When big innovations change the world, people tend to argue about them. Will Web3 finally democratize the Internet? Is decentralization real? I’m a data guy. I don’t consider myself in a position to answer questions about the cultural impact of Web3. However, I can point out that complaining is nothing new. As expected, it happens just as the biggest changes are coming. Consider this excerpt from an article written by automobile pioneer Alexander Winton, who sold his first automobile in 1897:
“…the great obstacle to the development of the automobile was the lack of public interest. Advocating for replacing the horse, which had served man for centuries, marked one as an imbecile… in the ’90s, although I had a successful bicycle business and was building my first car in the privacy of my basement, He began to be singled out as ‘the fool who is tinkering with a buggy that runs without being tied to a horse.’”
In data architecture, we talk about layers. Web3, like the cars of yesteryear, is being built under a layer of scrutiny. Regardless of what we say about it, the machine-readable Internet (Tim Berners-Lee’s original definition of Web 3.0) is underway. From DAO to Amazon’s Astro cleaning robot, use cases for artificial intelligence are growing.
Until recently, there was no way to package that data into a common language for people and machines. A wallflower protocol called JSON-LD is changing all that. This otherwise unattractive protocol is worth exploring, because it plays a formative role in the ever-growing Web3 architecture. Just as, say, break lines on a car go unnoticed but really make a difference in your driving experience, JSON-LD is the connective tissue that is driving Web3 to become the Internet as we know it.
The data internet
What does it take to read, interpret and process data on the Internet with minimal human intervention? In terms of Web 2.0, you need a lot of API integrations with a lot of databases. Data is poured into a data lake and then loaded into a data warehouse for interpretation.
This cumbersome process is the main motivator for the new Web3 architecture. Databases are useful for digitizing things that were previously done by hand, such as organizing business contacts. They are not used to feed data to machines in order to create new lines of business and transform society. Only when data is trusted, secure, and interoperable can it live safely outside of databases and be accessible to machines.
Many of the pieces already exist. Blockchain guarantees trust and immutability. Microledgers safeguard security and privacy. Semantic standards, called W3C RDF standards, make all data machine-readable so that machines can link and leverage data from anywhere. Another word for this is interoperability, and it has been one of Web3’s biggest challenges so far.
Why JSON-LD is important
As you may recall from earlier in this article, Web3, also known as the Internet of Data, requires that data live anywhere, contain cryptographic proof of its own trustworthiness, and describe itself in a common language that any human or machine can understand. It was unclear how that common language would happen. It turns out that one of the most common (and easily ignored) protocols on the Internet is changing all that.
JSON is a protocol that transmits data to be displayed on a web page. A drop-down list of options after entering a search query is an example of how JSON works behind the scenes. A machine reads your input and pulls suggestions from a database. A much more powerful version of JSON came out a couple of years ago: JSON-LD (Linked Data). Used in the same way as its predecessor, JSON-LD wraps data in RDF, a universal format that allows data to be interpreted and used outside the database.
By encoding meaning within a JSON document through the RDF semantic (shared vocabulary) standard, JSON-LD makes it possible to organize, contextualize, and connect data anywhere. Machines can read and analyze data wherever they are without human intervention. Data can be reused independently of the application, freeing you from having to enter the same data multiple times into multiple databases. Tasks like sharing, generating compliance reports, and re-operating data in new applications become much easier.
Some real-life examples might help clarify the value. You can securely and selectively share your patient data between hospitals or academic records between schools. Pathogen-borne diseases and counterfeits in supply chains become easy to trace. Meeting compliance requirements for data regulations like GDPR happens in a matter of hours instead of weeks. Manipulations like deepfakes become visible for what they are. The landscape of possibilities only grows when autonomous vehicles, robots and other intelligent machines are added.
JSON-LD could also help Web3 emerge from its current mess of disconnected blockchains. Let’s say someone wants to create a marketplace for NFTs and list all the NFTs that exist. If each NFT developer creates their own data silo to store them, then Web3 anonymity becomes a crutch. The market operator would have to go to each developer and decode the shared value of the NFT by asking them: “What does this mean? What does that mean?” Interoperability provides the common vocabulary to solve that problem and allow data to be linked to other data, while preserving the best features of blockchains, namely privacy, trust and security.
The driverless Internet
Times have changed and are changing again. Web3 is confusing because it is still in its formative stages. No one quite knows what inventions will shape it next. However, from time to time you see things that could support Web3’s motors and wheels. JSON-LD configurations could be one of those important tools to consider to help alleviate Web3 growth issues.
Brian Platz is co-founder and CEO of Fluree, a Web3 database platform that enables reliable, interoperable data management.
This article was published through the Cointelegraph Innovation Circle, a vetted organization of top executives and experts in the blockchain technology industry who are building the future through the power of connections, collaboration and thought leadership. The opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of Cointelegraph.
