I first came to Hive (then Steem) as a blogger, and I thought then, and still think that the basic concept of a proof-of-brain blockchain that ‘prints ’crypto which is then distributed to authors on the basis of stake weighted voting by curators is nothing less than absolute genius.
The concept is in fact extremely simple, which is why it is genius - I’m going to repeat it here, just a very simplified reminder of what Hive does…
There is a blockchain called Hive which prints around 25 000 000 New Hive tokens every year. The Blockchain links together:
- Authors who write posts and comments to the chain and get rewarded in Hive through readers upvoting them.
- Investors who buy Hive in order to stake it and get a return through curation for voting on what they read, currently split 50-50 between authors and voters.
- The ‘witnesses’ who run the nodes that power the network, who get paid for doing so.
- Developers who build Dapps on the chain and get funded through the DAO, people with staked Hive can vote for which proposals get funded.
- The wider public and (crucially) potential advertisers who should create a demand for Hive tokens and keep the price buoyant.
The real genius of Hive is that it pays people for ‘doing social media’, rather than being played by a centralised platform like Facebook, having their data used against them and with no ownership rights over the data they post there.
However, the social media aspect of Hive is only just the beginning....
Hive allows people to:
- Earn (probably) a small income by writing about stuff
- Earn a return for voting on content they like
- Earn a return by delegating Hive to projects they like and letting those projects use that Hive, a totally passive return.
- Power up and pay people to write stuff (in upvotes) without losing any capital.
- Post what they like without being censored.
- Clone the chain and fork it if they don’t like the whole chain.
- Send Hive to anyone else with a Hive account in 3 seconds for free.
- Transfer Hive to exchanges for almost zero fees.
- Store their funds securely (albeit with one’s capital value against the dollar being at risk)
- Play around with Hive-Engine tokens, and the rest of Hive’s second layer.
- Play games developed on Hive and earn more of a return
- Vote for what Dapps they want to see funded for development
- Vote for the witnesses who secure the chain, thus given them control over the future direction of chain and network and platforms built on it.
- Have an immutable ledger of their transactions.
Leo is showcasing what is possible on Hive...
I think Hive is still very much operating at a sub-optimal level - especially in linking advertisers and business interests to a wider audience - It has taken development on LEO which is only just beginning to realise this - with the advertising for burn policy and the forthcoming release of Project Blank which will hopefully bring more eyes and then an increase in investors and advertising revenue and more buy back and burn of LEO tokens, and so on in a virtuous circle of an ever increasing LEO token price!
Maybe the next step is to encourage a few companies to invest in Hive or LEO and use their Vested Power to pay for people to write content in upvotes? Or pay them in their own tokens they mint?
DeFi on Hive/ Leo could be a real winner
I'm not sure what plans are afoot exactly for Defi on Hive-Engine or LEO, but I know there are rumblings in that direction, bleo is coming for staking to the Binance Smart Chain for example, building on wleo - but bringing Defi into Hive - that could give the token price a real boost, and with our low low transaction fees, that is something that could appeal to a lot of people.
DRAMA! And The deeper utility of Hive as governance experiment
I think we can expect a lot more Drama here when the Hive price goes above $1 and we start to see people getting outrageous payouts for shit-posts and the Downvoting starts.
And then the debates start about what an appropriate reward distribution should be between the various actors on Hive, what the reward curve should be, how much Downvote power we should get, what the powerdown period should be, how many tokens we should burn, and so on and so on.
But to my mind, that Drama is a good thing, we have it because we can have a say in how the platform evolves, and if you buy an absolute fuck tonne of Hive (A few million could well be enough to manipulate a couple of witnesses into the T20, with a little help) you can have a meaningful say in shaping Hard Forks that shape the deeper mechanics of the platform.
Final Thoughts...
I think we just need to wait for this current DEFI craze to calm down a little and people will start to look around for blockchains and tokens with ACTUAL use-value and utility (rather than mere financial exchange value) to park some of their earnings in, and HIVE is an obvious choice - especially when it's got ALL THIS UTILITY and will also have some version(s) of DEFI in the not too distant future.
Man, what can I say to round off: this shit is getting real, and it's going to the moon!
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Very nice!
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This is a very good write-up!
The long powerdown is an important security feature not only for chain security but for individual users as well. Suppose you leak your password and criminals get access to your funds or that someone breaks into your house and demands that you transfer your funds at gunpoint. If you're all powered up, your funds simply cannot be taken. Powering up reduces your risks very considerably. Implementing instant powerdown for a fee would be a serious mistake. Powering down should take a month at a minimum. Three months is actually pretty good.
Let's say you had millions of dollars worth of HP in an account tied to your real life identity and powering down instantly were possible. You'd become a walking target. The fact that Hive is a blockchain that has irreversible and uncensorable transactions and pseudonymous accounts and that HIVE can be swapped for other coins and cashed out effectively anonymously makes the situation particularly dangerous. Bank accounts can be frozen if necessary to stop crime. But if everything is powered up and the powerdown time is three months, potential kidnappers or extortionists would be deterred from even trying.
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It does offer a certain level of security, fair point, but I think the consensus is that 13 weeks is too long, I imagine we'll change to a 4 week PD time frame pretty soon, which is still pretty secure IMO!
It's a good strategy to split funds between multiple accounts for sure - to avoid the risks you mention.
Hopefully none of us will ever be kidnapped!
It would be prudent to not split the funds by direct on-chain transfers from one account to another because they're too easy to follow.
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Remember that it was 2 years to start with!
It was indeed. That's an overkill in my opinion. The two-year powerdown forces stakeholders to choose with how much they want to control the inflation and with how much they want to trade with and make full use of the volatility of the token. Hive needs HIVE to have liquidity to be able to grow.
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With all these great features you have to wonder why Hive is not massive. It ought to win over some of the smaller blogging platforms at least. I know some will say that newbies get bullied, but from what I have seen this is mostly because they try to abuse the platform. I do think you have to give them some chance before pummelling them to nothing as some may just have wrong expectations of what is acceptable. We need things like HiveWatchers to highlight abuse, but they have to be as quick to accept when they are in the wrong as they are to flag people.
The rest of us should do what we can to make newcomers welcome. Comments can matter as much as votes to some. I see posts getting $10s in votes when they have zero comments and that looks wrong to me. More manual voting and real engagement go a long way.
There's lots of exciting stuff coming and I don't even understand all of it. What we need is a good experience for all users.
I 100% agree - I think votes need to spread around a bit more widely - I'm not the best at that myself.
There's a lot to be said for voting comments, it's one of the real things i like about leo rather than HIve!
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Spelt it out perfectly, learnt much reading this, I'm still exploring, so thank you kindly for this..
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Cheers! It's a bit of rabbit hole this eco-system.
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Hahaha,....
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Awesome thoughts! I am super excited about the potential that DeFi would have on LEO. That is probably one of the things that I am most excited about for the coming year in fact. I've definitely had a lot of "I told you so" moments lately when I am talking to myself (thinking) about crypto and Hive specifically :)
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Fee-free Defi - it's the dream!
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It sure is!
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Well written! Couldn't agree more!!
I agree with you here. I feel that most of the DeFi projects out there today are bubbles. When the bubble bursts, then people will know the tokens with the real value.
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They are bubbles, I'm just hoping for a few small pin pricks to release the pressure gradually rather than a gaping tear!
I keep dreaming.., it all got knocked back again... I'm sad.
It's Hive - it just wants to torture us.
Wait 'til either
It'll be sometime in 2021 I'm sure.
Just around the corner, HONEST!
What really?!? DeFi is a way better use case than blogging. Are you kidding me, blogging vs a financial revolution that will empower billions of people?
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I meant utility beyond just 'pooling for money' - which in fairness is pretty useful, but I dunno I just somehow see coins that have an underlying project and specific use case has having more staying power...
Of course we could have BOTH on this platform!
I hear ya man,.. and I think we will have both when LeoFi emerges from stealth mode. Blogging platform, microblogging app, liquidity pools, and crosschain compatible,. Bullish!
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Are people scared of posting stuff on HIVE, it makes me wonder if.. to the outsider it's a toxic environment?
I'm not sure what it looks like to an outsider? I do remember hating it when I first got to Steem and seeing Exyle's grinning dinner photos getting rewarded with $30 a pop this time last year.
Leo seems to be working out for people though!?!
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Yes, he rather liked his meat and chops if I recall. @exyle was OK.. he was always optimistic about stuff, we need some of that.
You told me you wanted to see it around 30c and it is staying around there for now. Can you be happy with that? ;)
You know me... never happy .... 😃
Bloody northerners ;)
Anything with the tag defi does 10x :d
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STOPCheck out the last post from @hivebuzz:
Of course, we will have again the
SteemHivesheriffs attacking from one side, and circle jerking from the other. Something like it is still happening now, but people pay don't any attention as the price is still low. Will be again popcorn time for sure.Posted Using LeoFinance Beta
It will be something to look forward to, err, I think?!?
I don't really as it is only damaging the reputation of the blockchain. :)
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It is a bit of an achilles heel!
Hive is still very centralized, that is for sure. Anyone who tells anything else is blind or profits out of it.
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Greetings, with all due respect I'll toss around a different opinion.
HIVE is a PoS blockchain, as that's how consensus is achieved.
Inflation is distributed through a proof of brain mechanic. I think HIVE should drop blogging entirely as its holding the chain back. Let 2nd parties do it instead, we've already seen that a group like Peakd can do blogging better. The core product is not and should not be a 5 year old blogging MVP! It's the fast and scalable chain that's a destination to build Dapps on.
I think HIVE should be a deflationary governance token, not a rewards token at all. Focus on building and maintaining a great blockchain to build on. Let Dapps build 2nd layer products with native tokens.
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Yes fair point, I mean the rewards can be distributed anyway those with Hive Power choose, I wouldn't vote against a radical cut in the deflation.
It's not something I'm necessarily against now we've proved we can build blogging dapps on top with custom tokens - I'd just rather they were properly decentralised first in terms of their distribution!
I enjoyed the post and by the shear number of comments alone I think you hit a nerve and started a discussion!
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I just have to ask 'what's the sake of money for the sake of money'?!?
LOL!
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