Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, who served from 2001 to 2011, recently offered his thoughts on cryptocurrencies and the Web3. He continued in the company as executive chairman until 2017 and technical advisor until 2020. According to the Bloomberg Billionaire Index, his net worth is currently $22.8 billion.
Schmidt says he has put “a small bit” of money into cryptocurrencies, but he does not say which ones. However, he does not believe that digital assets are the most exciting feature of blockchain. He feels the future is the Web3.
The former CEO goes on to say that if he could start his software development career now, he would focus on artificial intelligence algorithms or Web3, the name given by some developers to describe a new form of internet service based on decentralized blockchain technology. He claims that “tokenomics,” the study of the supply and demand characteristics of cryptocurrencies, has piqued his interest in Web3.
The objective, at least in theory, is to create a system that makes it far more difficult for a few corporations to control significant amounts of data and content on the internet, such as Google, which Schmidt helped transform from a Silicon Valley start-up to a global tech juggernaut.
Part of the problem, according to Schmidt, with today’s blockchain technology – notably, bitcoin – is that the majority of effort spent on those systems is spent ensuring that “nobody is attacking them… they’re really wasteful.”
Schmidt did not specify which cryptocurrencies he presently holds, instead stated that he is only “beginning” to invest in cryptocurrency. He’s devoted the majority of his time since leaving Google philanthropically through his Schmidt Futures programme, which sponsors core research in domains including artificial intelligence, biology, and energy.
Schmidt has co-written “The Age of AI” last year as a roadmap for what the technology’s future might look like. According to the organization’s website, he also became a strategic adviser for Chainlink Labs, a San Francisco-based research initiative that uses blockchain technology to create “smart contracts” that promote “economic fairness, transparency, and efficiency.”
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