(Amazon) Prime time in web3

There are two main differences to call out in how Prime type memberships might work in web3. First is that rather than simply having members, we have owners. Many DAOs such as Friends With Benefits are already operating in this way - holding a certain amount of token grants you access to the suite of products and services that the DAO offers. Early... See more

Prime membership simultaneously drives adoption and usage of transactional products (eg buying TVs on Amazon) as well as other subscription products (eg Prime Video) and infrastructure/protocols (eg Amazon warehousing)Because Prime’s main purpose is to drive behavior on other services rather than revenue on its own, Amazon can ensure the benefits d... See more

So the meta point here is that if web3 really is the future, I believe it will look remarkably less transactional than it is right now. We will need applications built on crypto rails to connect with friends, find restaurants, share photos, and so on. Those products will still feed the protocols underneath them, but they will also be expensive to b... See more

“The market cap of the protocol always grows faster than the combined value of the applications built on top, since the success of the application layer drives further speculation at the protocol layer. And again, increasing value at the protocol layer attracts and incentivises competition at the application layer.”

We will need applications built on crypto rails to connect with friends, find restaurants, share photos, and so on. Those products will still feed the protocols underneath them, but they will also be expensive to build and only possible if they can capture significant value on the application layer.Enter membership moats.

Aggregation, acquisitions, and partnerships will happen at the product layer as much or more than in web2, even given an interoperable and composable landscape. People will want fewer rather than more Prime-like memberships, so established organizations with already successful products will have an edge on building or partnering with complementary ... See more

There are a few elements of Prime that are very important and I believe transferable to web3 consumer applications:

People will want fewer memberships than more. Whether by acquisition, merger, or partnership, a few major membership tokens will emerge.

Here are a few predictions you might make if you buy the viability of this model: