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Web 2.0 has, without a doubt, made it easy to connect with friends, family, and coworkers. Based on web 2.0, social media platforms like Facebook, WhatsApp, and others enable geographically dispersed family members and others to communicate with one another and share regular updates about themselves via texts, phone calls, and even video calls. Social media platforms are used by almost half of the world’s population, according to numerous statistics. It is helping numerous users establish themselves as well-known individuals. Since its inception, social media has aided numerous users in promoting their businesses, interacting with a diverse group of individuals, gaining popularity, becoming wealthy, and other endeavors. However, something excellent is sacrificed for every advantage.
Data breaches, censorship, privacy violations, server outages, de-platforming, and many other issues plague traditional social networking sites, which are all centralized. They are causing much more trouble than the free services they provide. Consequently, numerous engineers and organizations are moving to web3 web-based entertainment stages to battle these issues, taking into account their benefits over conventional virtual entertainment. The advantages of web3 over web 2.0 social media platforms and their use cases in social networking will be discussed in greater detail in this article.
It is undeniable that Web 2.0 has made interacting with loved ones, friends, and coworkers simple. Built on web 2.0, social media platforms like Facebook, WhatsApp, and others enable geographically separated family members and other users to communicate and share frequent updates about themselves using messages, calls, and even video conversations. Numerous studies indicate that social media platforms are used by about half of the world’s population. It is helping a lot of users establish a name for themselves. Since its debut, social media has aided several users in promoting their businesses, connecting with a broad variety of people, becoming more popular, becoming wealthy, and other things. All the advantages come at a significant expense, though.
Traditional social networking platforms are all centralised and plagued by issues such as data security lapses, censorship, privacy violations, server failures, de-platforming, and many others. Despite all the free services they provide, they are actually causing much more harm. Due to its advantages over conventional social media, a lot of developers and companies are switching to web3 social media platforms to address these issues. This article will explain the advantages of web 3.0 social media platforms over web 2.0 ones as well as their uses in social networking.
The following four goals are served by social networking
Sharing – Through social media websites, geographically separated relatives or friends can communicate and exchange information, images, videos, and other updates.
Social networking encourages community interaction by removing time and distance obstacles. Users can connect with one another using video communication tools like WhatsApp in addition to text messaging.
Learning – Social networking enables users to share information about their studies or jobs that encourage learning as well as receive the most recent news and regular updates from friends and family.
Marketing – Social networking enables companies to connect with potential and current customers and increase brand awareness through adverts.
Web 2.0 social networking is centralised and offers individuals and their data little to no privacy. With complete control and authority over user information, it is dominated by IT companies. Web 2.0 social media platforms provide users no control over the content they produce. Such social media sites are owned by digital behemoths, who have the authority to remove any content without the users’ consent.
Social networking on the Web 3 is a paradigm shift from the established Web 2.0 social network. A decentralised social networking ecosystem with user-owned and controlled data is what it intends to create. Currently, consumers spend a lot of time going through their feeds, reading blogs, and watching videos. Despite the fact that these platforms are highly profitable for users, the majority of users receive no financial gain from them. Web3 can provide users with much more and provide incentives for them.
Web3 social networks are based on blockchain, a transparent digital ledger that can store immutable data and underpins Ethereum and other cryptocurrencies. Web3 social networks are a subset of decentralised applications since they are based on the blockchain (dApps).
Smart contracts serves as the backbone and business logic of social media applications and power dApps. These decentralised applications (dApps) operate on a peer-to-peer global network with thousands of nodes. Even if some nodes fail, the network as a whole won’t be impacted. As a result, the network will function without interruption, encouraging failure-resistant applications.
Several blockchain-powered web3 platforms, such as blogging platforms, web browsers, video-sharing platforms, social networking platforms, and others, are currently rewarding both creators and consumers. Each of these web3 platforms is powered by native tokens, from which each user benefits rather than a select group of people. Users can also buy these tokens in order to gain access to specific features, tip their favourite content creators, or make in-app purchases.
Web 2.0 social networking involves a large number of users, and web3 in social networking has the potential to drastically change how people connect and interact. Let’s look at how web3 social networks differ from web2.0 social networks.
Free and open source
Data in web3 is stored on an open, decentralised, and permissionless blockchain. There are no gatekeepers or censors who can change the API or block your access. It also eliminates project risks because developers no longer need to rely on other protocols and can clone functionalities. This is not the case with web 2.0 applications. Twitter, for example, once disabled its API to prevent developers from creating similar apps.
Because web3 is open-source, developers can fork the codebase of any social media platform and create a new one with far superior functionalities and user experience. Web3 is considered composable because it is open source, and anyone can re-use the freely accessible on-chain code to speed up the development process.
Interoperability
Although web3 is only partially interoperable at the moment, it is getting closer to true interoperability. Web3’s goal is to connect and communicate with each siloed blockchain environment. It enables users of one social media platform to share content, data, assets, and more with another social media platform in order to improve collaboration.
Free of spambots and bots
There are millions of accounts on Web 2.0 social media platforms, but not all of them are legitimate. Many of those accounts are spammers, bots, or false accounts. Many people try to get you to click on the incorrect link so they may access your information and steal your money or sell it to someone else for a significant profit. Web3 can securely encrypt your data so that only you have access to it and others can only access it with your consent. Additionally, blockchain technology encourages direct identity and data verification, which makes it more difficult for false accounts to exist.
User-created material
When a user creates content on a web 2.0 social media site, such content is not actually theirs. The platform owners are the sole owners of the material. As a result, any excuse could be given to remove your postings and content on traditional social media. Web3 social media platforms are censorship-resistant, and your content that is stored on the blockchain belongs to you alone. You can carry your material with you from one platform to another if you decide to leave it in order to connect into a more advantageous interface.
Web3 in social networking can help create a new ecosystem and solve the problems with social networking today. It offers the following advantages:
Removes the practise of viewing users as products.
Facebook and other social media platforms are much more than just social networking sites. Most existing social media platforms take advantage of users’ trust. It takes advantage of the data and information we provide when registering on the platform and sells it to third-party advertisers for a large profit. During the second quarter of 2022, Facebook, for example, earned an average of $50.25 USD per user in the United States of America and Canada. The majority of free social media platforms monopolise and incentivize user data without regard for user privacy.
Web3 closes this social networking platform by selling users. It prioritises user safety and privacy by replacing centralised overseers with decentralised nodes and distributed data storage networks.
Enhanced security
Since traditional social media sites began collecting each user’s social graph, user privacy has been jeopardised. Each person’s registration information, as well as other details such as their friend list, posts they like, or groups they follow, are all recorded in order to create a personalised feed for them. These details are kept in centralised storage, which poses security risks. Any cyber criminal with access to the system can break in and steal any amount of data to sell to third-party advertisers.
Although web3 is not a panacea for all web 2.0 issues, it does offer significant protection against cyber-attacks and data breaches. To address data vulnerability issues, many solutions are being built on web3. Any service powered by blockchain technology ensures a certain level of security because the data it stores is immutable and cannot be manipulated. Furthermore, obscuring and securing data in blockchain makes it difficult for unauthorised parties to gain access to the server..
More effective content control
Social networks that are controlled by traditional social media platform owners are under their control. They keep tabs on each user’s likes, comments, friend list, groups they adhere to, and occasionally even their message. They are then given a tailored user experience with these facts by adding them to their social network, which keeps them connected to the platform and encourages them to visit more frequently.
Even the social media adverts you see are tailored to you. Unfortunately, since you accept the “Privacy Policy” and “User Service Agreement” of that particular platform upon registering and signing in to your account, you have no legal claim to your data and social network. Additionally, if the platform owners deem your content to be unsuitable, they have the right to erase any of your content and even your account.
With Web3, users regain ownership over their data and content rather than platform owners. Your social network belongs to you, and since you are the only one who can offer access to others, no one else can gain anything from it besides you.
In-app payments
Most web 2.0 social networking sites go above and beyond to prevent users from closing their accounts. One such technique to improve user experience was to provide an in-app payment feature. This function has been added to the majority of social networking sites, including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, so that users may make payments to friends, shop online, and place food orders without ever leaving the site. The majority of these in-app payment solutions claim security by giving a PIN, but how much security do they actually provide? Many users are hesitant to enter their financial information into these platforms due to the numerous data scandals and security breaches involving the current social networking programmes.
Blockchain technology, which was first used for cryptocurrency transactions, is the ideal choice for integrating in-app payments. Social networking sites that use Web3 may easily and securely promote in-app purchases. Peer-to-peer payments can be improved further via smart contracts without the use of a middleman.
Verifying the authenticity of content
Not everything of what we read or see online is accurate. Our social media feeds are filled with a lot of bogus news that passes for the real thing, which makes us doubt the veracity of every post. Almost 62% of the information on the internet is unreliable, according to data gathered from the Center Statistics Office (CSO). Social media operates in a similar manner. People are less likely to believe news or material, even if it is correct, if more than 50% of the information available on the internet is false and unreliable.
The dissemination of illegal content can be stopped with the help of Web3. Some web3 sites use blockchain-based algorithms to verify the legitimacy of user-generated content and films. Although it could be improved, it is working to slow the spread of malicious and unreliable content. Offering users blockchain-connected compensation in exchange for ranking the content’s legitimacy is another option.
Compensation for high-profile posts and influencers
Because it pays its most well-known influencers depending on the amount of interactions their material receives, YouTube continues to be the most favoured web 2.0 social media platform among influencers and content producers. On this list, Facebook, Snapchat, and TikTok are next. Despite paying their influencers, other social media networks like Instagram have a different business model than YouTube. Traditional social media networks also give influencers less ways to make money.
User interactions take precedence over gaining followers on a web3 social media platform. The followers of an influencer on a web 2.0 social media platform are not always genuine, as many use bot accounts to increase their follower count. In web3 social media applications, however, user interactions are tracked using blockchain ledgers, which provide more robust metrics for fair compensation. Furthermore, smart contracts can trigger automatic payments for influencers based on metrics.
Identity verification online
Social media sites are now more populated by bots and fraudulent accounts than by actual users. Under these guises, the majority of bogus news, con games, offensive information, and criminal actions are carried out, deceiving many unsuspecting consumers. To enhance the number of their followers, likes, comments, and shares, many influencers pay for these accounts, which are typically operated by bots. Users and platform owners alike can no longer tell the difference between real accounts and those controlled by bots. Although every social media network is implementing measures to address this problem, there are currently no workable solutions.
Social networking sites that use Web3 can solve this issue. To prevent the use of bots and false accounts, identity authentication methods are used. Web3 allows you to enter your information in a blockchain so that any web3 services or social media sites you use may cross-check it to ensure you are a real person and not a robot.
Conclusion
Social networking’s Web3 platform might be seen as a doorway to a decentralised future. It returns ownership to the real owners, which are the people, and takes away the influence that web 2.0 tech giants have over our content and data. They do, however, have the right to their data and the ability to use it to support the social media platform. By incorporating a number of web3 components, including the digital ledger, NFTs, cryptocurrencies, the metaverse, and more, it expands the potential of social media by providing more opportunities for users and content creators.
Get in touch with Brugu Software Solutions right now if you want to create a web3 social media platform. Your dream project might become a reality thanks to our skilled experts.
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