Will Web 3.0 Introduce The World To Its First Gazillionaire?

We’ve all heard of millionaires and billionaires. Web 1.0 opened the floodgates and the number of people who became millionaires ballooned almost overnight. (Remember the dot-com bubble?) Similarly, Web 2.0 raised the bar and created a new class of billionaires. But the world is yet to see its first trillionaire in any currency; save, perhaps, for the Zimbabwean dollar. It is predicted that Web 3.0 will introduce the world to its first trillionaires. And it’s just around the corner!

Web 3.0 (or Web3) is a new iteration of the World Wide Web which incorporates concepts such as decentralisation, blockchain techniques, and token-based economics. Web 3.0 means immersing yourself in the digital experience and involves individual control of personal data, cryptocurrency, and decentralised record keeping on the blockchain. Whereas Web 2.0 operates on fiat money, Web 3.0 will rely on cryptocurrencies and a decentralised finance (DeFi) model. There’s no “launch” of Web 3.0, but we have the tools needed to build a decentralised web right now—and some of these means are already being incorporated into web design. However, there doesn’t exist an efficient or inexpensive way to implement these systems or structures across the Internet.

But here is a sneak peek: on 20 October 2021, Mark Zuckerberg announced that starting 1^st December that year, Facebook was officially changing its corporate name to Meta Platforms Inc., and its well-known stock ticker symbol, FB, would change to MVRS. So why does this matter to you? First, you have to understand cryptocurrency and begin investing in it. Meta has invested billions of dollars into creating the Metaverse, a digital universe where cryptocurrency is going to become even more popular and more valuable because it will finally have utility behind it, and more companies are building utility behind the blockchain. Secondly, you must understand NFTs if you’re going to harness this imminent opportunity. Imagine, for a second: you own a digital NFT hanging inside your digital home (in the Metaverse) and increasing in value as the company that developed it is also increasing in value. This is going to create a lot of wealth for those who understand what is happening right now, and those who appreciate where the Internet is going. The people who will internalise and skew Web 3.0 to their advantage will walk away with trillions.

But wait…why are we jumping straight to a trillion? Where does gazillion feature in this list of zeros? It does not, because it doesn’t exist, that’s why. After billion comes trillion. Now, were you to count to a trillion at the rate of one integer per second, you would require 31,710 years! And then what? I’m sure you’ve heard of zillion, prillion, etc., for large numbers, or even the ubiquitous mega-million. It is fairly obvious that most people don’t know the proper terminology. So, where do we go from trillion?

Million = 1 x 10⁶

Billion = 1 x 10⁹

Trillion = 1 x 10¹²

Quadrillion = 1 x 10¹⁵

Quintillion = 1 x 10¹⁸

Sextillion = 1 x 10²¹

Septillion = 1 x 10²⁴

Octillion = 1 x 10²⁷

Nonillion = 1 x 10³⁰

Decillion = 1  x10³³

Undecillion = 1 x 10³⁶

Duodecillion = 1 x 10³⁹

Tredecillion = 1 x 10⁴²

Quattuordecillion = 1 x 10⁴⁵

Quindecillion = 1 x 10⁴⁸

Sexdecillion = 1 x 10⁵¹

Septemdecillion = 1 x 10⁵⁴

Octodecillion = 1 x 10⁵⁷

Novemdecillion = 1 x 10⁶⁰

Vigintillion = 1 x 10⁶³

Unvigintillion (or vigintunillion) = 1 x 10⁶⁶

Duovigintillion (or vigintiduoillion) = 1 x 10⁶⁹

Trevigintillion (or vigintitrillion) = 1 x 10⁷²

Quattuorvigintillion (or vigintiquadrillion) = 1 x 10⁷⁵

Quinvigintillion (or vigintiquintrillion) = 1×10⁷⁸

Sexvigintillion (or vigintisextillion) = 1 x 10⁸¹

Septvigintillion (or vigintiseptillion) = 1 x 10⁸⁴

Octovigintillion (or vigintoctillion) = 1 x 10⁸⁷

Nonvigintillion (or vigintinonillion) = 1 x 10⁹⁰

Trigintillion = 1 x 10⁹³

Untrigintillion = 1 x 10⁹⁶

Duotrigintillion = 1 x 10⁹⁹

Ten-duotrigintillion = googol =  1 x 10¹⁰⁰

Skewer’s Number = 1 x 10¹³⁰

Centillion = 1 x 10³⁰³

Googolplex = 1 x 10^googol

There are no names for the numbers between googol (defined in 1929 by American mathematician Edward Kasner and named by his nine-year-old nephew, Milton Sirotta; if it sounds familiar, it is because Google was named after this number, but they got the spelling wrong—which is probably another story for another day), Skewer’s number, centillion, and googolplex, one of the largest numbers ever named. Googolplex is represented as 1 followed by a googol zeros. Skewer’s number is the largest number ever used in a mathematical proof. The centillion is 100 groups of three zeros beyond 1,000, which follows the American convention of naming numbers. As it turns out, there isn’t a universal standard for naming large numbers. Webster’s Dictionary differentiates between American and British systems of numeration, which explains why a billion is 1,000,000,000 in the U.S., while in Britain it is 1,000,000,000,000. The list above follows the American convention.

And then there’s Graham’s number. This number is big. Actually, Graham’s number is mind-bendingly huge, bigger even than the age of the Universe, whether measured in years (approximately 14 billion years) or seconds (4.343 x 101¹⁷ seconds). It is bigger than Avogadro’s number, a sizeable 6.02214129 x 10²³. This is the number of hydrogen atoms in 1 gram of hydrogen, also called a mole, and is the standard unit for measuring any amount of a substance in chemistry and physics. Graham’s number is bigger still than the number of atoms in the observable Universe, which is thought to be between 10⁷⁸ and 10⁸². It is also bigger than the 48ᵗʰ Mersenne Prime, 2^57,885,161 -1, which is the biggest prime number known, with a gobsmacking 17,425,170 digits.

Graham’s number is also bigger than a googolplex, which Milton initially defined as 1, followed by writing zeros until you get tired, but is now commonly accepted to be 10^googol. A googolplex is significantly larger than the 48ᵗʰ Mersenne Prime. You, or rather a computer, can write out the 48ᵗʰ Mersenne Prime in its entirety, all 17,425,170 digits. But no person, computer, or civilisation can ever write it out in full. This is because there is not enough room in the Universe to write down all googol +1 digits of a googolplex. “You will get some idea of the size of this very large but finite number from the fact that there would not be enough room to write it if you went to the farthest star, touring all the nebulae and putting down zeros every inch of the way,” said Kasner and his colleague James Newman in their 1940s book Mathematics and the Imagination, which introduced the world to these numbers.

Now, Graham’s number is bigger than the googolplex. It’s so big, that the Universe does not contain enough stuff on which to write its digits. It is literally too big to write. But this number is finite and is also a whole number. Despite it being so mind-bogglingly huge, what is known about it is that it is divisible by three and ends in a seven. Any bets Google will ride the wave of Web 3.0 (or beyond) to their first googol dollars? I’ll let you know if I’m around for it.