Yep, I think the biggest concern for me is the barrier of entry for new users. The retention side is obviously important but I think that comes from people being able to easily bring their current friends into the platform.
Right now, I believe the retention is low due to the fact that most people don't have the ability to join or interact with their current social circles. There is no easy way for someone to experience the platform and then invite all their friends to come join them immediately. Each and every one of us has had to put time into the platform getting to know others on it by following and reading content.
Add to that the fact that it's blockchain based and users have to immediately have this weird long password that they can't forget and no way to recover, along with three different currencies and there's just a lot of hand holding and explaining that has to happen. It's not an insurmountable barrier of entry but it's not an easy one for sure. The more users we get that stay here and figure it out the more users we have that will understand it and be able to bring their friends in. For me, I haven't been preaching this place yet because I want to see a dead simple sign up process that happens as quick as signing up at any other site.
Once that's the case, I'll be evangelizing and getting all my friends involved. It's just a perfect way to introduce them to crypto, get them participating in the space and having some fun while doing it.
Retention will come when you have community and social circles that you get to engage and interact with on the platform daily. Which brings us back to ease of entry and ui/ux.
In my opinion HF20 is huge. If it can deliver on simplifying entry to the platform that's going to open a lot doors. We'll see how it all goes but there's a lot riding on the next few months as far as what the Steemit team needs to do and how well they execute.
Wow, I agree completely, and let's hope that this upcoming hardfork does in fact fix many of the issues we are all currently experiencing.