Where is the blessed land of Web3?

Author: Meng Yan's Blockchain Thinking

Recently, I have traveled half the world, and have been to Accra, the capital of Ghana, Zurich, the largest city in Switzerland, Dubai, the economic gateway of the Middle East, and of course Singapore, which radiates Southeast Asia, and Hong Kong, which is backed by mainland China. I mainly attended several industry conferences and investigated the development opportunities of the local Web3 industry. In addition to Rwanda, which I visited last year, Australia, where I have lived for a long time, and mainland China, which I have always paid the most attention to, I now have some intuitive understanding and judgment of the current situation and development prospects of blockchain and Web3 in these places, and I would like to share them with you.

Tilt Head Bulletproof

First of all, we must clearly define what I mean by "blockchain and Web3", because every time I talk about these contents, a group of people will jump out and say, what blockchain? What is Web3? What does it have to do with crypto? In order to deal with these sneak attacks, let me tilt my head and explain my position.

It is like this, blockchain technology has spawned a new industry called encrypted digital economy, referred to as crypto. Like other industries, crypto also has a physical part and a transaction part. Unlike other industries, since blockchain itself is a value Internet protocol with its own transaction infrastructure, crypto can complete the expression and transaction of assets internally, without having to go to a special external venue to trade like other industries. This feature is so prominent and eye-catching that almost all the hot spots in the first ten years of the crypto industry have revolved around the transaction link. But this does not mean that crypto has no actual business. As long as you ask, what are the assets you trade? That still depends on the actual business.

Now in this industry, there are three ways to enter the actual business. The first way is speculation and gambling. Now many projects in this industry are like this, with a coin on the front and all drama behind. The better one is meme, telling you clearly that I have nothing, just a cultural shirt, an open gambling game. The worse ones are pretending to do business. The outside world thinks there is something, but it is actually fake, and it is actually a Ponzi scheme. The second approach is "industrial blockchain" or RWA, which is the connection between blockchain digital assets and real-world businesses. The third approach is Web3, and typical representatives are Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, etc. There are indeed businesses underneath, and this thing is the infrastructure or application in the open Internet.

I have always focused on the two paths of industrial blockchain and Web3, and believe that this is the right way to long-term sustainability. The projects I initiated also emphasize actual business. It is a little slower, but I feel at ease, and I firmly believe that the benefits will be greater in the long run. Of course, most of the players I have come into contact with in this industry are trading-oriented, capturing trading opportunities to make profits, and not paying much attention to actual business.

Both types of people are needed, those who engage in actual business and those who engage in transactions. But when people like me express their opinions, they are often misunderstood or even ridiculed by trading players. So I have to explain here that I am talking about the "real business" part of the crypto industry, so when describing it, I often use such a lengthy expression as "blockchain and Web3". As for the many people who only engage in transactions and are not very good at thinking, they insist that there is no actual business in crypto and it is just a pure gambling. I will not spend time refuting this shallow and stupid view.

Blockchain and Web3 in the big framework of informatization

Whether it is industrial blockchain or Web3, it should actually be viewed in the framework of informatization. Informatization is a continuous and large process of the entire human civilization, which has lasted for tens of thousands of years and is a big framework. However, the informatization we usually talk about is the informatization of digital computers and networks in the past few decades. This process actually started from the military industry and developed on the enterprise side. Later, the consumer Internet emerged suddenly, greatly changing the path and pattern of the entire informatization and creating a new paradigm.

Now, technologies such as blockchain and zero-knowledge proof may create the third paradigm of informatization. The development of this new paradigm is industrial blockchain and RWA on the enterprise side, and Web3 on the consumer Internet side.

Why dare to say it is a new paradigm? Because blockchain redefines the account system and resource hosting model in the Internet, which is different from the current centralized Internet in DNA, so it will either not develop at all, or once it develops, it must be a new species that the traditional Internet has never seen.

In the digital age, no matter how weak a new species is now, it cannot be ignored, because once it grows up, it may bring a new dimension of competition that you are completely unable to resist. Between industrial blockchain and Web3, my basic view is that Web3 will come faster and more fiercely than industrial blockchain, so now we should focus on the discussion of Web3. To discuss the development opportunities of Web3 in different regions around the world, we must first look at the form of informatization development in each region.

What is the overall situation of global informatization now? In short, China and the United States are competing in artificial intelligence and robots, Europe and Australia are insomnia, and high-growth countries in Africa and Southeast Asia are carrying out the first large-scale informatization construction, while Singapore and Dubai hope to get the biggest dividends in this process.

Below, I will talk about my impressions of different regions.

Insomnia in Europe and Australia

The situation in Europe and Australia is very similar on the surface. The Internet infrastructure in both regions is not bad, but there are no leading large enterprises, and the depth of actual application and the level of innovation are far behind China and the United States. They know about new technologies and trends such as blockchain, Web3 and tokenization, and they all pay attention to them, but their actual attitude is like Ye Gonghaolong. In other words, in principle, since it is innovation, it is welcomed and supported, but if you take it seriously and promote it seriously, then once you encounter specific problems and specific contradictions, you will immediately hesitate. So now both regions are like this, watching such a thing happen, unable to sleep and unable to get up, so it is insomnia.

However, I think the underlying logic of insomnia in the two regions is different. Australia's problem is lack of motivation. Life is too easy for itself. When it comes to innovation, it just goes with the flow and follows the United States and Britain. The United States does not have the technology to do it, so we are not in a hurry to grab the first prize. The United Kingdom has not set up regulatory rules, so we will wait first. In fact, I have lived in Australia for many years. The regulations here are relatively loose, and the market is not big or small. If you really want to do things actively, there is room. But as long as you cooperate with local companies or people, you will find that they are not very motivated. Whenever there is a little difficulty, they will retreat in various ways, and six words will float in the sky: "Too lazy to move, no need".

Europe is different. It is not that they do not have the idea of ​​independent development, nor do they see the value of blockchain technology, but their governance mechanism is too complicated, the provisions are cumbersome, and there are too many constraints, so they can't do it. I attended the European FinTech conference in Switzerland, where tokenization was the absolute protagonist. However, the speeches of the various leaders were all in the same format. They first fully affirmed the value and significance of blockchain and tokenization, expressed their confidence in its long-term prospects, and then when it came to the present, they pulled out a long list of constraints and restrictions. The most unacceptable thing in the world is that it is called the only way, but in fact there are unexpected pitfalls. In my opinion, things in Europe are difficult to handle.

So both places are insomniac, one is too lazy to move, and the other is tied up and unable to move.

Interlocked Mainland China and Hong Kong

(This part was deleted when it was published on the official account, please see my Twitter for the full text)

China is the biggest winner in the mobile Internet era, and it should be the most qualified leader of the Web3 revolution. However, history has repeatedly proved that the winners of the previous cycle are particularly likely to fall behind in the next cycle. Many people attribute this to path dependence, that is, even if interest groups know the right direction, they will choose a conservative path for the purpose of maintaining vested interests, even if they know the right direction. But I think there is still a spirit of adventure and self-revolution in the Chinese Internet industry, because path dependence is not the main problem. If there is a problem, it is mainly in the understanding.

Web3 is indeed not an ordinary industry. It has super transaction and speculation, and is very active. If it is not well controlled, it will cause financial troubles. Now China is in a cycle that is particularly sensitive to troubles and has high requirements for stability. Faced with Web3, a "bad boy" that is both good and evil, it is not so easy for decision makers to make up their minds. Follow up, it may impact the existing large enterprises and industrial structure, may cause some chaos, and may also increase the burden of financial supervision. If we don't follow, and let this thing be put on the international fission reaction, we don't know what kind of monster will be fissioned, and we don't know how much impact such a monster will have. If we are not careful, it will put us in a very disadvantageous position. Therefore, China is somewhat hesitant in developing Web3. If we advance, we will be afraid of the consequences, and if we retreat, we will worry about stepping into the air.

Many people believe that Hong Kong, as a blockchain pilot area, carries a special mission to help mainland China touch the stone of Web3.

However, although Hong Kong is an international financial center, its core advantages are actually all concentrated in financial transactions. If you ask him to do some real economy, "I haven't been a big brother for a long time." He didn't get the Internet going back then, and now he can't even make movies. Now expecting him to independently explore a new paradigm for the global Internet industry, whether in terms of industrial foundation, talent pool or market size, is actually a difficult task. So in practice, for companies in Hong Kong, no matter whether you are a celestial globe or a golden man or a jade Buddha, I only focus on "transactions", because this is the only thing that Hong Kong has a comparative advantage in. This is obviously far from the need to explore a new paradigm for Web3 for the mainland.

Of course, digital asset transactions are a key node in Web3. If the mainland's Web3 industry can develop, it is enough for Hong Kong to do a good job in transactions. But the problem now is that the mainland is waiting for Hong Kong, as a special administrative region, to explore a path before it can develop Web3, while Hong Kong is waiting for the mainland's Web3 industry to provide digital assets for transactions to earn fees. The two sides are waiting for each other, and no one can break the situation, which has become an interlocking situation.

Big Opportunities in Southeast Asia and Africa

If China does not break through in Web3, then the regions in the world that are most likely to open up new situations and fission new monsters are of course the United States, and the other, I think, Southeast Asia and Africa. I haven't been to the United States yet, and I haven't investigated, so I have no right to speak. But in the past two years, I have been to Africa and Singapore many times, stayed for a long time, and have some observations.

In recent years, some countries in Southeast Asia and Africa have begun to enter a stage of rapid economic growth. Although the economic scale is not large, it involves hundreds of millions of people and has great potential, which has put forward an urgent need for information construction. So these countries are experiencing the first large-scale IT and Internet construction. China has also experienced such a process since the 1990s, so we are not unfamiliar with it. The so-called one-shot work, the first time climbing the technology tree, is the most curious, the most open-minded, the most sincere, and the most motivated. These countries are now at this stage.

However, compared with China, many of their basic logics are different. When China started to build its IT industry, it was the end of the Cold War and the historical stage of globalization. Therefore, China basically adopted the "take it as it is" approach and directly introduced American technology and complete solutions without considering too much about the needs of autonomy, control, data sovereignty, and privacy protection. It was not until the outbreak of the Prism Gate incident in 2013 that China came back to make up for this lesson and embarked on a road of informatization with consumer Internet as the core architecture and super Internet platform as the main force.

Now that the economies of Asian and African countries are developing rapidly, they also need supporting IT construction, but the times have changed and the logic has also changed. First, the era of globalization has ended. China and the United States have launched fierce competition in many fields. The two tigers are fighting, and the fishermen are profiting. These countries have a large space for choice. Second, the concept of data sovereignty and privacy protection has been strengthened. Even the weakest countries and enterprises are unwilling to run naked in the digital prism of foreign large companies. Third, the demonstration effect of the Internet's huge success has made economies of a certain size want to support and build their own platforms so that the benefits do not flow to outsiders.

What are the consequences of these changes? The expansion model of large companies, which was originally created by large American companies and later carried to the extreme by Chinese companies such as Huawei, is no longer feasible, or at least the resistance has greatly increased. Take data privacy protection as an example. In the original model, large companies only need to sign a promise with users, and then issue public relations articles every now and then to promote themselves. They can go straight in and get all the user's data. They can sell it however they want and analyze it however they want. All the profits they get are put into their own pockets. Users don't even know about it, let alone object. Such a good thing will never happen again.

Now these countries that are engaged in the Internet all hope to support their own platforms. Foreign big companies can come in to sell equipment, sell technology, participate in construction, and help train talents, but if you extend your tentacles directly to my economic extremities, let us join your network unconditionally and become a prefecture-level subnet of your big country's network platform, I'm sorry, I understand this, this is called digital colonialism, we are not so naive.

But the problem is that the Internet has a network effect. Chinese Internet platforms are oriented to the whole of China, and American Internet companies are oriented to the whole world except China. Only in this way can the network established have scale benefits, and only when it is bigger can it become stronger. Each of your countries is unwilling to join a large network, and they all want to support their own platforms. As a result, this small piece, that small piece, one by one is underdeveloped, not only there is no scale benefit, but also brings endless troubles to cross-border cooperation.

The insightful people in these countries understand this problem. When I attended a meeting in Ghana, a South African industry leader said that Africans always mention Africa, but where is Africa? This is just a continent fragmented by colonists, with more than 50 countries, 48 ​​currencies, extremely complicated internal economic exchanges, and foreign trade far exceeding the mutual trade within the continent, so he wants to create an African digital economic community. When I went to Rwanda, I found that in a country with more than 13 million people, there are more than a dozen payment networks like "Alipay", most of which have only tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of users. Such a small market is cut into pieces, and no one can be big or strong. The same problem exists in Southeast Asia.

Speaking of this, the value of blockchain and Web3 for the informatization construction of African and Southeast Asian countries is reflected. One is clear ownership, the second is tamper-proof, consensus building, and trust transmission. The third is that the value network sinks to the Internet protocol layer. Everyone's business is separate, but the transaction can be integrated and interconnected, and the benefits can be shared. Fourth, with the cooperation of technologies such as zero-knowledge proof, privacy protection can also be solved very well. With so many advantages, plus they are young and fearless in informatization, and there is no strong vested interest group to hinder them, it is not difficult to explain that the regions in the world that are most enthusiastic and curious about blockchain and Web3 technology are concentrated in Africa and Southeast Asia.

When I communicated with people in these places, I could really feel their simple enthusiasm and expectations for Web3 technology. They really want to use Web3 technology to solve practical problems. In other places, this kind of simple enthusiasm is now relatively scarce, and more people only care about how to make money. And this is also an important risk for African and Southeast Asian countries to build Web3. Their regulatory capabilities are relatively weak. If they are accidentally misled and a few thunders explode, their attitude may change 180 degrees in an instant. Fortunately, many such things have happened before, so they are generally more cautious now and are not so easily fooled. In terms of blockchain and Web3, they are more aware of institutions such as Singapore and the Bank for International Settlements. This also brings a unique historical opportunity to Singapore.

Singapore and Dubai: Both are centers, but very different

Singapore has clearly seen the great opportunities of informatization and digital economy in Southeast Asia and Africa. The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has launched a series of projects and plans since a few years ago, and has held meetings all over the world. Recently, MAS proposed the "Global Layer 1 (GL1)" plan, taking the lead in creating a cross-border blockchain that is jointly supported, used and shared by commercial banks, financial institutions and commercial institutions in various countries, which more concentratedly reflects Singapore's strategic intentions in the field of blockchain and Web3.

It is not difficult for discerning people to see that Singapore's strategies on blockchain and Web3 are not at all for its domestic market, nor is it intended to directly lay out its business to the economic ends of other countries like Internet giants. Instead, it takes Southeast Asia, Africa and other regions as the market hinterland, and provides enterprises with a value network that is compatible with the existing paradigm, voluntary participation and benefit sharing. This is undoubtedly the greatest common divisor of blockchain applications, which meets the needs of developing countries in Southeast Asia and Africa. Singapore itself has a global reputation in the field of financial regulation and financial technology, especially in the minds of Southeast Asian and African countries, and is a role model. Therefore, in the African and Southeast Asian countries I have contacted, both the government and the enterprises generally recognize and trust the blockchain and Web3 plans led by Singapore, and are less defensive. Therefore, Singapore is indeed likely to accomplish this.

This matter is of great significance to Singapore. If Singapore can play a major role in the informatization construction of Southeast Asia and Africa, and truly use transnational digital economic blockchains such as GL1, then it can strive to become the capital of the digital economy in the Indo-Pacific region.

However, the route chosen by Singapore actually contains a strong assumption that blockchain and Web3 can be hidden behind the traditional Internet, and are the infrastructure of enterprises, not facing ordinary users. Chains like GL1, which we call "open alliance chains", are only open to existing institutions. Ordinary users still use centralized Internet platform services in the same way as today, which are isolated from blockchain. In this way, the implementation of the entire Web3 can be led by existing government agencies and enterprises without destroying the existing industrial structure, and can be promoted in an orderly manner. But what if this assumption goes wrong? What if Web3 goes directly to large-scale applications in the future through social or gaming, and what if ordinary Internet users start to have one or more Web3 accounts and communicate and trade with each other in them? There is no doubt that this is the most natural form of Web3, and this form of business is bound to subvert the existing Internet industrial structure and application paradigm. If this happens, Singapore must adjust its strategy.

In contrast, Dubai has adopted a laissez-faire attitude towards Web3. Dubai is built like a future city, but it is actually a deliberate superficial effort. The real wealth center of the UAE is in Abu Dhabi. Dubai itself knows this, so their core competitiveness is to attract foreigners to settle in large numbers by relying on advanced infrastructure, loose supervision and currently good cost advantages. Dubai itself does not have any industrial policy. "Build a nest to attract phoenixes and let it go freely" is sincere and is something written in Dubai's genes. I visited its history museum in Dubai and carefully studied the history of the city. Before the oil wealth changed the fate of the country, Dubai was just a poor Arab country that made a living by mining natural pearls. The rulers of all dynasties here have adopted an extremely relaxed and friendly attitude towards businessmen. In the past, Dubai survived and developed by relying on this policy, and now it also hopes to develop by relying on this policy.

Compared with Singapore, Dubai's understanding of Web3 is far behind. The Singapore government may be the government in the world that understands blockchain and Web3 the most. Because of understanding, Singapore has the confidence to design strategies and actively guide the development of this industry. But because of understanding, it will say no to certain businesses. Dubai is different. In Dubai, 90% of the population of more than 3 million are foreigners, bringing 360 industries from all over the world. It is impossible for the Dubai government to understand every industry. Since it does not understand, it will not formulate industrial policies and provide industrial support, but it will not refuse at the same time. Therefore, the Dubai government also thinks very clearly that it can only fully relax and allow all kinds of talents to show their talents.

In this case, Dubai's advantages are very prominent. If there is a business that has high requirements for loose supervision, it is most appropriate to put it in Dubai. Now that Dubai has become the main base of crypto centralized exchanges, it clearly shows its positioning.

Another advantage of Dubai is cost. Of course, Dubai's cost is not low, but it depends on who you compare it with. Compared with Southeast Asia and mainland China, it is definitely very high, but if it is compared with Hong Kong and Singapore, Dubai's cost is too competitive. Doing the same thing, reducing the operating cost by half compared with Singapore is not a difficult goal. Therefore, for businesses facing the international market, with a large team size, and requiring loose supervision, Dubai may be the best choice.

So in comparison, Singapore has a clear on-chain digital economy strategy, and has supporting policies and support, with the goal of seizing the rapid growth of a large number of Asian and African countries to become the international digital economy capital. Dubai does not have such a strategy, but it is relaxed and inactive, and its costs are still competitive.

After comparing these regions, I will make a summary.

Unless China and the United States suddenly change their attitudes towards the Web3 industry dramatically, blockchain and Web3 will not find a single large market that combines all the favorable conditions like the Internet and mobile Internet did in the past. Therefore, the Web3 team is forced to consider the global layout in the early stage. In my opinion, a more ideal strategy is to be based in Singapore and Dubai, actively cooperate with Singapore's strategy, seize the market opportunities for the initial informatization in Southeast Asia and Africa, and also make good use of Dubai's regulatory environment and cost advantages to optimize the overall situation.

This article does not mention Japan, South Korea and the United States, which is an important omission. Mainly because I haven't been there during this period, so I have no right to speak. Fortunately, I have the opportunity to go to the United States in the second half of the year. If I gain something by then, I might make up an article.