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IBM, Microsoft, and other industry pioneers of the open source computer era laid the foundation of computer hardware with their technology and influence. The World Wide Web protocol in 1990 allowed networks around the world to be interconnected, and since then people have officially entered the Internet era, and centralization has helped billions of people join the Internet and create a stable, robust infrastructure.
In the era of Web 2.0, the development of the Internet has deviated from its initial design track. As users have changed from receivers of information to participants, their digital behavior is gradually being controlled by individual companies in the form of data, and a portion of entities with absolute control are exercising monopolies, using algorithms to control the distribution of benefits and unilaterally determining or interfering with the order of the Internet.
From: Paradigm, Technology, and Ecology of Web 3.0
The Internet era is changing, power is gradually shifting from a centralized monopoly to the hands of individual users, and decentralization is becoming the signature feature of the new generation of the Internet. Although the Internet barriers of high replacement cost, strong network effect, and user experience will not be overturned shortly, users' pursuit of the right to control identity and data will eventually start a prairie fire like a star.
Web 3.0, as an all-encompassing term, represents an emerging vision of a better Internet, encompassing emerging concepts such as decentralization, blockchain technology, and token economics. For skeptics, it is an exaggerated house of cards, while for Web3 evangelists, it is a revolution, with technological innovations that will bring a wave of Internet innovation.
From: Understand Web 3 in one article
Before we can understand Web 3, we need to have a good base of knowledge about the development of the Internet. The Internet that most people living in the Internet era know is very different from how it was originally conceived, and to better understand this, it is helpful to outline the short history of the Web in several phases (Web 1.0 and Web 2.0).