The spoils of Web 2.0 went to the West, now India is uniquely positioned to shape the future of Web 3.0, partner, Lightspeed India, writes
India-2022 is a far cry from 2018 when the co-founders of a crypto exchange were briefly in police custody for putting up a ‘Bitcoin ATM’ in a Bengaluru shopping mall
Image: Manjunath H Kiran/ AFP
For over a thousand years, the constant driving force of history has been technology. Nation-states, ruling parties, socio-political ideologies have all come and gone but technology and innovation have remained the bedrock of societal development. From gunpowder and naval superiority that allowed Britain, Spain and Portugal to capture much larger dominions, to the steam engine, automobile, nuclear power, space and satellites, and finally, the internet—nations that were first to these waves of industrialisation benefitted immensely.
We are perhaps midway through the third industrial revolution kick-started by internet-enabled technologies in the 1990s. Globally-dominant internet companies have now become the new superpowers, shaping and reshaping consumer behaviour, opinions, and amassing wealth that rival nation states. Today, a fourth industrial revolution is underway. The nature of the old internet—the ‘Web 2.0’—itself is changing.
This new internet is being called ‘Web3’. When the West was innovating and shaping the old internet, India was a fledgling nation, a few decades old. By the time we liberalised in the ’90s, we could only be the service back-office to the foreign tech giants. The Web 3.0 presents India with a massive opportunity. Let me illustrate why, using the US—an early supporter, innovator and adopter of the internet—as an example.
(This story appears in the 14 January, 2022 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)