What is Web 3.0 Data Space?

Platforms have reshaped our lives over the past decade. We now have a buffet of brilliant services that help us keep up with friends, book hotels, and handle documents. And the cherry on top? Almost all of it is free! However, slowly but surely, we’ve come to understand that "If you get it for free, you are the product!"

For years, we've been scattering our data across platforms. These copies become outdated, leading to situations like an insurance company still contacting you about a car you sold or receiving mail for someone who moved away long ago. This is known as the data silos issue, and it's a problem that companies (those that create goods and services, not platforms) face even more than individuals.

And finally, we can’t even transfer our accumulated data to another platform when needed, which leads to the issue of vendor lock-in.

To sum it up: Data Silos, Vendor lock-in, Data sovereignty, are the Three Major Issues that make us suffer, hinder innovation and create tensions on the markets.

It’s time to rethink the fundamental principles of how we manage our information, starting with data ownership. Web 3.0 Data Space offers a practical solution that is radical, permanent, and elegantly simple: it separates data from platforms.

In the Web 3.0 Data Space world data stays with the users, on their own eVaults (Tim Berners-Lee refers to them as PODs) – secured servers – 100% controlled by users.

Meanwhile, platforms and services continue to operate, but this time they have equal access to all clients and all data in the world, and therefore have to compete for your attention with the quality of their services.

To be precise, eVaults will keep not only your own data, but all kind of data “about you” – likes, comments, discussions about your photos, products etc. It creates a rich layer of data to calculate “eReputation”, and we will discuss it in other news-letters in due time.

In the world of W3DS, all Three Major Issues are solved automatically:

1. Data sovereignty. 100% of your data is under your control. It’s all in one place at your eVault, where you can monitor who accesses what, when, and how. For example, you can even set a price for your photos.
2. You no longer suffer from data silos. You have a single “profile” on your eVault. And if you change your address, everyone who needs to know is automatically updated.
3. You’re free from vendor lock-in. You can use any platforms to access any data. E.g. you can write a post on facebook and your friends may review it in Instagram.

But that's just the beginning!

There are many other social impacts to consider beyond the eReputation mentioned above: IPR control, long-term data preservation, persistent IDs, combating counterfeit goods and fake news, eVoting, universal access keys, advanced statistics, a flat economy, support for participative democracy, digital currency and much more. We'll explore these topics further in upcoming newsletters.

We will also examine how Web 3.0 Data Space relates to major European digital infrastructure projects like Solid (from Tim Berners-Lee), IDSA (European Data Space), European Digital ID, European Central Bank Digital Currency etc.

In upcoming newsletters, we'll discuss how Web 3.0 Data Space can benefit companies struggling with data silos and vendor lock-ins across countless platforms and services. We'll also dive into the role of IoT, where even your car can have its own eVault, alongside its engine.

Finally, we'll present practical, business-driven rollout scenarios for implementing Web 3.0 Data Space with minimal yet helpful government regulation, leveraging the power of both society and companies.

Ah, one more thing! Web 3.0 Data Space has nothing to do with blockchain. We encourage you to read Tim Berners-Lee’s comments on the “Web 3.0” term here.

Join us in exploring the possibilities of the new world of Web 3.0 Data Space by subscribing to our weekly newsletters.