked closely together over the past year and a half, grappling with the explosive growth of the company and the increased scrutiny their success has invited. Gann joined Onlyfans in

2020 as head of communications and marketing after working for Red Bull, Quest Nutrition, and a Los Angeles-based Cannabis Cafe. Stokely will become an advisor to the London-based company, which he has run since it started up in 2016, according to a statement Tuesday. Gann must now chart a course for the future of a company that has millions of users and creators, but has wrestled with its reputation as a purveyor of pornography and sex work. She said the closely held company will increase its investment in its free streaming app, OFTV, and introduce new tools for creators, end quote. Meanwhile, according to the information, despite publicly stepping down from his post as CEO amid the big Beijing crackdown on Chinese tech companies

and founders, BiteDance founder Zhang Yi Ming remains apparently actively involved in his company, focusing on long-term strategy. Quote, Zhang Yiming, founder of BytDance, the Chinese company that owns TikTok, resigned as CEO and chair earlier this year. He no longer has any management title or board seat, but that doesn't mean he's no longer in control. The 38-year-old Zhang, remains as active as ever inside the company. He continues to participate in high-level management discussions, attending virtual meetings, and online chat groups with other executives, according to people with knowledge of the matter. He's especially focused on big-picture tasks, like mapping out industry and economic trends, identifying future business opportunities

and crafting the company's long-term strategies, the people said. As Bight Dance grapples with the Chinese government's crackdown on tech, Zhang also leads the company's efforts to tackle climate change and promote renewable energy initiatives that are in line with Beijing's policy goals. Zhang's retreat from official executive roles has made governance and decision-making at ByteDance more opaque at a time when TikTok's rapid global expansion continues to raise questions from foreign governments about the video app's Chinese parent and its ties to Beijing. BiteDance, the world's most highly valued startup, is the first Chinese internet giant to build an international product rivaling meta-platforms and Google. A few months ago, two secondary market deals

valued ByteDance at more than $300 billion, the information reported, end quote. Finally, today, a look at U.S. satellite internet speeds with Starlink median download, upload speeds of 87.3 mbPS and 13.5 mbps, respectively, followed by HughesNet at 19.3 and 2.5. If satellite internet is ever going to free us from our traditional ISPs, well, let's just say there's some work to do, quoting speedtest.net. Satellite Internet is making headlines across the globe as Starlink continues to launch service in new countries and Vesat plans to acquire in Marsat. We're here to check in on our ongoing series on satellite internet performance around the globe with fresh data from Q3 2021 to see if Starlink's performance is holding up and how satellite internet compares to fix broadband in 12 countries. Consumers in the U.S. looking to use satellite services to connect to the Internet will find that performance was mostly flat when comparing Q3 of 2021 to Q2.

Starlink's median download speed decreased from 97.23 mbPS during Q2 to 87.25 in Q3, which could be a function of adding more customers. Huesnet followed distantly at 19.3 mbps comparable to what we saw in Q2, and Vesat came in third at 18.3.5.5.5. and Vesat came in third at 18.75 MbPS. For comparison, the median download speed for all fixed broadband providers in the U.S. during Q3 was 119.84 MbPS. Starlink's median upload speed of 13.54 MbPS was much closer to that on all fixed broadband, an average of 18.03 MbPS in Q3. Vesat and Huesnet followed at 2.96 and 2.54. mbPS, respectively, as we saw last quarter Starlink, which uses low Earth orbit satellites, was the only satellite internet provider with a median latency anywhere near that scene on fixed broadband in Q4, 44 MS and 15 MS, respectively.

Via Sat and HughesNet, which both utilize higher geosynchronous orbits, had median latencies of 6.29 milliseconds and 744 milliseconds, respectively. We saw sufficient samples during Q3 to analyze Starlink performance in 3, 3 hundred and counties in the U.S. And while there was about a 100 mbPS range in performance between the county with the fastest median download speed, which was Santa Fe County, New Mexico at 146.58 MbPS, and the county with the slowest median download speed, which was Drummond Township, Michigan, at 46.63 mbps. Even the lower end speeds are well above the FCC's baseline performance tier of at least

25 mbPS download speeds, end quote. The last link in the show notes today is to that New York Times article that finally came out featuring quotes from Chris and I discussing the TechMeme Ride Home Experience Twitter space episodes. Yes, there are also photos. So if you ever wanted to see the Command Center where I do this show every day, except for, you know, today when I'm here in Michigan, check that out. You can't see it in the photo, but behind my butt in that picture is the soundproofed voiceover artist box that I put. put my head into every day to get that crisp sound that I can't get when I'm on the road like this right now. I could bring that box with me on the road. It folds up, but I can't bring my sure SM7B mic with me. It's too big. It would be too much stuff. So you can't see where the magic

really happens, but hey, you can see Max's latest artwork on the wall. And that photo above the desk is of Robert Caro, thanks to Jesse Ditmar, my celebrity photographer friend. Anyway, nice little piece. And P.S. You might have heard on Twitter, my daughter and I tested positive for COVID yesterday on a rapid test. We had tested negative on previous tests and the kids tested negative on a PCR test from Friday. So now we're waiting on the PCR test we took yesterday for full, full confirmation. We are both currently feeling fine, symptom free. So, you know, waiting game. Max tested negative and he was the one that we thought had gotten exposed. So I don't know. I've literally been nowhere. I'd been staying off the train for the last two weeks because I was concerned about Amacron. But on the off chance that sharing this news has some of you be a little more cautious this week, then please do so. Be well, everybody. Be careful.

Talk to you tomorrow.