An Overview of Web3's Social Landscape: Applications, Protocols, Public Goods, and Ecosystems

Author: Thomas Scaria and Natasha Khimji

Compiled by: Captain Hiro

As Web3 begins to gain mainstream attention, a brand new category has emerged: Web3 social.

Humans are tribal beings. Communication and a sense of belonging are deeply ingrained in our DNA. Web3 social fills the same human void as Web2 social: connection.

So, what exactly is Web3 social? It is a new open social model that is user-centric rather than platform-centric.

In Web3 social, users own their identity, data, and the content they create for applications and protocols. Web3 social serves as a stepping stone into the world of DAOs (Decentralized Autonomous Organizations) and platform-less social networks. Indeed, Web3 represents a new era of social media where users own the networks and protocols, creating positive external conditions for non-users.

Web3 social products leverage the native value propositions of Web3, such as user ownership, to empower users while utilizing familiar Web2 social models to create recognizable user experiences.

Leveraging Open Data

Humans are gathering their identities into their wallets. Their wallets contain memberships to social clubs, NFTs that reflect their personalities, and even events or memorable moments they have participated in.

The trajectory of this data travels with the users, and it is also public. Application developers utilize this data to build social graphs and reputation systems, forming the connective tissue of Web3 social applications.

Social Graph: A map of connections between users

• Web2: Users hand over ownership of their data to centralized networks
• Web3: Users travel with their data, and social platforms access on-chain data to connect users

Reputation System: How platforms and networks allocate attention

• Web2: Gaining "followers" and "likes" is a feedback loop that incentivizes content creators to continue contributing to the network
• Web3: Social networks build reputation systems that interpret public data based on likes/comments on social media, investment patterns, and/or governance participation in protocols

While the connective tissue of Web3 applications is (currently) centralized, many applications are dedicated to ensuring users own the value they create. Users place their profiles, reputations, and social graphs on-chain, which can then be utilized by other networks or DAOs.

Collective Ownership

DAOs are platform-less social networks. They allow members to coordinate capital and resources to accomplish tasks. At this stage, two types of DAO use cases emphasizing socialization have emerged: social DAOs and investment DAOs.

• Social DAOs: Users form communities based on shared values and interests. Social DAOs empower communities to coordinate tasks, plan roles, and incentivize contributors. One use case for social DAOs could be creator/fan clubs that co-create content and grow brand value together.
• Investment DAOs: Users truly own their assets in Web3. DAOs allow groups of friends/strangers to own anything. By investing and sharing ownership, users play an active role in the development of the products and communities they own. Communities coordinate group actions, and group actions foster community.

Breaking Down the Web3 Social Landscape

Web3 Social Landscape

Applications: Interfaces, Social Experiences

In Metalink, users connect in verified chats, check floor prices, and (soon) trade NFTs all in one place. Metalink is integrating various Web3, social, chat, and NFT-related functionalities into a single application.

By using Context, users can see what’s happening on Web3. They can view the wallets of friends they follow, see what NFTs they are minting and buying, curate NFTs to share their aesthetics, and help their favorite creators reach more people.

Showtime is building an open social graph with NFTs. They help collectors showcase NFTs and discover emerging creators. Ultimately, every piece of content will be an NFT, and Showtime aims to be its primary social media interface.

Prysm helps investors connect, form teams, and invest together. They combine familiar Web2 social experiences with the simplest ways to launch, manage, and flexibly invest in NFT DAOs.

.eth Leaderboard displays the top 200 users followed on Twitter who also have ENS names. This allows those active in the Web3 community and newcomers to understand the leaders shaping the industry.

Eth.xyz is a universal short link for your Web3 username, usable for all .eth names. On Eth.xyz, you can view any .eth name's public ENS profile and NFT collection on a secure .xyz URL.

Islands.xyz is building your passport to the metaverse. They help creators establish their own NFT communities, enabling communities of various sizes to manage digital assets and pay for projects and personnel globally.

PartyBid enables users to pool capital and bid on NFTs. They focus on a core principle of allowing strangers on the internet to acquire expensive assets while experimenting with different forms to host successful gatherings, such as token thresholds, creator fees, and private parties.

Another example is Koop, a platform that allows users to collectively own NFTs and projects, generating social reputation through being investors, contributors, and/or collaborators.

Myco leverages novel social domains and strong ownership rewards to help communities grow into thriving ecosystems. They are assisting a new generation of social clubs in launching their own long-term sustainability foundations.

Mirror's crowdfunding capabilities allow capital to form early and support ambitious missions. Successful Mirror crowdfunding has launched new projects and examples of new collective ownership rewards include BLVKHVND, KrauseHouse, and even PartyDAO.

Protocols: Protocols and Smart Contract Building Blocks for Anyone/Any DAO

CyberConnect is a decentralized social graph protocol built on IPFS and Ceramic. It creates a data standard for social connections, storage infrastructure, and a recommendation indexing system, while also providing a universal data layer for the next generation of dApps (decentralized applications) to create their own context-specific social functionalities.

Mem is building tools for the social layer of Web3. Users own their friend graphs on Mem, allowing them to explore the blockchain and earn money by sharing knowledge.

Syndicate DAO is democratizing investment through investment protocols and social networks, changing the way the world creates value. Their first product allows anyone to start an investment club on Ethereum at a very low cost, guiding investment DAOs.

Gnosis Safe is a leading tool for collectively managing digital assets on Ethereum. It is a smart contract wallet that supports ETH, ERC20 (tokens), and ERC721 (collectibles like NFTs).

Juicebox is a community fundraising tool. It allows you to fund your projects while giving ownership to your community through NFT minting, combined with Gnosis-like primitives to unlock large-scale capital formation and coordination. This combination is based on productive cultural moments, such as ConstitutionDAO.

Public Goods: Decentralized Models, Storage, User-Owned Identities

One of the building blocks of Web3 social is ENS (Ethereum Name Service): the Web3 username for users. This is the most widely integrated blockchain naming standard. Normal social network wallets struggle to connect with 0x addresses, so ENS humanizes wallets and is central to Web3 social.

Ceramic is a decentralized, permissionless data stream network. Users store information streams and files on a decentralized network.

IDX is a new decentralized identity standard for connecting your digital identity, built on Ceramic. By allowing users to control the discovery, sharing, and permissions of their data, IDX is helping realize the vision of a user-centric web.

Ecosystem Growth

Other projects are catalyzing the growth of a broader Web3 social network.

Seed Club is an incubator for Web3 communities and DAOs. They provide guidance, thought leadership, and programming to help communities bring their future value of collaboration, creativity, and connections into the present, transforming their social capital into digital assets.

Forefront is a community of social tokens with the sole purpose of helping tokenized communities thrive and ultimately becoming the leading insight and development platform for the entire social token community.