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I feel the rumbling of uncomfortable conversations. Many people are still adjusting to the 50/50 distribution split of Steem rewards after Hard Fork 21. That news was so challenging many content creators left the community (even before the hard-fork).

What I am hearing now is significantly more exciting (or terrifying, depending on your perspective) for the Steem community?

What if Steem stopped being a reward altogether and just acted as a utility token?

I can hear the screams now.

• Who gives you the right to take away my rewards?
• How am I going to provide for my family?
• Is this another way for the reach to get richer?

PARADIGM SHIFT

This change is hard for many to comprehend because it requires a significant paradigm shift. Most people came to Steem with the hope of making some money thought content creation. With the introduction of tribes, Steemit Inc may serve the broader Steem community better by focusing on the blockchain and letting tribes and communities focus on the user interfaces and rewards

SO WHAT ABOUT MY STEEM POWER?

I think this is a great question, but I think it is even more critical that we ask, “So what about all of my Resource Credits?” When Steem is staked in the form of Steem Power, it increases the influence of the user. Today, we see this influence most notably in the form of upvotes.

If we remove the need to upvote (which we would if Steem is no longer a reward token), what is the benefit of holding Steem? Great question.

Every Member of Every tribe will need to transact on the Steem Blockchain
So instead of my upvotes being the value resource everyone wants, my resource credits become a valuable resource that people need.
Let say that there are two companies – Company A and Company B.
Company A starts a tribe on the Steem blockchain and has enough fiat to cover the resource credits for its members to transact within the community. I am perfectly ok with this because Company A’s purchase of Steem increases the value of my current Steem holdings.

Company B wants to start a tribe as well, but it does not have enough capital to fund all the resource credits needed upfront. So Company B decides to rent resource credits from people who currently hold Steem Power. Hey, Company B, I am willing and ready to rent you some of my unused resource credits.

The Resource Credit Pool is being developed for just this situation. And the beautiful thing is that there will not only be two companies/organizations/entities that want to start new tribes but hopefully hundreds or thousands. What does that mean? There are potentially millions of users who need resources credits. As more users join the Steem blockchain through tribes and communities, the resource credits being held via Steem Power will become even more important. Why? Because resource credits are required to conduct daily transactions.

JUST TO BE CLEAR

Your current Steem Power still has value, and it will continue to be needed if/when these changes take place. But we will have to change our mindsets in regards to the purpose of the Steem token. Don’t forget, friends, that content creators can still be rewarded with a variety of existing and emerging tokens.

If you have created content and accumulated Steem power, then CONGRATULATIONS. Now you are a Steem investor, and you (potentially) have a stream of income where you do not have to exchange time for money. Let’s be honest. That is what our current reward system is.

A special thanks to @exyle for helping open my eyes to what may be. I am both hopeful and excited about the future possibilities of Steem. I imagine someday that people will not even know what Steem is, because there will be no need to know. All end-users will care about is that they belong to an authentic tribe that supports and values its community members.

What do you think? I want to hear from you.

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