The Gambler

This essay explores the influence of financialisation and the 2008 credit crisis on the cultures forming around Web3. In a context of renewed mistrust in financial institutions and states, the emergence of Web3 and digital finance opens a way to navigate this problematic state of affairs and invites individuals to conceive of the agency of machines, code and algorithms as a possible deviation from austerity towards some form of liberation. The "Gambler" archetype is used to describe those who engage with digital finance as a strategy to face the generalised climate of austerity and to claim their share of the economy, now that work is no longer a lifetime calling.