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The next tech breakthrough will involve this battle between centralized and decentralized tech - Jeppe Stokholm
(Kitco News) - Centralized, "blue chip" companies are competing with decentralized startups for domination of the metaverse, and this will drive innovation in Web 3.0 technologies, said Jeppe Stokholm, Founder of Stokholm, an international advisory firm.
"We have centralized, big, existing tech companies with billions they can invest, and then we have Team Decentralized, these young startups, brilliant minds with absolutely no money who are searching for funding," he said. "They're all building their version of the metaverse."
Stokholm suggested that this competition will be beneficial, allowing for consumer choice among myriad options.
"We will have a lot of virtual worlds out there," he said. "Some of them will be built on decentralized platforms, and then we'll have the existing blue-chip layers also doing something. But most importantly, we will have more freedom to choose between different options."
Stokholm spoke with David Lin, Anchor and Producer at Kitco News.
FTX and lack of legal clarity
The failure of FTX, once the third largest crypto exchange by trading volume, has led to discussions over whether Sam Bankman-Fried, its Founder and CEO, should go to prison for fraud. Bankman-Fried, also known as SBF, is alleged to have used customer funds to conduct highly leveraged trades.
"It's difficult to say exactly what's going on right now," said Stokholm, who is also a lawyer. "What we can definitely say did not happen is good corporate governance, because something went terribly wrong. We have a lot of people who deposited their money with FTX and suddenly they can see that the money that should be there is now gone."
Although Stokholm claimed that crypto regulation would come out of the FTX collapse, he added that it may be difficult for regulators to keep pace with rapidly accelerating blockchain technology.
"There is already regulation here [in crypto], but much more regulation will come," he said. "The challenge is that the technological development goes so fast that it is difficult for legislators to really always be on top of what's coming next."
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NFTs, Blockchain, and AI
Stokholm laid out a vision of the future of Web 3.0, which involved artificial intelligence and smart contracts in the blockchain.
"Artificial intelligence is generating so much data, but artificial intelligence without validated data is nothing," he said. "So the link between artificial intelligence and blockchain is obvious… we can use blockchain technology to make these data transfers secure."
As an example of new technology, Stokholm pointed to non-fungible tokens (NFTs), unique digital IDs on a blockchain, being deployed to help artists gain money from ticket scalping.
"We have a very big problem with the secondary market, the black market where scalpers are taking all the best tickets and then selling them with a 10X revenue, and then they pocket all the money themselves," he said. "But the artists… will not get any share of that secondary market, nor will the event owner. If you issue the ticket as an NFT, and you have this trusted platform where people can buy and sell, and they know they will not be cheated, then the extra revenue generated on the NFT can now be distributed back to the right owners."
To find out Stokholm's view on venture capital in crypto, watch the video above.
Follow David Lin on Twitter: @davidlin_TV
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