Last CallLast Call Pool

UX Product Design

What every designer should know about the web3 revolution

Power Talk

🇵🇱 Polish

About

The Web3 revolution is happening, and it is changing the way we design digital solutions. In my speech, I'll outline how decentralized applications are changing our idea of virtual identity, how to implement UX in the world of blockchain applications (DeUX - Decentralized User Experience), and how to use the token economy in digital product design.

‍

Talk by

Photo of Szymon Paluch, CTO of Diagnostyka Digital HUB

CTO of Diagnostyka Digital HUB at Independent

Watch the full talk

Watch this WaysConf session, then continue with related talks or explore the current programme.

Explore the 2026 agenda More WaysConf recordings

From the recording

Talk in brief

An introductory guide to Web3 for designers, separating the broader design questions from cryptocurrency speculation. The talk traces the web from reading, through user-generated content, toward systems where identity, assets, and value can be controlled without one platform. Tokens create incentives and micro-economies, while blockchains provide a decentralized transfer layer. These capabilities also produce difficult experiences: unfamiliar custody, delayed transactions, network fees, and complex recovery. The design opportunity is not to repeat the technology’s language but to make ownership, risk, and system status understandable to ordinary people.

Key takeaways

01
Separate Web3 infrastructure from speculation
Cryptocurrency losses may dominate attention, but designers need to understand the ownership and coordination models beneath them.
Watch from 1:06
02
See ownership as the next web shift
Web3 proposes that people control identity and assets beyond the platform that currently hosts an interaction.
Watch from 5:24
03
Design incentives as product behavior
Tokens form small economies, so their rules influence participation, power, and customer expectations inside the service.
Watch from 7:51
04
Explain decentralized value transfer clearly
Removing a central intermediary changes responsibility for transactions, errors, keys, and recovery rather than removing risk.
Watch from 10:43
05
Expose delays and account complexity
Transaction confirmation and wallet retrieval need visible status because familiar instant-interface assumptions no longer hold.
Watch from 16:58

Video chapters

1:06Cryptocurrency anxiety and the wider Web3 topic
The opening acknowledges financial speculation before moving toward the underlying product and ownership concepts.
3:06Learning the web story out of sequence
The evolution of the web is used to place current decentralized ideas in a longer interaction history.
5:24From participation toward digital ownership
User-generated content leads to questions about who controls identity, access, and the value people create.
7:51Tokens as incentives and micro-economies
Token rules are presented as behavioral and governance mechanisms rather than decorative reward points.
10:43A decentralized layer for transferring value
Blockchain-based transfer is explained through independence from a single controlling intermediary.
13:34Accessibility as the decisive Web3 challenge
The talk argues that the winning experience will make difficult infrastructure understandable to ordinary customers.
16:58Designing for transaction and wallet reality
The conclusion highlights delays, account retrieval, and background operations that interfaces must communicate.

Read edited transcript highlights

These concise notes were edited from automatic captions and checked against the talk structure. They are not a verbatim transcript.

The design question extends beyond token prices

Public discussion often begins with gains and losses from cryptocurrency, but the underlying technologies raise broader product questions. Designers should examine how identity, ownership, coordination, and value move through the system. That understanding is necessary before deciding whether decentralization improves a customer problem or merely adds technical and financial risk.

Watch from 1:06

Ownership changes the platform relationship

The social web allowed people to create and distribute content while platforms retained control over identity, access, and monetization. Web3 experiments with assets and credentials that can persist beyond one service. The promise is portability and agency, but the design must make it clear which rights are real, which remain platform-dependent, and what the customer is responsible for protecting.

Watch from 5:24

Tokens create rules people will optimize around

A token is not simply a visual reward. Its supply, transfer, value, and governance create a micro-economy that shapes behavior. Product teams should anticipate who can accumulate influence, how incentives may be exploited, and whether participation still produces genuine value when the market changes. Economics and interaction design become inseparable.

Watch from 7:51

Removing intermediaries redistributes responsibility

A decentralized transfer system can operate without one organization approving every movement of value. That does not eliminate trust or risk; it moves responsibility into protocols, wallets, keys, and customer decisions. Interfaces must explain finality, fees, counterparties, and recovery before people take actions that may be difficult or impossible to reverse.

Watch from 10:43

Web3 interfaces must reveal background state

Transactions may wait for confirmation, networks may become congested, and retrieving an account can involve unfamiliar security steps. Treating these processes like instant conventional payments creates confusion and dangerous repetition. Show current status, expected time, cost, and safe next actions, and prevent customers from interpreting technical delay as a failed request.

Watch from 16:58

Explore WaysConf 2026

View the agenda

Get tickets