Let's Create a Steem Community Roadmap (Discussion)
There is a lot of talk and excitement surrounding the release of the Steemit 2018 roadmap. One thing @jesta reminded me of a few weeks ago when we were on @aggroed's "Steem Panel Discussion" though is that Steem is much more than Steemit.com. There are tons of other platforms/tools/projects that community members are working on, which are adding lots of value to the Steem ecosystem!
Just to give a few examples:
- Utopian.io
- Vessel
- ChainBB
- New Member Support Community / MSP
- Busy.org
- eSteem
- SteemDB
- And of course, many many more on SteemTools.com..
As we begin the new year, I thought it would be a good idea to organize our thoughts as a community on things we would like to do in 2018 to make the platform better.
In the comments below, please share your thoughts for ideas/projects/goals that we as members of the community should focus on for the new year.
I am especially interested to about hear projects that you personally will be involved in, and working to make happen. If you see ideas from other Steemians that you are interested in helping with - network together in the comments and discuss how to turn the ideas into a reality :)
After a successful implementation of SMTs, i would like to see a fiat exchange for steem. Steem is extremely well positionned as a "gateway drug" for crypto, because users who might know nothing about cryptocurrencies suddenly earn steem by posting.
They might easily consider investing, or buying more steem to gain influence, but then they would have to go through the hole process of signing up to coinbase, buying bitcoin, transfering to an exchange, converting to steem, transfering to steemit wallet, and finally power up. They will even have to understand what are cryptos, bitcoin etc... This can be very discouraging.
Oh for fucks sake. They were on such a good run with the jailing the bankers thing years ago.
I've been through this with friends and family and trying to get their heads over how to buy Steem if they wanted to they have to jump the massive hurdle of bitcoin, verification, exchanges, powering up like you said! When one feels overwhelmed they tend to retreat and stick to what they know. Are there any fiat/steem projects in the works at all? I've still managed to get around 4 people to sign up to Steem, which I take the credit for(not the recent rise in price at all :D ) .
I don't think there are any projects working on this at the moment, so we might not see a fiat to Steem exchange anytime soon :(
Aww no! Will hunt to see if I can find any :)
Oh, nice! Let me know if you find any!
Agree 100%
This is needed SO much. Agree!
Yes totally agree. If I could buy steem directly I would have bought a lot more a few days ago.
YES PLEASE!!
This is a good point! It is far to difficult to people who are not familiar with crypto to buy Steem at the moment! I hope we get a service where people could potentially buy Steem directly with their credit card.
Yes, @timcliff. As you know from our recent exchange, this is a MAJOR pain point right now, and one that could SIGNIFICANTLY help people who are in need - whether temporarily or on an ongoing basis. Perhaps it might be IDEAL to start developing this service as an "emergency" type fund, for the MANY Steemians who are in a bind, and then building it out from there. In fact, this "emergency" setup could initially be run in a more peer-to-peer manner, where someone simply sets up a message board type of platform which allows those in need of cashing out of SBD to post the amount, the (general) reason, etc. so that the people who choose to convert can choose who to help. I am just thinking that this would be a more productive "stepping stone" which will likely avoid some of the legal issues which everyone is worried about. That is, it would be more of a CHARITY than any sort of potentially misinterpreted money transmission service.
I would be willing to help with #4 in return for STEEM/SBD. Not sure if the witnesses would want to try to pool funds together to encourage this.
Message me on Steemit chat about #4.
Please keep us posted if a debit /credit card gets made for steemit!
I haven’t tried them myself, but there are three listed here:
https://steemit.com/steem/@timcliff/the-steem-economy-tons-of-ways-to-spend-your-hard-earned-steem-sbd
The main thing I am going to recommend the community focus on for 2018 is to try and add more things that people can buy directly with STEEM/SBD. Do you own a coffee shop? Why not accept STEEM/SBD? Do you sell jewelry? Why not sell it for STEEM/SBD? Do you offer some type of service, like creating avatars? Why not offer it for STEEM/SBD?
Would a business be better off to offer SMTs instead of trading directly in Steem/SBD? At least to get started. They would be able to give out the tokens to repeat customers and then get them back, like punch cards for frequent customers. It seems like the business would have better control of their risks and expenses that way. They would set up a specific amount of SMTs to issue over time, as they wanted to expose themselves more to Steem/SBD.
For myself, I'm trying to figure out a reasonable approach for a foraging community on Steemit. It's not a topic of interest to everyone on Steemit, but it's a good test case for how to build, sustain, and reward niche communities. For many months, I curated the @foraging-trail under the SteemTrail project. Foraging wild plants and mushrooms for food is one area where expertise and being correct really matters - much more than in gardening or homesteading. If your tomato harvest is lower than usual, that's not the same as getting sick or worse from eating the wrong wild mushrooms!
Steemit has some stellar foragers and plenty of people interested in becoming foragers or better foragers. But there are also folks writing without a base of actual experience -- just copying information and photos from other places, misidentifying plants or mushrooms, and providing medical advice and then backtracking by saying don't take my advice - all wasting people's attention and potentially worse.
So a niche community centered around foraging, seems to need the Oracles and Quality Assurance roles that Ned has written about. I like @juliank's model in the photography area for encouraging contributions and engagement with other people. But moving up to different levels in foraging reputation needs vetting that's topic-specific. Folks that go outdoors to look and learn, or that connect with other folks should be able to move up easily in some action-related reputation. But moving up to something like a Master Forager level would take showing demonstrated skill in identifying and using specific plants or mushrooms.
Anyway, some of my Steemit goals for 2018 are to grow the foraging community (outside of the @foraging-trail) and offer a series of foraging courses on the blockchain. That would include using SMTs to reward people as they advance their foraging skills, and build a group of folks that can handle the Oracle and Quality Assurance roles for a growing foraging community active on the Steem blockchain. Of course, I'd like my work to be well rewarded. But I believe that foraging can help us have lives that are richer, more secure, more grounded, and more interesting by getting to know the plants and the land around us – in our yards, our parks, and our wild places.
Anyway, that's my not-fully-developed personal Steemit project for 2018. I'd be happy to talk more about it with folks that understand how Steemit communities and SMTs might work. And with folks interested in foraging!
Wow, this is the best response I’ve seen so far. Your project sounds very exciting!
Specifically for selling goods and services, I think accepting STEEM, SBD, and SMTs (all 3) is really the way to go. If you can integrate your SMT into some type of customer rewards/loyalty program, that would be a sweet use case.
Regarding communities and SMTs, I think this will be a game changer for the platform. Instead of everyone focusing on the one main rewards pool and community, each community will have an opportunity to decide the rewards of their own communities using SMTs, and the communities that create value and attract outside attention/investors are going to be rewarded with higher valued SMTs. I’m really excited to see how it will all play out :)
That is so cool @haphazard-hstead , I am just realizing the foraging community on Steemit, and it is very cool & interesting! Awesome ideas!
Hi @timcliff, promoting SteemCommerce is something I strongly believe will help promote steem.
How cool will it be if we start seeing 'steem accepted here' signs alongside (or instead of) 'bitcoin accepted' here.
To this end I posted a couple of days the second edition of the list of Businesses accepting payment in steem :
And, partly for a bit of fun, I also posted 'Around the World in 80 Steem-Fed Days' - could you get around the world just on food purchased with steem :
Starting this spring (late March/early April) I'll be accepting Steem, SBD and Bitcoin at my farm produce stand.
While its not much, it's a good start.
Has anyone heard of or considered programming a point-of-sales smartphone app for Steem?
Shouldn't be that difficult, but I haven't done much programming in the past 10 years or so...
Just an idea off the top of my head.
As a member of this community, I've quickly observed how every little bit grows organically; and, support your efforts whole-heartedly.
I'd love to be at the Farmer's Market and see a "WE ACCEPT STEEM" sign. That would be like BTC for the honor to be associated with such a promising crypto.
Btw, the POS app sounds like a smart plan. Surely, some developer has an idea in the works.
Best regards!
Peace.
I'm looking forward to adding your stall to my list of businesses that accept payment in steem.
A point-of-sale smartphone app for steem would be so useful.
@progressivechef has taken this idea to heart, opened his own restaurant in Mauritius
https://steemit.com/steemit/@progressivechef/introducing-the-first-restaurant-to-accept-steem-and-sbd-as-payment-pmc-grill-and-resto-a-place-where-i-want-to-promote-steem
And it looks amazing! He even accidentally found a steem logo embossed in the steel on his toaster :)
Check these photos out, and get to know ProgressiveChef (of steemit Iron Chef competition founder fame) and his family here. Great guy! Great ideas about taking steem in retail establishments!
Yes, a research trip to Mauritius to check out @ProgressiveChef's new establishment would definitely be worthwhile.
It is a vital feeding post on my Around the World in 80 Steem-Fed Days itinerary.
Has @YouAreHope got any projects coming up down Mauritius way that need a visit...?
As a matter of fact, one just occurred to me, our own welfare demands we eat @progressivechef's healthy cooking :)
😊
I wholeheartedly agree. There needs to be a much wider acceptance of STEEM/SBD for everyday goods and services. I'd encourage those of us who have some kind of business to consider receiving STEEM/SBD, and those of us who know business owners to do the same. Which includes bringing those folks into the fold if needs be.
That said, if I had a business now, my main concern as a business owner, before committing too much to STEEM/SBD would be the current volatility. As long as it grows so quickly, there's always the chance of a hard correction. While a business could adjust their prices accordingly, so that they derive the same value with each transaction, most of us, even here, are used to getting our morning cup of coffee for the same price every day.
I think that we can take an example for imitation weChat "http://blog.wechat.com/". In China it is very popular. With him you can do almost everything.
I think this is critical for any cryptocurrency to gain wider use. We need to be able to purchase real world things with it.
To that end, I started working on a project called Steemtaskr, which is the steem version of Airtasker.com - a site where you post task you want done (either in the physical world or online) and what you are willing to pay for them. People then tender what they are willing to accept to do the job.
To be honest, though, there's so little support on here for anything that isn't done by a whale or witness, so I'm not even sure I'll bother finishing it off. I'm disillusioned with steemdev.
Dang, I was really vibing with your optimism til I got to this line! We, minnows and planktons, HAVE to stop looking any further than our own vision(s) to see them thru. How do you know your design won't make you the next new WHALE!
Stop with the 'disillusionment'. Promote your idea. If it's good, people will buy. That's what I believe. I'm most times clueless of who's who on the platform, beyond the work they put forth.
If you have to sell your idea post by post, do so. But, don't let a GIFT be squandered with the pity-party effect...so uncool. Be encouraged!!!
Peace.
I'm probably only a couple of weeks away from having a working 'product', so I guess I will eventually get around to finishing it.
My pessimism stems from my notification apps, that got very little support, despite people screaming out for an Android version of a whale's IOS app. I pointed out a number of times to some of these people directly that you can have an Android notification app right now, and all I got in response were crickets. It's seems some people are more interested in fawning over whales and witnesses than actually exploring the platform here.
Yaah true but also we need to fight hard and make steem dollars more prominent so that we receive our cash direct not converting to bitcoins
As a professional teacher (quitting next year) I see one of the largest areas for development for the steem blockchain as education provision..with a global market estimated at $7 trillion.
Some kind of Moodle type system (like WizIQ) that allows instructors to upload resources and structured plans of learning would be great.
Another area to focus on could be a blockchain version of Udemy.
Easier to develop would be creating an interface more like wordpress - I'm not going to spam my blog there - but I get 400K + views a month - mainly because of the navigable pages which provide a structure -but is it possible to have such a thing on a blockchain like this (pages that can be updated 5,10 years from now) or does everything have to be 'locked into' the chain as proof of work?
As an educator I can't function with having to produce everything from scratch all the time - I need some sort of platform (like WP/ udemy/ WizIQ) that allows me to refine/ modify/ evolve the internal structure of my (or it could be 'our') courses over time.
I really need to give that SMT paper a read!
If that could be SMT based it'd be great, and a $7 trillion market - huge potential - but for me this platform's not ready for me to disasssemble my WP architecture (three years work) and bring it here, so I'm using it for more personal interest projects.
Talking about education (in terms of learning more about steemit), I'm looking forward to watching yr interview.
Cheers! Nice discussion thread. Apologies for typos, written on my phone.
Karl.
Currently you cannot edit posts past 7 days, but that will be changed in the near future. (hopefully within a few months)
Thanks, good news... I was going to add in (before the last reply got overly long) that given that there are steemit profile pages (I must knock one up, got some HOT* new selfies that are begging to be used!) then I assume it must be possible to have a home page which you can then link to your posts.
It's so crucial - to allow people easy access to your best resources in a structured way.
Another idea (which just occurred to me) is the links bar up top... with trending, new, hot, and so forth - maybe something like that as an add on, which users can populate with their own links (could just be tags) to their posts - I know a lot of users write on multiple themes - it'd all help with the navigation/ communication.
I'm sort of wishing I was a software developer, so much potential, but an area I know nothing about!
*at least if you're into beards.
Hehe
As far as the navigation, when they release communities, they layout of the homepage and they ways people browse and consume content is going to drastically change :)
As a minnow it can be really hard to know what is and isn't considered good form on steemit. Can I upvote my own posts? Can I use bots to do the same? Will this lose me followers or respect or will it simply allow people to read what I think is good content. Answers to questions about steemit etiquit are what I'm looking for!
Thanks!
-tfc
There is an etiquette guide in the welcome page. That has a good set of guidelines. Self upvoting and bid bots are allowed. There are various opinions on whether they are ‘good’. I don’t use them personally, but my view is that as long as you are not awarding yourself more than what your contributions are worth (using similar contributions that others have done as a reference point) then I don’t see an issue.
Thanks for the help, I guess with so much content out there it can be hard to know where to look. I appreciate the help :)
This is as much positive it could be in this post.
I will get involved in cryptocurrency meet up in my area and tell them about steem.
The more steemian. the better the steem.
Keep on steemit.
Ho good job...@pouchon
I have some JavaScript / nodeJS background and I would love to help with some of the listed project.
If you are involved with one of them, please contact me.
You can go to steem.chat and contact the dev's for yourself. Most of the dudes if not all are very polite and welcomed to anyone willing to help.
As a new member, I would like to see more information on how to get started. I still don't know the difference between Steem, Steemit, Steemd, Steemchat, and I don't know all the others.
Is there a new member development committee or something?
I don't know if it's being addressed, but I'm concerned about the fights on Steem. I've been around a week and have noticed that people will Destroy! other people if they decide they're "bad". Downvoting, group voting, botting, spamming votes to kill a persons rep and visibility. I don't have a web series or anything that people could rip apart, I'm just hanging out, but it will hamper growth if people are more concerned about tearing down others than building their own brand/following. Who is going to want to join Steem if there are a few people with lots of SP who are downvoting everything they don't like?
tl;dr It's a scary world out there, Steemers!
It is confusing around here - I'm using the platform to write a few personal things as well as doing my own sociological investigation into it - just trying to answer a few of the most basic questions about how the platform works is actually taking me longer than I thought - part of the problem is that it's constantly evolving! Try connect with a few people and inter-comment on the posts you're interested in. It makes it much more sustainable, and blinker yourself to those monster payouts, they're not representative.
Steemd/@youruser name is really one of the best tools on here - that's what I use to check whose voted for me, whose commented.
Karl.
As a community I believe there should be a 'marketplace' something like an area or platform where Steemians can showcase their art, creations and inventions and sell products. There are so many of us who are naturally skilled at designing things, writing books, drawing etc., (I see it as I travel through the categories listed on Steemit) that the System does not recognise unless you're a celebrity or have money. As a Steemit Community we should be galvanizing our power to make a difference in people's lives which means empowering fellow Steemians to become financially free, much like what cryptocurrency is doing for a lot of us.
It would be great to get that support from the Steemit Platform as well as helping to promote ideas and projects fellow Steemians are working on. Peace.
...I forgot to add, we could also use our cryptocurrencies to buy the products which will increase steem power on the platform! It would be interesting to hear your thoughts on this idea. Peace.
I think that new users should have some guide directions when they create their accounts. Maybe that would be more interesting for new users and they don't give up right away in the start. Like many users did. We have many registered users which are not active. I think that Steemit has much potential to grow in the future. I wish you happy New Year. :D
I help to maintain the "welcome page" - the first page that Steemians see after signing up. If you have any suggestions on how to improve this, let me know :)
Yes, that is good for beginners. I think Steemit has a lot interesting themes for everyone. Just someone needs present to the beginners in the right way.
I really like and support your work :)