Web3 In Transition and Participatory Regulation

Web3 constitutes the first qualitative revolution of the Internet. The technology in Web2 has been neutral, while with the blockchain, it becomes a field of competition. Digital platforms (Web2) remained up to this year unregulated. In 2022 the European Union started to regulate them from a premise: technology is neutral. This premise doesn’t apply to Web3: EU rules change according to the technology used. Hence, EU rules for Web2 and Web3 are mutually incompatible. However, since the transition from Web2 to Web3 will still last years, it is necessary to find a convergence of the rules or their implementation. This article suggests a convergence on the regulatory level, defined as “participatory regulation.”

By Fabio Bassan^[1]

I. WEB IN TRANSITION

Web1 (1990/2000) refers to the first stage of World Wide Web evolution, featured by static web pages, hosted on ISP-run web servers or free web hosting services, few content creators, no advertisements, and, importantly, relying on a content delivery network (“CDN”) that was decentralized and using open protocols.

Web2 (2000-2020) refers to websites characterized by user-generated content, featuring usability, interoperability for end users (the birth of the “social era”). It also involved the centralization of the business model by which user data are captured, aggregated, and resold. Applications were developed, delivered, and monetized in a proprietary way. All decisions related to their functionali