On November 21st, Su Zhu, the founder of Three Arrows Capital, tweeted about "Ethereum abandoning users", which triggered a counterattack from the hardcore supporters of Ethereum, and then added ETH, which caused a lot of controversy in the encryption circle. waves.

On the 21st of this month, another "war of words" was staged on Twitter, this time the protagonist was more important: former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey VS a16z partner Chris Dixon. The topic of the debate between the two sides revolved around "Web3 and its dominance". Next, Odaily will take everyone to eat this "new melon" and see what they are fighting with each other.

The incident started with a tweet from Dorsey about Web3.

On December 21, Dorsey tweeted, "Users do not actually own Web3 products. The actual owners of Web3 are the venture capital institutions (VC) and their limited partners (LP) behind the project. Web3 can never be separated from their settings. Incentive mechanism. Ultimately, Web3 will be a centralized entity with different labels.”

Subsequently, a16z partner Chris Dixon replied to the tweet and said, "In Web3, all code, data and ownership are open source, and VCs (including a16z) own very little."

Dixon also said that he is a huge fan of Jack Dorsey and hopes to eventually bring him into ETH and other blockchains; BTC is great as digital gold, but there are many important applications that require other chains.(The atmosphere is quite harmonious at this time.)

He also quoted a famous saying, "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they criticize you, and after that is your day of victory." Dixon said that Web3 is now in the stage of "being criticized", implying distance. Victory is not far away.

Dorsey’s response to this is, “a16z wants to be a media empire that cannot be ignored, not Gandhi.”(Want to control Web3 not liberate Web3.)

On December 22, Dorsey retweeted a tweet from Twitter netizen levelsio, which implied that in Web3, all the money was made by VCs, and ordinary people couldn't make any money at all.

Dorsey unfollowed Coinbase co-founder and CEO Brian Armstrong and a16z founder Marc Andreessen on Twitter. He said, "In the world of Web3, VC is the problem, users are not (the problem)."

On December 23, a16z founder Marc Andreessen blocked Dorsey's Twitter account. In this regard, Jack Dorsey laughed at himself, "I have officially been expelled from Web3."

Nick Caldwell, head of core technology at Twitter, said in a post(Hey, why is there another one), Marc Andreessen also blocked himself. In this regard, Jack Dorsey borrowed a passage from the introduction of a16z's official website and said, "a16z's goal is to block and block Twitter accounts through open source and decentralization."（Introduction to Renjia's official websiteThere is only the first half of the sentence, We aim to connect entrepreneurs, investors, executives, engineers, academics, industry experts, and others in the technology ecosystem.)

As of press time, a16z has not responded further to this.

In general, this is a debate about "Whether the dominance of Web3 belongs to users or venture capital". It has to be admitted that the "debaters" on both sides can be regarded as the strongest representatives deeply involved in Web2 and Web3.

Late last month, Dorsey announced his resignation from Twitter, noting that he wanted to pursue cryptocurrency and philanthropy after leaving the company. He was once known as one of the most ardent Bitcoin supporters. Now, his Twitter profile has just one word: Bitcoin. As the leader of Twitter and Square, he is also an important player in Web2.

a16z is a legendary encryption venture capital in Silicon Valley. It has also promoted the Web2 trend. Since 2009, it has successively invested in Internet giants such as Facebook, Groupon, Skype, and Twitter. Invest in stars.

As early as the early days of blockchain technology development, a16z entered the Crypto field. In 2013, a16z led the US$25 million Series B financing of the encryption exchange Coinbase, when Coinbase had only 8 people. After being listed on Coinbase, a16z has also become the biggest external winner and has received rich returns. a16z also specially established a16z Crypto, a blockchain investment fund. Its investment projects cover almost all encrypted tracks such as public chains, DeFi, and NFT, and have achieved great success.

This year, Web3 has been discussed, and a16z is also in line with the hot trend, and has laid out many new Web3 track projects, including Friends with benefits, Fingerprints DAO, BitClout, Capsule, DeSo, etc., and published many articles to discuss the development trend of Web3 , problems and challenges.

As a venture capitalist, a16z has participated in various new trends and changes in the encryption field almost all the way. He is a trend finder, a vane, and an important promoter.

It is undeniable that a16z will also influence the development of the encryption field and Web3, which seems to be contrary to the ideal of Web3 decentralization and community leadership. Therefore, Dorsey’s worries are not unreasonable. In fact, Dorsey did not directly criticize Web3. His focus revolves around whether the real beneficiaries of Web3 are users or VCs. The current response from a16z is to avoid the important ones, mainly talking about the prospects of Web3, and There is no specific discussion on the degree of participation and influence of venture capital in Web3.

Odaily will further pay attention to the subsequent development of this incident.

Attached "melon skin" - Musk who provoked the situation: