Cartoon: Tarred with the same brush
“Tarred with the same brush” by Ian Foley
This new cartoon illustrates how the collapse of the speculative crypto market continues to impact the blockchain technology sector.
Decentralised computing is a natural third evolutionary step in the shift from on-premise equipment (e.g. mainframes) to public cloud computing (e.g. Amazon Web Services). Also, the current web infrastructure is not designed for many of today’s current use cases.
For example, the Internet is a good file server, but the prevalence of digital rot and 404 errors suggests it is not a good long-term storage solution. Rather, using a decentralised and distributed blockchain, which ensures persistence, is a better solution for archival data storage.
The nuance of distinguishing between speculative crypto and the opportunities for decentralised blockchain infrastructure is lost for most people. As a result, the precipitous drop in confidence by consumers and investors in the speculative side of the industry has resulted in a dramatic decline in investment in the space.
The first half of 2022 brought in just under $30 billion of venture investment to the overall industry, while the second half only saw $7.3 billion. The one bright light is that investors are starting to distinguish between the different parts of the industry – with blockchain infrastructure investment securing the largest amount of capital (33% of all VC investment) and 295 deals.
You can find more of Ian’s cartoons here.
