In the latest episode of Decrypt's gm podcast, Amy Wu, the head of FTX’s $2 billion Web3 fund, weighed in on Jack Dorsey’s beef with the Web3 concept and VC firm Andreessen Horowitz’s outsized role in the space.
Overall, she said healthy skeptics like herself will help keep the Web3 ecosystem, well, healthy.
“There’s this constant narrative and paranoia that Web3 will become centralized, just like the previous rise of industries and the Internet, etc.,” she said. “I think it’s good for people to remain paranoid about it, and to call out bad actors.”
In December, Jack Dorsey and Elon Musk derided Web3 as merely a buzzword, something that ultimately will be centralized and controlled by VCs—especially Andreessen Horowitz (a16z). This was shortly after Dorsey stepped down as CEO of Twitter, which has since moved to adopt more non-Bitcoin-related projects, including an Ethereum tip jar.
Wu told Decrypt that she doesn't believe a16z is among the alleged “bad actors,” and that most of the industry is “swimming in the same direction” at the moment, largely due to its youth. She also acknowledged what a giant competitor a16z is among crypto funds.
FTX's Amy Wu Sounds Off on Dorsey vs Andreessen
On Episode 3 of Decrypt's gm podcast, Amy Wu, the head of FTX Ventures, gave Dan Roberts and Jeff Roberts her take on the Jack Dorsey vs Andreessen Horowitz feud over Web3. "There’s this constant narrative and paranoia that Web3 will become centralized, just like the previous rise of industries and the Internet... I think it’s good for people to remain paranoid about it," she said. She also commented on a16z's huge size in the space.
Web2 them vs. Web3 them
Wu said Web3 will attract many Web2 developers to its ecosystem, particularly after numerous cross-chain protocols go live later this year. These bridges could make developers more confident in working on new products on one particular chain.
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has said he believes the future of crypto to be “multi-chain,” not “cross-chain,” citing potential security vulnerabilities in bridge protocols as the primary reason—a concern proven true in a $320 million hack only a month later.
FTX's Amy Wu: How Crypto and Gamers Can All Get Along
There's bad blood between the crypto and gaming communities—and the situation is getting worse. As more studios propose introducing NFTs and other crypto elements, gamers are lashing out like never before. Is there any way to smooth things over? Amy Wu thinks so. A prominent investor in gaming startups, Wu recently jumped from Lightspeed Ventures to FTX to lead the crypto giant's new $2 billion Web3 venture fund—a position that will entail spreading bets from FTX's war chest across new trends i...
Wu said she believes better security will come with time. And regarding the frequency of rug pulls in the crypto world, she sees potential relief from both automated and decentralized auditing of smart contracts.
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