Berky's Marketing English: Web3 Edition

The First Rule of Cryptocurrency for marketers is simple: ignore the prices.

That's the red herring. It doesn't matter if the market cap of Bitcoin one day is equal to all the world's wealth ever assembled or Eritrea's gross national product during a slow year.?

It's akin to marketers judging the internet's value in 2000 by the cratering stock prices. Internet usage was booming, business models such as Google's were quickly emerging (thanks in part to Overture, formerly GoTo, which Yahoo acquired), and Apple was reinventing palm-sized devices that would soon sport touchscreens, cameras, and that magical app Shazam. So what if your Webvan shares tanked??

This could be that moment for web3 and blockchain. Because the world's gone even more bonkers since then, perhaps there will be dozens of such moments. Even consumer usage and familiarity are less important than the potential for what technologies can do.?

Sometime during the pandemic, I published the book Berky's Marketing English, a?"quaint compendium of meaning for the modern marketer"; it's available gratis at?berky.co. Illustrated by the gifted Brazilian artist Isabela Flores de Moura, I've been itching to update it for a while.

Here are a few terms I may include in a future edition that may give a little more context to what's happening with crypto right now.?

Also, a disclosure may help: anyone who says they're a crypto or blockchain expert will say at least 75% of what's below is wrong.?

DAO (decentralized autonomous organization): Members join such a digitally-connected community by contributing tokens or coins. The ante earns voting rights that then determine what to do with the ante, or it may give members other ways to share their voice and direct the group's efforts.

A DAO is generally not entirely decentralized, as someone must start it and set the rules; this founding body or team sets up the DAO for their own advantage and perhaps the advantage of their members.?

Another challenge to the DAO's centralized nature comes from whether DAOs cap voting power. One version of a DAO could involve all members contributing 10 shares, coins, or tokens, and if everyone has one vote per share, they all have the same voting power. A common property of DAOs, however, is that members who have bought more shares claim more voting power. Power then is centralized in those with the most shares. The opportunity for the wealthiest members of a society to make their votes count more should be a familiar concept wherever you, the reader, are likely to live.

Expect DAOs to be less autonomous too as existing organizations embrace them. In such a scenario, the organization would confer limited power to the DAO to ensure it functions more like a task force than a board of directors.?

DAOs should not be confused with Daoism, as it is in many ways the complete opposite. Core to Daoism are the principles of yin and yang which show the interconnectedness of all things; that harmony does not fit well with supposedly autonomous DAOs. One of Daoism or Taoism's?Three Treasures is frugality, which also tends to not be emblematic of most DAOs.?

Discord: Discord, which initially gained popularity with gamers, is the most popular community platform for web3, thanks largely to how well it integrates with various web3 apps and protocols. You may discover that you haven't immersed yourself in web3 until you are invited to a Discord.

The customization and automation potential for Discord servers is so robust that the biggest advantage of the platform may be that it makes you pine nostalgically for Slack groups which seem so quaint by comparison.

Please do not go on Discord to complain about being unable to keep track of all your Discords; you should continue to share all such complaints on Twitter.

NFT (non-fungible token): These are tokens that may never, ever be funged. And thank goodness.

Fungible tokens may be exchanged for any other and have the same value. If I send you one $CMO coin and you send me one, they will be as interchangeable as if we exchanged dollar bills.

NFTs are not so readily interchangeable though. Even if we both bought a Julius Randle basketball video clip NFT showing the same moment via NBA Top Shot, my NFT may be worth $10 and yours may be worth $5 depending on its serial number and other factors. The serial number of a dollar bill will not make one more collectible or valuable than another.

NFTs themselves tend to resemble fads in almost every way, or at least NFTs will until they become more useful. That utility could come from unlocking value, such as buying a Harley and receiving an NFT that gives you access to exclusive biker clubs, events, and merchandise. A sneakerhead may pay more for sneakers that come with matching NFTs so as to provide digital, shareable proof of ownership of the physical goods.

NFTs that more closely resemble a version of digitized sticker albums will likely fade in popularity, as will NFTs that offer no more access utility than buying a ticket on Eventbrite.

The NFT this writer most wishes for would come from Goodreads so that I can show off my collection of Library of America editions of Philip Roth novels, with the NFTs connected to my purchase history. I could then receive exclusive invites, such as an NFT-holder-only tour of the historic Weequahic neighborhood of Newark, NJ. That may be a very limited use case for NFTs, but it is a reminder that the value of NFTs lies predominantly in the beholder.

Web3: This is the way to write "Web 3.0" to garner the respect of Discord users. You may also use "Web3" and escape the digital equivalent to eye-rolls. Writing "Web 3," "Web 3.0" or "WWW III" may lead to your indefinite suspension on Discord servers.?

"WWW III" is not to be confused with "WWIII," which may not be a war at all but rather an overreaction to someone who perceives themselves to be canceled.

What other terms should we address in future editions? Reply here with your suggestions, or in true web3 fashion,?submit an idea here?via Bonfire and receive a $CMO coin as a fungible token of gratitude.

David

PS 1: First Wednesday is back in person February 2 in NYC.?See details on Meetup?and RSVP. Proof of vaccination required, even for former vice presidential candidates.

PS 2: The virtual community Salons are coming back too, co-hosted with Michael Bendit of Trusted Referral Network. The first one on February 16 will feature career advice from the ANA's Marni Gordon.?RSVP on Meetup?as well,