Mike Demarais on Design in Crypto and What Web 3.0 Will Look Like

Joe Weisenthal (0:10)

Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lots Podcast. I'm Joe Weisenthal.

Tracy Alloway (0:16)

And I'm Tracy Alloway.

Joe Weisenthal (0:18)

Tracy, we've obviously done a lot of episodes about crypto, probably doing more and more, to say the least, but there's still big aspects of this space. Like, it's so sprawling and broad and maybe ill defined that there's just a bunch of stuff we have yet to cover.

Tracy Alloway (0:35)

Yeah, I mean, there's new stuff happening every day, but certainly one of the big things that has been going on recently is this whole idea of Web 3, Web 3.0, NFTs, the idea of actually building new worlds, new spaces, new identities on blockchain technology.

Joe Weisenthal (0:56)

Yeah, exactly right. So we've done a lot about DeFi in the past, and maybe, maybe not, crypto will have some disruptive effect, unclear. But then there's this whole other aspect. And as you mentioned, like NFTs and DAOs and identity and de facto social networking.

And I think a lot of people are excited about some alternative to, I guess what I would say is the Web 2 tech giants. Like there's this anxiety about the power of a centralized company, like Facebook or Twitter, and maybe some hope, even if it's still not perfectly articulated, of how something that's decentralized and based on crypto or Ethereum specifically, could create new spaces, new forms, new ways for us to interact in a social manner that aren't tightly controlled by one entity.

Tracy Alloway (1:47)

Yeah, I think that's right. Although I think there's still a tension there which we can discuss. But the idea of being able to have your identity on the web somewhere or have your assets in a wallet somewhere and then be in absolute control of them in the sense that you can move them, they're portable from one wallet to the other without actually having to necessarily interact too much with the platform that you're using.

There is something that is very attractive in that proposition.

Joe Weisenthal (2:20)

No, it's super cool. And the idea of being able to log into an app or website without a password or username, just connect your wallet, it's pretty cool. It feels really powerful.

On the other hand, I guess I have to say, I have a hard time getting to, okay, yeah, but when does this become a sort of genuine social interaction? I can't tweet in Web 3 yet, as far as I know, or no one else is there. There's a bunch of social things that I do.

Tracy Alloway (2:51)

That's when everything becomes real for you, right? When you can tweet it.

Joe Weisenthal (2:55)

Yeah, that's basically the question. No, but literally, all my friends are in Web 2.0, and I get, in theory, that there's some Web 3 stuff that would allow us to interact, but I don't know what it quite looks like. What social relations look like in a Web 3.0-based world or whatever.

Tracy Alloway (3:16)

Yeah, fair enough.

Joe Weisenthal (3:17)

Anyway, I'm very excited about our guest today because I think he is someone who talks a lot about crypto. He's in crypto and explores crypto from this angle of these tacit or de facto social networks. And he's thought a lot about this. He's a company that is building in this direction. I'm very excited. We're gonna be speaking with Mike Demarais, the co-founder of Rainbow.me. It's a crypto wallet and built around all this stuff, built for this stuff. Mike, thank you so much for joining us.

Michael Demarais (3:47)

What's up, Joe? What's up, Tracy?

Big fan of the show. Excited to be here.

Joe Weisenthal (3:53)

How many Duncan's have you had today so far?

Michael Demarais (3:56)

I'm on my second Duncan right now. Feeling good. I feel it's a good number.

You know, this is pretty early for me. I'm normally, you know, still up at the 5 a.m. what I'd miss tweet. You know what I mean? Normally I'm the first reply.

Joe Weisenthal (4:09)

Yeah, right.

Michael Demarais (4:09)

So, you know, this is big.

Joe Weisenthal (4:11)

You say GM at one in the afternoon.

Michael Demarais (4:14)

Yes, exactly, GM.

Joe Weisenthal (4:15)

So in all seriousness, you know what I think? I don't know if anyone's made this analogy before, but I kind of feel like Rainbow, Rainbow.me, your company, it kind of feels like the Tumblr of Web 3 or like, because Tumblr is like all the cool Brooklyn hipsters. That was like this very design-oriented ease of use, social networking, making blogging, this thing. And it's like, rather than installing some boring WordPress template, just have this fun, cool way to interact in social media.