People Don’t Give A Shit About Web3

And they won’t. That is, unless we start story telling again.

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Anyone who has spent some time in a sales role has heard the phrase “we don’t sell drills, we sell 3/4” holes.” Okay yeah, it’s cringe, but if you’ve ever tried to sell someone on the features of a product — you know it doesn’t land right. We’re so desensitized to being shilled stuff that if you can’t differentiate yourself by making me feel something you have no shot at winning my business.

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In my opinion, we’re not even selling drills anymore. We’re telling people they’ve never actually seen a drill before and, because of that, they’re “normies” and going to get left behind in this new world.

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After working for Twitter for 3.5 years and launching their crypto ads team, I know I’m in an echo chamber. I’m self aware enough to know that my follows, my likes, and the algorithm all reinforce my biases. However, I also know that I have a pretty wide view of the space. I’ve worked with major companies like Coinbase, Kraken, and FTX but I’ve also worked with smaller up-and-coming protocols like EverRise and Giddy. I own and follow NFTs and keep up to date with the trends in that space as well.

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If you couldn’t tell, Twitter is where I spend most of my time online and a great percentage of the time I find it to be incredibly thought provoking. I find myself to be inspired, excited to build, and generally optimistic about the future of finance. (And some of y’all are so funny)

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So, why don’t my IRL friends give a shit about crypto? Outside of Twitter or Crypto conferences when someone asks what I do I shyly tell them “I’m in web3 advertising.”

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To which I almost always get the same three responses:

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“Oh that’s far too volatile for me”

“So, you’re selling bitcoin?”

“oh, yeah… I have no idea what that means”

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In fact, the only real engagement I get talking about crypto outside of Twitter is the occasional snarky “Bitcoin died again” comment to my girlfriend who is sweet enough to always give me the eye-roll response that I want so badly out of her. If you’re reading this, thank you Sus.

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Here’s the tough pill to swallow and the point that I’m trying to make.

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We’ve stopped story telling. We’ve stopped educating. We stopped trying to create a narrative that makes people curious to dive deeper.

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Instead, we’re constantly throwing charts with random lines drawn on them and telling people that they’re going to be poor forever if they don’t buy this dip. Bitcoiners have created a cult-like narrative by constantly posting cryptic tweets that you only understand if you’ve been deep in BTC Maxi narratives for years. As an outsider, there’s nothing to draw you in.

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Tweets like this only muddy the conversation, not give people direction.

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Be honest with yourself for a minute, humor me. If you take a step back for a second — it’s all a bit ridiculous. People just lost their entire life savings on what seemed to be one of the most promising new blockchains less than a month ago. The collapse of Luna and UST wiped more than $40B of value out of the market. Today, Crypto Twitter pumped goblintown.wtf to a 9ETH ($16,000+) floor. The juxtaposition is alarming. As an outsider, how could it not all look like a scam?

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For now, it seems that we’re entering a bear market and there’s bound to be a great deal of uncertainty over the next 12–18 months. If we didn’t reach mainstream this cycle, we’re certainly going to reach it next cycle. Right now we have the opportunity to mold the narrative. To win hearts and minds. Price goes up brings in new money but it doesn’t change the way that people think about the future of access to financial products and digital ownership.

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All that being said, there’s an open space for someone to create content that’s not viewing web3 from the technical side but from the cultural side. Instead of talking about the mathematics of interest rate swaps or impermanent loss let’s talk about crypto’s impact on equity and wealth distribution. Instead of hopping on Twitter spaces with people making animal noises and arguing with each other about who is going to slow-rug lets talk about digital identities and ownership online. A space that I hope to fill by creating content sharing my experience with crypto and where I see things going. Hopefully, amplifying some inspiring voices along the way.

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If you want to be a part of it, follow me on Twitter

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Ty 🟪

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and if you have ideas for content or you want to co-write a piece with me shoot me a DM. Also, I don’t have an editor or a copywriter so if small grammatical errors are a deal breaker — this might not be the follow for you.

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Let’s get it.

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Disclosure* my current bags organized by USD value high to low

Bitcoin, Harmony, Algorand, Solana, Avalanche, Giddy, EverRise, Ethereum, Matic, Waves, Litecoin, USDC

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