What's better? Being a successful website or being the environment on which thousands of social media websites can be created?
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What's better? Being a successful website or being the environment on which thousands of social media websites can be created?
Thousands of (failing) social media websites vs Facebook. I know which I'd rather be!
The social media landscape shows where the trend is going... Audiences are congregating around a handful mega sites.
Done right I'd bet on a single decentralised blockchain social media platform/ token (e.g. Steem and it's apps) succeeding, over thousands of tokens/ sites with limited or no usage.
The premise of the OP is value flowing back to STEEM, it would make sense to make the core product... well, valuable.
The only way I see these thousands of tokens working out is if there is some revenue sharing or dividends or interest. The same way Steemit originally had interest on top of Steem Dollars is the way to attract people to buy these tokens.
Will people buy these tokens if they are just a gamblers paradise? No. If these tokens also are just a bunch of scams and startups then again it's very high risk and not necessarily going to be a high enough return to be fully worth it.
The early ICOs really have to be huge successes for this to takeoff and they have to be very effective profit generators. If the projects that launch these ICOs are just pie in the sky type stuff like we see on Ethereum then I don't see it being sustainable. At some point there has to be revenue and that revenue has to either be shared with token holders or tokens have to be bought back and burned to reduce supply over time to encourage people to hold it.
In order to have a few successes you need a massive amount of failed experiments. That's what the SMTs are about. Enabling devs to have control over a business rather than being at the mercy of STEEM Inc if it decides to chance the parameter on the STEEM token. (like the reward curve for example).
We reduced the chance of a hardfork massively by doing so.
Of course but you need early successes to build enough momentum to have permission to fail. Perception matters!
we will be able to downvote and call out scams. This is not possible with Ether ICOs
The BLOCKCHAIN is where it is about, but without steem will be imposible :-)
There's bound to be some successes in there too! Maybe one greater than facebook!
actually, you've got the trend backward. It's going from mega site to specialized websites. Facebook had 1/2 as many post this year than the year before while specialized site such as snapchat or 4chan are going parabolic. (my job is as a Facebook advertiser, so I know where it's going)
The forum world, another example of specialized site, is a MASSIVE market ready to be tapped into. Combined they are almost as big as Facebook.
Finally, the chances that steemit.com becoming a top 10 website are extremely slim and putting all your eggs in that basket is risky. Empowering people with expertise and ideas to experiment, increase the chances of success.
I'd argue Snapchat is another mega-platform (rather than a specialised offshoot of something else). Imagine if Snapchat had diluted it's core offering before it had even gained traction (like Steem is proposing)?
Forums have been huge before Facebook. Yet people know Reddit to be the premiere forum.
Steem should focus on gaining a critical mass (as the blockchain, user-reward based social media platform), before outreach. Success with Steem first, then SMTs become more viable...
If Kik wanted to launch via a Steem SMT what advantage would they have on Steem vs on Ethereum?
Great question! First there are the token characteristics which would be immediately superior with 3 second fee-less transfers, but more importantly they would be able to launch the token with minimal engineering investment. People seriously underestimate just how much work it requires to launch an ERC20 before you even get to the mechanics of making sure that the token actually serves a function. Kik doesn't want to be a blockchain company and they shouldn't have to be just to integrate a token that actually works. When SMTs launch they will be far and away the easiest and most efficient way to integrate a token that will just work. The tokens will immediately start flowing to Kik's most valuable users as determined by the stake-weighted upvotes of Kik's users.
Community Liaison, Steemit
STEEM was never about steemit alone. Steemit is a proof of concept of what the STEEM blockchain was capable of. That doesn't mean steemit will stop to develop but it means that now devs won't start their own chain because they have no power to decide on their reward pool parameter and raise fund like Steemit INC was able to.
Critical mass will be achieve by thousands of experiments, maybe steemit.com will be the one to make it but why bank on one alone?
As with most development it is rarely "either/ or" but prioritisation and timing.
It would be good to hear from Steemit Inc on how development and roadmap of Steemit and other apps (e.g. mobile app) will be impacted by SMT.
this development goes hand in hand with the community feature. I would expect the major overhaul of the front-end by SteemFest.
@cryptoctopus 4chan going parabolic? Really? Can you point me at some evidence to back that claim? Not disputing it - like you said this stuff IS your job, just surprised and curious
Yes I agreed with you @nanzo-scoop
@nanzo-scoop I totally agree with you. Before joining steemit I used to surf hours on Facebook. But now I pay about 90% of my free time on steemit. Because as you said its valuable..
@amirl you have been followed
True. Enable others, everyone should take a look at Ethereum. It's a platform that enables everyone to build something on it and raise funds for their projects - and is doing quite well one could say. I'd rather replicate that.
the internet is the environment on which thousands of websites can be created. it was free and decentralized and marketing found a way to centralize it again. seeing all these bots receiving investments in steem dollars by transfers of the authors to bots which are returning them the sum multipled by 1.5 as a reward under their posts is already pointing in wrong direction. but that can be fixed. anyway, a free network is no guarantee to be free of loopholes that can be exploited by clever people in the market.
it wasn't marketing that found a way. It's just the 80/20 rule happening...all creative endeavors distribute themselves according to this power law.