The Web3 Leaders Roundtable with Marieke Flament, Henry Holtzman & Jeff John Roberts

uh right now we've got the web 3 leaders round table and so please give a warm welcome to Marie flemen CEO of near Foundation she's been a leader in the fashion and hospitality industry CEO of a bank uh really fun background and Henry holtzman's Chief Innovation officer at mobile coin and moderated by Jeff Roberts from Fortune Magazine hello hello and welcome everyone we're just talking backstage about how this is supposedly a winter and a bear market and there's 20 000 people packed into this place it feels more like a Broncos game than I thought the industry was dead so it's it's a lot of fun um the top of this panel we've got a couple people who are very successful in conventional Industries who are now in web 3 so we're going to be uh talking about that but I'm gonna let them introduce themselves Marie if you want to give us a quick bio please yeah sure um so I'm a computer science engineer at background I started my career in Asia working for lvmh and then after that I actually understood I understood nothing about business I retrained myself did an MBA working strategy Consulting then for Expedia and it's when I was actually at Expedia I got head hunted to work for Circle so I worked for Circle between end of 2015 and 2019 and after that I'd worked in a bank with CEO of a Neo bank and joined the near Foundation that helps Foster the near ecosystem and community in January 2022. hi yes I'm Henry Holtzman um I work at bubble coin I have a background in computer science as well I was at MIT as an undergraduate and then I went to this new internal startup there called the media lab at MIT right as it opened um stayed there for another 28 years so I'm a little bit of a slow learner took me a while to graduate but while there what we did was we thought about how everything would become digital and what that would mean and then after everything became digital we started to think about okay how do we reconnect the digital into our lives because we're physical beings and so my specialty was really about human computer interaction took a jump out of MIT to go join Samsung and really try to put some of these ideas to work reaching out to tens of millions of people with products made new kind of TV that looks like a uh uh a painting on your wall it's called the frame things like that and then got into AI there as well where we started doing intelligent assistance I finally decided I wanted to get back into like the really build things from scratch um and the place that really attracted me the most was again thinking about what it means for something to be digital and digital money in particular so mobile join we work on digital money and that's what that's what we're doing now cool yeah let's stick with that just one sec very quickly both you I think mobile coin and near blockchain are things if you're in crypto you've heard of but might not be able to Define exactly so can you give us like a 20 second summary of what the near blockchain does and why we need it and then after that um Henry you can do the same with mobile coin yeah perfect so as of yesterday actually we're positioning near as near as the blockchain operating system and what that means is that we all need better usability front-end back-end and actually not just decentralizing back end with layer one layer to whatever it is but also front-end and so that's what near does the core in the heart of the blockchain operating system for near is actually near as the layer one which is fully sharded proof of stake and therefore extremely sustainable and super fast that's in 20 seconds very good yeah and at mobile coin we wanted to create digital cash and for it to be digital cash it meant to us you had to have custody of it you had to be able to exchange it with other people privately you had to be able to use it on the go it had to be mobile friendly and it had to be really cheap to do all those things so to achieve that we also created our own blockchain um that's end to end encrypted uh works on mobile phones and is under Ascent to do a transaction what we're really focusing on now is the usability part so we have a wallet we call Moby and in that wallet we're trying to make the simplest experience for paying people and so uh we kind of have these dual things we have deep blockchain experience and a real obsession with ease of use great um you know in a minute we're going to talk about you both you know came from traditional Industries and are we were lighting it up now you're in doing the same in crypto but first the topic of this panel is supposed to be web three and Henry brought up an interesting point before we kicked off something about that term like I think people still are not sure what it is and then I was reading a good article the other day on how nfts are kind of being rebranded on Reddit no one talks about nfcs anymore the digital Collectibles a little bit of the Slime of Sam bangman freed is kind of unfortunately washed into over areas of the industry so there's an effort to kind of Rebrand things and re rethink how we talk about things web 3 uh do you think that's still the best term and do you think that's going to be what we're calling it in 10 years well one thing I've noticed is that for example back in 2015 when I got that call from a Headhunter it was to work in a Bitcoin startup and so that's how actually boxing and crypto was branded back then and then that evolved into being crypto and then that was also a word not used then it became blockchain then that was aware not used then it became wet three so I think it it's almost like the industry self-free brand itself and things happen and you mentioned you know what happened with FTX and and all that and I'm just curious so far it seems to be sticking out I'd be curious to take your stake on web3 yeah I'm I I tend to be curmudgeonly when some of these marketing rebrandings happen in particular um you know I remember the transition from web to web 2 and I would Define it as the web became Dynamic interactive it knew who you were and it gave you content just for you and so with that in mind I think web3 might be a stretch so far but it really does tie back to it because it is about how the web will know who you are now it is about you know um I have my wallet and my wallet has my keys and it's in my possession and if a website is going to interact with me and know who I am it's because of my wallet not because I gave them a username and a password and so I see that transformation is like really making sense why we're calling it web3 um how we pay for things on the web will transform ownership is transforming who owns the content uh web3 is making those changes but I still like feel like at the core the web is about like that content-based experience that I don't know that blockchain goes at the at the very center of you know okay well let's ask the audience once again the question is web three should it be our go-to term you know and in 10 years is that the best thing to call it will we be using it so uh pick a quick show of hands web 3 is what we want to call it so it's going to be in 10 years ouch okay who thinks we should retire web3 and come up with something else okay well I I guess I guess yeah I should take note of that because I'm the media and that's what I call it still but uh anyways let's move on to a different topic namely you know you work for a Louis Vuitton and hotels.com which are both kind of cool companies uh Marik what was it like going from that world into crypto land like where the crypto natives nice to you or was it hard to make that transition well I think I was extremely lucky my first experience in crypto was with circle and you know I worked with veterans who had actually created extremely successful web 2 companies so that was my first experience in that I think one of the things that I always found intimidating and it's like the amount of jargon that is used in this industry and actually I think that's a blocker for having a more more diversity and inclusion in this space because it's almost we hide be I know those terms like do your own research and and I think actually it's completely unhelpful and so now I'm not you know I'm not shy when I say I don't understand and I want to understand what's going on right so but apart from that I would say what the ethos of actually web3 because I think we're going to stick to that for now the ethos of web 3 is extremely inclusive and it's actually whomever you are you can participate in whatever project you want and I think that's extremely welcoming yeah um well how is it going from Samsung and MIT to crypto land um uh uh enjoying the permissionless nature um of being working in in crypto Finance like MIT was kind of like that too I I you know academic Independence let you do wide-ranging things Samsung very like planned structured corporate and so um I am really really enjoying being a startup I am enjoying being in the space I am really excited about what we're building because um for quite a while now our finances have just been numbers and ledgers but finally those numbers and ledgers are are becoming our own right we're owning them we're owning the owning the assets owning the data around the assets and I'm really excited to be working on making that uh kind of transformation cool well since we're talking about kind of traditional business I mean I had a you know cup of coffee at an MBA school for a year and they're all about like competition and assessing like you know market share and who has what and stuff like that one thing in crypto that struck me last couple years is there are so many blockchains you know no offense to near maybe it's the new killer one but you know sometimes I wonder like I'm old enough to remember when the first search engines came online and there was like 12 of them and you didn't know who was going to win but ultimately it's a network effect thing and a kind of a winner's take most market so just kind of putting on your conventional business hat Marik like you know do you think in five years there's still going to be you know 20 or 40 blockchains or is it going to get whittled down to like two or three I mean it's a really good question because actually I think right now one of the issues that there's so much tribalism right and there's almost like you know my layer one is better than your layer one like who cares because at the end of the day if we want to really deliver on what we're defining as web 3 it needs to be a collective and again at the end of the day the end user is not going to care what technology is under it we open a web page we don't you know we don't need to know what SMTP and HTTP and and other underlying protocol are so we are deeply convinced about actually a multi-chain world and actually where things come together and again as we showed yesterday and we demoed the blockchain operating system is getting in that direction of you can actually now completely decentralize front-end that are apps that are in-depth that are actually built on ethereum and then they can run on ethereum but actually they have a front-end that decentralized on something that actually is within the near ecosystem and I think that's the future and so collectively we have to get out of you know our tribes and our you know very small ecosystems to really fulfill the vision of web 3. yeah I I couldn't agree more um the you know the analogy I would make is the Swiss army knife do we want to build the blockchain that tries to do everything or do we want to have like that wonderful carving knife do we want to have the wrench do we want to have the screwdriver and I think we're moving towards that world where we're figuring out how to interconnect these blockchains and that is where maybe we're gonna we're gonna fulfill the promise of web in the web 3 name is because it's becoming a web of blockchains and let each blockchain Shine for what it can do well and host the applications that need those characteristics um without having to think that there's one convergent blockchain that can do everything perfectly because I don't think that'll exist yeah that's interesting I you know I'm torn sometimes I just think it'd be easier if we had you know Bitcoins Bitcoin it's not going away and ethereum seems to be doing everything so do you need do we need anything else like you don't hear a lot about ethereum Killers these days you know but maybe that's just reflection of the current market but something you said about um tribes you know I agree with you in the sense I'm always you know as a reporter someone outside fascinated by how blockchain people like to fight with each other you know then they're you know try versus tribe but part of I think the strength of crypto is the tribes in that it gives people a sense of loyalty and belonging and energy you know just look around you at ethereum too it's just you know it's so colorful and freaky and interesting and you know Bitcoins got their thing you know they're the kind of grumpy OG people um and so is it possible maybe you know you need the tribes to make the blockchains sort of you know kind of succeed and work together uh you want to take that one first Henry yeah I mean I think there's definitely critical mass right in anything you do in in this kind of space and so you need to achieve that critical mass uh or else here it's kind of like you're building something and hoping people come to it and that doesn't feel good so I I definitely think that that's the case and so maybe there there will be some consolidation um because maybe there are a lot of projects that don't have that critical mass and those projects will wither naturally but that doesn't mean that there's an always room for more and for more entrance and for more technology and for more good ideas and those things will gather uh those will gather A Flock and and the other thing is somebody doesn't you know in this world you you can be a member of more than one tribe right and so uh there's no exclusivity nobody says oh no you you can't own eth and own Bitcoin you can own both right and so I think there's room for both yeah we completely agree with that and actually I think it's it's not a matter of perspective right so ultimately we all belong to the tribe of web 3 and then within the stripe of web 3 then there is like you know smaller sub ecosystem that are trying to go to a broader picture I think sometimes we lose track of that bigger picture and we tend to think that you know we are you know competing against it I think really when I step back what we're competing against is actually very large and Broad players that we want ultimately to replace and to reshift how things are done and so I think having the bigger picture in mind is really important and then of course having your you know it's almost like when you play sports you have your team but you're also part of like you know the sports that you play and that's also your tribe right so I think exactly what you said we can have different levels of tribe I think my core attraction would be for all of us not to forget that there is a bigger picture and I think East Denver is a perfect example of that right how many ecosystems are actually Gathering to have all those different ideas coming together to really realize web3 yeah I like the analogy of sports whether you like them or not but you know every Sunday day if you're in Denver you know you'll see the Broncos tribe come out in force even though they suck right now I mean they shouldn't suck but that's you know another story but you know of course you know just because you're a tribe of the you know part of the Broncos tribe doesn't mean you can't like football and be friends with the other tribes so I don't know where I'm going with this um anyway so we're running on time but let's um let's talk I you know almost tired to bring this up but we have two Regulators you know we all know what's going on you know I've covered crypto for a decade I've never seen anything like this the onslaught of you know Congress on the White House and the SEC um you know a year from now is it going to be better or worse Henry oh gosh um now you've entered an area that feels like Ouija board to me um I have no idea I'm gonna be honest I have no idea I think we're seeing a world we order because when you look actually at what's happening in Asia and the movement on regulation There is almost like a complete divide east and west on what's Happening and so I'm very curious to see actually what's going to happen in the U.S but you know it's not the only place in the world where Builders can build and where actually Innovation can happen and so I think that's the game change that's happening and over the last few weeks we've seen you know very big movement made by Hong Kong very big movement actually also made in Japan and I think you know looking at that will be very interesting in Europe Mica is also different interesting take on on what things are happening and I think the cool here for Regulators is to Think Through the implication is actually Talent movement because let's face it having global harmonized regulation uh seems that something that's probably completely impossible and therefore there will always be in the world a place where something can be innovated and created you know now that I've had a second to think I want to type tie together your last two questions okay the tribes The Regulators I think one of the things that we see in the web 3 Industry is that its primary users are the Builders of those things um and there's an area where it started to grow past that where people are seeing the value who don't have the Deep technical knowledge to know what they're getting themselves into eventually we want to get to a place where the crypto is just an implementation detail right the the person who's getting the advantages knows nothing about the technology and for that we actually do need strong active Regulators who are looking to make the consumer safe and so I actually hope that they step up to the plate and help us do that yeah but I mean I think Marie's not wrong in that if the U.

S continues this way I think there's a real chance of developers voting for with their feet and you know it's been a while since Europe's really innovated with much of anything no offense but you know it seems like America could lose you know a new wave of you know Innovation to Europe and Asia so hope it doesn't happen but it feels like a real risk um looks like we're out of time so we're gonna do a quick lightning round uh we're going to play overrated underrated three things and that's all you can answer either overrated or underrated um uh we'll start with you uh Marik AI um underrated underrated nfts overrated underrated the theory of Shanghai update the what the ethereum Shanghai update neutral under overrated nice try guys I think it's gonna be big okay um thanks everyone for listening let's have a hand for our panelists thank you very much [Applause]