Initial Coin Offerings with SMTs
The most unique, and potentially disruptive, feature of SMTs is the ability for anyone to launch a powerful cryptocurrency with industry leading features, without having to write a single line of code.
ICOs
Potentially as disruptive, however, is the unique value proposition that SMTs will offer with respect to ICOs (Initial Coin Offerings). With any other token launching protocol, it is the developers of the cryptocurrency who are ultimately responsible for airdropping the cryptocurrency to the people who contribute to the ICO.
Minimizing Risk
This creates two risks to the stakeholder. The first is the risk that the smart contracts will have a bug. At Steemit, we believe the idiom "All code is buggy," and this belief continually shapes our development practices and priorities. Therefore, the risk that the smart contracts will have a bug is significant. The second risk is that the airdrop will not be faithfully executed. In other words, there is generally an element of trust.
Decentralized Airdrops
With SMTs you get the reliability and security of Steem, and decentralized execution of the ICO parameters. Once the creator of an SMT finalizes the traits of their token, including how the ICO will proceed, they give up all control over the token launch and distribution process, and hand over control to the Steem blockchain which faithfully executes the airdrop.
In short, SMTs are not distributed by an organization that you need to trust, they are distributed by a decentralized blockchain protocol that has been in operation for over 3 years: Steem.
Highly Customizable
Just because you don’t need to write code in order to launch an SMT doesn’t mean they aren’t a highly technical product. As you will see, there are a lot of “knobs” that an SMT creator can turn, which results in nearly infinite customizability. In this post we’ll talk about just a few of these knobs and the potential value they offer to those considering launching a cryptocurrency.
Minimum STEEM Contribution
You can think of the ICO process as having 3 stages, each of which should be designed to incentivize contributors to reach the next stage. The first stage is delineated by the “Minimum STEEM Contribution.” If this parameter is set to 100,000 STEEM but only 99,000 STEEM is contributed, then the ICO will not be executed and all of those funds will be automatically returned to the contributors. This protects contributors in the event an ICO fails to reach its goals.
Contribution Soft Cap
The next major stage is delineated by the “Contribution Soft Cap.” You can think of this as a “safety cap.” It might be a goal you believe you are likely to achieve, but not the highest contribution goal you’re hoping to get. In order to maximize the odds that the SMT creator can reach this goal, they are able to set “Pre Soft Cap” and “Post Soft Cap” token distribution parameters. They are able to specify how many tokens they want to distribute to a contributor based on how much STEEM they have contributed before the soft cap is reached, and a different distribution for after the soft cap is reached.
For example, an SMT creator could choose to distribute 5 of their SMT for every 1 STEEM that is contributed by a given account prior to the Soft Cap being reached. The SMT creator could also choose to set the “Post Soft Cap” token distribution parameters such that 2.5 of their SMT is distributed to an account for every 1 STEEM it contributed to the ICO. In other words, the account that contributed prior to the Soft Cap got a 100% bonus.
Contribution Hard Cap
But an SMT creator might still want to create some scarcity around their token so that those who contribute after the Soft Cap still feel like they got a “deal.” That’s where the Hard Cap comes in. It acts as a ceiling on the total amount of an SMT that accounts can receive in return for contributions. Once the Hard Cap is reached it will become impossible for more contributions to made. Even if the creator of the SMT wanted to increase the Hard Cap they couldn’t because all of the parameters are “locked” in consensus.
If the Hard Cap has been reached, anyone who wants the SMT must wait to purchase it from an existing token holder, or earn it through Proof-of-Brain, assuming the SMT creator decided to leverage those features.
No Code?
Just because anyone will be able to launch an SMT without writing a line of code, that doesn’t mean they are underpowered or simple. SMTs are an enterprise-level product, and there are a lot of features that one must understand in order to take full advantage of the capabilities.
More to Come
The ICO features are just one example of the types of options developers and entrepreneurs will have at their disposal, and how a trustless implementation differentiates SMTs from other token launching protocols.
We will continue to release more information about the various features included in the SMT protocol, so be sure to follow @steemitblog or subscribe to our e-mail newsletter. We will also be talking about SMTs, and much more, next week at SteemFest! So be sure to tune in to the livestreams.
The Steemit Team
I would like a promotional campaign on this ASAP!
Posted using Partiko iOS
There's an idea ;)
They are users here on STEEM and have an account. You just did an interview with them which was really good.
Yeah maybe coindesk or cointelegraph
NC
Amen ! Share the good word !
An important job for the Steem community.
Rather then paying just 10 SBD, could you consider making the fee for creating a new SMT "RC credit purchasable as well"; something high like need 5K Steem min would do it, this will reward us old school Steemer's plus encourage more power ups..Just a thought lol!.. without knowing much how they work yet. Cheers
OK. This is cool. I am finally beginning to understand what SMTs can offer beyond what Steem-Engine already does.
A simple to use, decentralised ICO platform is huge.
Please include an option to exclude US investors as the SEC is a pain in the arse that the rest of the world shouldn't have to deal with.
Maybe Steemit should be talking to the SEC to get their blessing and advice right now.
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Can't wait to see it released!
What I like about this is the "no code" bit. However that does raise some security concerns, if all the SMTs have similar or the same route code, doesn't that leave the door open for mass attacks?
I know something similar happened with the standard ERC20 token, with many people copying the route code and then having their tokens hacked.
Hopefully it's all as simple as you've laid it out here, and quite frankly I can't wait to check it out.
This has been 3 years in the making; better late than never! :-)
Cg
Curious about this as well..
Lovely improvement! I’m glad that we’re here finally, indeed this is a dream come true. All thanks to Steemit Team and to Steemians for their support and patience.
But please permit my novice question here.
What will be the fate of Steem-engine Tokens when SMTs is finally launched, or are they totally different entities?
We think there will be plenty of utility for Steem-Engine tokens. Because they are centralized and use Soft/Emergent consensus, they can be modified more easily and updated more quickly because updates do not require a hardfork. This will likely enable that team to experiment with a lot more features. The features that have the highest demand would be perfect candidates for integration into SMTs. In this way Steem-Engine tokens could become a testbed for SMTs. There will always be opportunities to improve SMTs, but what we don't want to do is add features that have not already been validated by the market. Therefore, Steem-Engine could prove crucial in 1. offering valuable features to the market before they are available in SMTs, and 2. demonstrating the value of those features before precious engineering time is spent adding those features to SMTs. Hardforks are very difficult to execute and so any feature that does not HAVE to be in SMTs, shouldn't be. That should create ample opportunity for Steem-Engine tokens.
Can you please explain how steem-engine tokens differ from SMTs?
SMT's are built right into the steem blockchain and are decentralized. Steem-engine tokens are more like a centralized side chain, someone with better knowledge could probably explain it better.
Solid response!!
That’s a great idea using SteemEngine tokens to test things as they are very adaptable. From what I have read SMT’s are not once launched .
Also do you see SteemEngine communities using SMT’s or SteemEngine tokens?
SMT’s with the ICO feature sound a bit to much for communities to launch as communities more often then not will be looking for a cheap or free community to join rather then funding or paying for one.
Just enough time for me to power down and use the Steem to finally create my projects with the community. Thanks!
It is a great idea. The coming of SMT will launch the business side of the steem tokens.
Posted using Partiko Android
BUIDLING is much more important than HODLING
nice,
But there must be a creation fee for ico to prevent spam.
There is a creation fee in SBD.
perfect and in SBD is also smart :)
Nice :)
What is that fee? And I assume that fee is burned?
The fee is burned. I think it’s 10 SBD, but that number is easy to change any time prior to the HardFork. That number is mostly a placeholder.
The white paper says 1 SBD.
"SMT creation fee
Issuing a smt_create_operation requires payment of smt_creation_fee. The amount required is set by the smt_creation_fee field of dynamic_global_properties_object. This field may contain a value in STEEM or SBD. If specified in SBD, an equivalent amount of STEEM will be accepted, at the current price feed.
Initially, smt_creation_fee will be set to 1 SBD, and no means will be provided to update it. Updates to the smt_creation_fee amount may occur in future hard- forks, however, so user-agents should read the smt_creation_fee value from the dynamic_global_properties_object. User-agents should not assume the fee will always be 1 SBD and they should be prepared to charge a separate fee paid to the user-agent if the aim of the interface is to enable only a curated set of tokens.
The fee is destroyed by sending it to STEEM_NULL_ACCOUNT."
Please make it $100 or 1000 steem. We really need this to get steem back in the top 50 so people take us seriously again.
Awesome! Glad to hear on all fronts, especially that the 10 SBD is a placeholder. I don’t know what the amount should be but I would love to hear open arguments for higher. Thanks for your response.
That's great idea, and cost is not prohibited to aspiring entrepreneurs.
Getting closer to reality.
Share some of that good drugs yall using cooking up this blog, pretty good... So Steem is the new Ethereum killer???
All the best...
Not at all. Ethereum is a general purpose protocol; a decentralized computer. Steem is more like a GPU or ASIC miner; it's designed to power web applications with powerful tokens than can be created without having to write a line of code. We're not saying that's better or worse than what Ethereum is doing, but it is very different. Ethereum lets developers experiment with smart contracts, which is great. We look at what smart contracts and features produce the most value on general purpose protocols like Ethereum, and then add those features to Steem. This enables Steem to be fast, efficient, and easy to use for developers and users alike.
Good use of analogy....
In other words, Steem is the place for the average Joe who is interested in Blockchain but not familiar with coding and the technical details needed to get started.
Probably market it like this, "The place where the average Joe who is interested in Blockchain base application can tokenize his business or project".
While we at it, we need to deal with liquidity and see some recovery with the token and merit of the system would pay off. But if that isn't address, that's gonna turn off people. Remember you are competing with 12 top100 project offering the same product, try to hit all areas and get ahead of the crowd
Nothing can kill Ethereum.
Nothing can compete with the Ethereum Defi niche and no one is trying to.
You can bet your ass Ethereum can't be killed. Serenity's DeFi movement is gonna be all up in the bankers' "business"