Ownership for all

Part III — The digital asset disruption gets physical

By Colin Johnson (@colinhjohnson), Co-founder of Freeport

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Part I [Here] discusses why legacy stores of value will benefit from moving on chain over time. Part II [Here] covers DeFi infrastructure, and how more resilient forms of value will bolster its utility long term.

An evolution in ownership

In the preceding sections we made two high level points: that legacy assets like art and real estate will have more utility once fractionalized on chain, and that DeFi absolutely needs them onboarded to add stable value to the ecosystem. But here’s the catch: neither of those things are going to happen until the end product is actually more useful and desirable than its predecessors.

Let’s walk through a simplified history of the web to see why:

Phase 1 — Read. Content was pushed from a company or media outlet to their local server that the general public could access and view, along with links to other pages. Here’s what those early pages looked like.

A classic example: spacejam.com, courtesy Mashable

Phase 1 only became ubiquitous when content we actually wanted to consume was brought online.

Phase 2 — Write. Then came the ability to write. Forums and blogs popped up, as well as social media. For better or worse, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram all allowed anyone with a connection to create content and push it out to the world. Once their algorithms mastered the effective delivery of that content, we were off to the races.

Phase 2 only became ubiquitous when blogging and social media platforms built products that actually let user-made content be found.

Phase 3 — Own. Blockchain has emerged as the crucial technology empowering decentralized ownership in a meaningful way. But there’s a catch. The theoretical capabilities have not been brought to life for most outside of the technically ultra-savvy. Below is an example of a (good) DeFi interface in the wild. Does this feel ready for the layperson?

Tokemak: https://app.tokemak.xyz

Phase 3 (crypto) will only became ubiquitous when we deliver products that let people easily understand this new form of ownership.

Making web3 ownership intuitive for all

So the task at hand — necessary to bring web3 to life — is creating well-structured experiences that will help shepherd our legacy intuition of ownership towards a new one, on-chain. We at Freeport plan to deliver something entirely new to users, such that old forms of ownership feel hollow in comparison. Here’s how:

• Offer shared ownership of high-value assets that are normally out of reach
• Create visually stunning spaces with an intuitive user interface
• Introduce cutting edge DeFi tools, as legally permitted
• Enable a vibrant secondary market
• Offer experience enhancing NFT passes to users
• Lean in to true blockchain partnerships with metaverse builders

We’re making all of the above happen, and we’re making it happen legally. As mentioned in Part I, making humans more efficient is a noble goal. And that’s the world we’re committed to build towards.

Follow along with us here on Medium, as well as on Twitter, and Instagram — you can also submit your email at freeport.app to be added to the pre-launch waitlist.