Internet Guru Tim O’Reilly: Crypto and NFTs are Bubble, ‘Get Ready For The Crash’

Web 3 is being dubbed as the next threshold in the evolution of the internet. Businesses and big entities like Apple, Facebook Meta, Microsoft are all jumping in the Web 3 melee, fearing being left behind in the race. Some NFT companies are already valued in billions. However, is this real, or is the bubble going to burst in the future? Tech luminary Tim O’Reilly feels that it will crash, and we must be ready.

CBS MoneyWatch spoke with tech luminary Tim O’Reilly, better known for publishing the world’s first website and coining the term Web 2.0. Tim feels that Web 3 has a promising future but is still a long way from fruition. Tim also added that it is hard to convince somebody of a thing when the commercial benefits depend upon believing in it.

O’Reilly feels that cryptocurrency, NFTs, and the metaverse, are all valued very highly and reeks of dot-com boom and bust in the breathless boosterism around Blockchain.

"It's very hard to convince somebody of a thing when financial gains depend on them believing in it," says tech luminary @TimOReilly, the publisher who coined the phrase Web 2.0, of web3 products like cryptocurrency and NFTs pic.twitter.com/i2pXR303hP

— Dan Patterson (@DanPatterson) February 7, 2022

Tim cautions and says that the bust is inevitable

Tim reminiscences of FTP and Telenet before the web was introduced. Unfortunately, it was highly overvalued, and when the web arrived, it went bust. Nevertheless, the web opened possibilities never thought of before, and by ’95, significant innovations in media and e-commerce happened.

In the case of Blockchain, Tim said that it is interesting, but when you delve deeper, there is not much despite a whole load of technical people into it.

Tim labeled Web 3 as the new decentralized web based on cryptography and the Blockchain. Tim had coined the term Web 2 17 years ago, and it appeared after the dot-com bust.

Web 3 could be defined as a bubble, and we are actually in the middle of it, said Tim. It is akin to the dot com bubble with numerous projects and ideas being conceived but very little product delivered.