Just the other day I was reading about the Cosmos ecosystem and the fact that it's lacking a face, a central figure, a spokesperson with a crazy amount of followers across social media, a guy that is respected and followed on other networks and in the whole industry as well.
This got me thinking, does a chain need to have The Guy? What are the advantages or disadvantages of having one for a chain and its brand associated with this single dude?
First, let's find out which sort of guys are out there and which chains are doing it without The Guy.
Popular Chains That Have The Guy
The CARDANO blockchain is heavily associated with its founder, Charles Hoskinson, who was also one of the co-founders of Ethereum before starting Cardano back in 2015. Hoskinson is a very outspoken guy in the industry often speaking for Africa and commenting on the future of blockchain technology. Good guy.
TRON has The Guy who often seems to be all over places. Justin Sun is known for his aggressive marketing tactics and controversial (marketing) schemes. Bid $4.6 million to have lunch with Warren Buffett but folded. Ate an expensive banana instead.
ETHEREUM is the most well-known blockchain (after Bitcoin) and has probably the best-known character as the key figure. Unlike many other more flashy guys, Vitalik Buterin is more of a low-key guy who focuses on talking about tech. However, is sometimes seen shilling coins on social media.
Bad Guys
Co-founder of the Terraform Labs, Do Kwon was the face of Luna which crashed in May 2022 causing a loss of $40 billion to investors. Kwon’s aggressive online persona and dismissive attitude toward critics, often calling them “poor” or “clowns,” further fueled backlash after the collapse. Not actually sure where he is now and where he will face criminal charges but not a good guy.
SBF. Not a face of a blockchain but a founder of one of the largest exchanges - FTX. Sam Bankman-Fried was all over crypto media at some point. Everyone was talking about him and everyone was talking about him after the FTX collapse but not in a good way. Among other things, he used customer assets to cover Alameda's losses and now sits in jail.
Chains Without The Visible Guy
BITCOIN. Yeah, I know. In a way, Bitcoin does have the Guy, or should I say, THE Guy - Satoshi Nakamoto. This is obviously the most intriguing story in the crypto space. Nobody really knows who Satoshi was or if there was a bunch of guys behind the most famous cryptocurrency.
Some chains might have a guy but he or she isn't that outspoken so I cannot name them. For example, does Avalanche or Injective have a key figure? Maybe they have one but they've chosen to remain more quiet and let the tech speak for itself.
I think Solana has a guy. Anatoly, something?
Are Chains Without The Guy a True Example of Decentralization?
Hive has no guy. Many Hive maxis probably feel this is a good thing, showing how decentralized Hive is compared to many other ecosystems. However, perhaps this is also one reason Hive has been stalling as a chain since the visibility across the internet is so fragmented. There is no single Hive spokesperson who would stand up for the chain on a stormy day.
When retail, or no-coiners, finally take the step toward the unknown, they want to see faces. Nothing takes the uncertainty away faster than a friendly face, a person who we can trust and identify with. We know that the most decentralized platforms are probably the safest ones in many senses but I was thinking, does someone who's new to crypto see it that way?
Think about it. You've just entered the space and been introduced to a platform that instead of having a single central figure, has many OG users behind obscure nicknames and NFT profile pictures, all wanting to take your hand and guide you in a certain direction.
The very nature of a decentralized platform may come as a shock to many newcomers and present itself as somewhat shady to say at least. I mean, it's not that different from the darkest corners of the web such as TOR networks where everyone's identity is hidden.
We, who have been active on Hive for a while are used to it but for a newcomer, this might be if not scary but a little turn-off maybe.
My Favorite Guy
In conclusion, there are good guys, bad guys, and chains with many non-visible guys. Does it matter though?
It's the same thing in "the real world". There are many companies without a visible guy as well. I mean, do you follow the CEO of Coca-Cola on social media? I don't even know who he or she is.
Then there's of course one of the most famous IRL Guys - Elon Musk. We happily use his X platform and many even idolize him to a crazy extent even though he is clearly a narcissistic sociopath.
The Guy I like is Changpeng Zhao or in short, CZ. The (former) face of Binance has smart, casual notions across social media that appeal to me. I don't know, he just seems like an honest decent guy and I don't even know why he was jailed in the first place.
What do you think? Do networks need to have The Guy or are they better without? Would $TRON really be at the 11th spot on CoinGecko without Justin Sun's aggressive tactics?
Leave a comment and thank you for reading!
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when looking at vitalik's photo:
That's just Vitalik being excited about something! 😂👍
Thanks for reblogging 🙏 !PIZZA
Having a 'guy' for a blockchain gives it vulnerability. I actually don't think it's good to have a figure head for a blockchain because that is a major centralized point of attack.
As someone who used to work in the Cosmos ecosystem for a validator team, the 'guys' of those chains only made things worse and more corrupt over time. You don't necessarily see it on a community level, but if you are in the trenches, you know who they are, and they are mostly greedy pieces of shit to be honest. Again, I actually worked for over a year in that space, so I have some first hand experience with it. Not to mention that community is extremely toxic. I was there for so much drama it's not even funny, and that will really kill your spirits. To the point that I view all proof of stake chains, including Hive to be 'rich get richer' scams in most cases. DPoS is nothing but a popularity circle jerk. It's always the same guys at the top of the validator lists, which brings in a major centralization issue. And yes, that happens on Hive too with the top 20 witnesses. They actually do not want growth on the chain so they can keep raping the rewards pool without most of the top 20 really doing anything other than running a node, aside from people like Blocktrades, GTG, and a couple of others that are developers and actually contribute.
Anyway, that's my 2 satoshis on the subject. Take it as you will.
That's some great inside info, thanks for commenting!
Interesting though, in both Cosmos and Hive cases you refer to these guys creating small greedy circles all possible cos of decentralized environment so wouldn't it actually be better if there was a single leader? And wouldn't that be better for the growth as well since I see both Cosmos and Hive falling behind?
Perhaps in decentralized surroundings there are too many chefs in the kitchen and that creates new issues that many didn't think of.
No it's not better to have a single leader... You were not here for the STEEM/HIVE fork. At least this account wasn't. One person can do more damage than a small group. At least the witnesses still had the desire of some kind of decentralization, but the 'ninja-mine' from the original Steem launch (which is what funded the DHF after the fork) was used to completely take over the chain with sock puppet witnesses. That was because he took over only 1 front end (which was the main one), but still he had the stake, then used his influence with CZ to get Binance to use their CUSTOMER FUNDS to attack the chain and help JS take over. So, no, one dictator over a chain is not better.
If you are going to have one evil or the other, I would at least rather have small groups because at least in Hive's case, some do actually care about decentralization, but they just want as much for themselves as they can get so they can dump on the rest of the market and earn for basically doing nothing.
I have been around for a while.
If a blockchain has a 'leader' it's not decentralized in the slightest. They pretty much have full control over the chain. It's the same with any of the ETH layer 2's as well. EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM have admin keys that can do any kind of malicious move whenever they want. That is a major central point of failure.
Hive and Cosmos are falling behind because people only care about raping rewards pools and getting airdrops, and don't actually care about the purpose of the chain. Most of the top 20 witnesses on Hive really only care about earning the tokens, not trying to drive growth for the chain. Those of us who actually tried to build were pretty much shunned by the larger whales because of this fact. They want all the rewards for themselves. It's mainly the old guard who ran a bunch of voting bid bots and got rich in the Steem days from all of that scam shit. People basically used to pay for votes, and paid more than the voting power was worth, so those that ran these bots made a killing in the beginning. Many are top 20 witnesses now.
That's a real shame. Sad, really. I'd love to see Hive as a thriving ecosystem where games are developed, NFTs are created, and new defi dapps emerge. Take a look at Solana for example, new dapps are created all the time, and quality dapps too! The devs are rushing in there.
The worst thing for idle chains is that competition is getting tougher all the time. Movement, Berachain, and Monad launching soon and since I've been active with their testnets and trying out their dapps, I can say the competition is gonna get very tough!
Still, glad we got Splinterlands and especially Inleo here. 👍
Is what it is. If it doesn't have real world utility, I don't have anything to do with it anymore. Been burned by too much BS since 2016 and really only focused on a few majors that I actually use as money to buy things in the real world.
I am not a gamer, so none of that really appeals to me at all. I have Splinterlands cards and used to try and play, but I have lost a huge amount of money it on because the card market went to complete crap.
InLeo would be best to fork away from Hive to really grow IMO and become it's own chain to get away from the old oligarchs of the old chain that are hindering it's growth.
I am not a fan of Solana or any of the projects there. They all seem like nothing more than cash grabs and vaporware with absolutely NO real infrastructure behind it. The Solana blockchain has crashed more times than I can keep up with. Definitely not something I am putting my funds into. But that's me. You do you boo.
Seems good. But have they (from Inleo, not from users) tried to promote their own products outside the HIVE ecosystem? (because I don't really follow their development, so I'm curious)
Some of us got interested in crypto because it started with airdrops offering free money (who here doesn't want free money). Or maybe there are users we follow on social media showing off the benefits they get from airdrops or memecoins, and some of us follow their lead (FOMO).
In SOLANA's case, it's mostly because of the memecoins. Solana which can now be considered the home of thousands of memecoins (or rather shitcoins) But in Solana there are also still some good projects such as JUPITER, RAYDIUM, MAGIC EDEN, TENSOR, and so on.
airdrops are often raised by some projects as an incentive for users. I think because of this, users are divided into 2 sides (the side that uses a project because they hope there will be an airdrop and the side that uses a project because of its usefulness). And sometimes even with the lure of airdrops, if the distribution is unfair or seems stingy, a project can be abandoned by its users.
Oh I understand what it's drivers are, I have been around this space for a long time at this point and worked in many different ecosystems in the space. I used to work as a validator team in the Cosmos ecosystem during the last cycle and it was a nightmare. Just a bunch of crap chains dropping crap coins with absolutely no utility other than to dump and run on their greedy little followers who cared nothing about crypto and just wanted to make fiat gains. They were all rude and would only stake with you if you gave them shit for free. This caused a crap ton of centralization at the top with teams giving away NFTs and stupid shit like that. It causes issues with chain security when you have all the stake with a few players.
It was a complete nightmare to be honest and not what the original fundamentals of the space are about. Chains like Solana, Cosmos, and other ecosystems are driven by greed for the most part. Those of us who have been here for quite a while have more discipline and conviction over their investments. Some don't, but they are gamblers in my opinion. Crypto is an industry. For me it's a true business where I make my money everyday, so I take it more seriously. I am here for the freedom money and to create an alternative economy outside of the traditional system. You know, doing commerce with true peer to peer cryptocurrencies.
In many cases with Airdrops, it's not free money, nothing in this world is ever really free, you are giving up your time, data, or money in some kind of way. It's all a marketing gimmick because the devs hold the majority of the tokens that they use to tank the prices of the tokens before they run. Seen it too many times. I mean, do whatever you are going to do, but don't forget the reason crypto exists in the first place.
To answer your Inleo marketing question, yes, the market like crazy outside of Hive and have several partnerships they are developing like with DASH, CACAO, and Thorchain. They also have an Arbitrum and Ethereum version of LEO, but that is an attempt at cross chain liquidity. I say they need to fork away from the old Hive guard and create their own version of the chain with full history. Just my opinion. Hive is great tech, but the people running it are not so great, we'll just put it that way.
InLeo would be great on Solana although I'm not sure if it would be technically possible.
When thinking about the last couple of years, I've experienced 1000% more node issues & downtime than on Solana! 😅 And I've been using both daily. See you are perhaps not very active on Sol, it's actually very stable these days and the apps are quality ones and don't look like made in granny's basement 😀.
No wonder devs favor Solana:
In Solana there is already a DSCVR which is similar to Facebook (although it originally came from ICP). Unfortunately the only way to earn is to rely on tips (upvotes don't earn anything, just numbers). However, DSCVR has held several Airdrops (free NFTs, tokens, or points).
No, I am not active on Solana at all. I don't have a reason to be. I don't chase casino vaporware coins and that is pretty much all it's for. There was too much crap going on with it in the beginning that I never cared to look back at it. I only use crypto with true fundamentals and infrastructure behind it. Basically Hive is my only DPoS coin anymore, and I use it to get more Monero, Litecoin, and Bitcoin, which I use to buy the things I need in life.
Actually, I had to use Solana for a USDC transfer not too long ago (like a couple of months ago with Polygon was going through it's transition from MATIC to POL), and the transaction failed multiple times. So needless to say, I wasn't impressed.
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