RE: Valuing Cryptocurrencies Based on Competitive Advantage
Agree with your points, except for steem.
I think you are overvaluing the advantage of being the first in something.
Orkut was the First. Look what happened to It when Facebook went global.
This is only one among a lot of other business examples.
Being the first doesnt mean anything long term, If you cant keep up with the competition.
Steem have its value, and as long as It is the only media platform on the blockchain, i Will be fine.
But there is too much small governance and structural problems (like the people that its attracting). And since @ned and co. Doesnt seem to care much about what happens around here in terms of quality of content (wich is the main reasons people start to use a media website), i dont see a bright Future ahead.
Maybe (and a big maybe) steem Will have a Future If the SMTs work. Or Else, there Will be a replacement not Very Far in the Future.
So, i would say that steem have only the advantage of being the Pioneer. Nothing Else.
I think you misunderstood what I was saying. Steem's competitive advantage is not that it was the first, being the first is merely the opportunity that allowed it to attain its current competitive advantage which is that it has the vast majority of content publishers (for a blockchain platform) and a highly valued token with which to reward them.
Being the first is not a competitive advantage in and of itself, it's an opportunity, and examples like Orkut simply failed to capitalize on that opportunity.
You're definitely correct about Steem having its share of problems, and it will need to grow and solve them if it wants to maintain the competitive advantage it currently enjoys.
I understood that steem advantage is the user base, which is a consequence of being the first mover on this field.
But an user base can exit a platform as quickly as they got in, when a better alternative become avaiable. In the end that is a Very small advantage.
Most of content publishers are here mainly because of the reason below:
Also, the system is too easy to game.
There is one simple thing that could be done by steemit inc. To actually bring quality:
Partnership with well established content creators.
Bring somemone who have a public and create good stuff in here, and use steem inc. Stack to promote them here (with a bottom page disclaimer, for transparency)
Now you Will have a lot of people that never heard of steemit joining in, because they favorite creator is here.
Also, user interface... Come on, steemit.com is a joke.
Yes, there is better interfaces like busy.org, but for the mass adoption, the base interface must the a lot better than what we have.
I Will be around, until a better alternative arrives. (And i bet a lot of people think like me)
I think that is a very big advantage. It is not easy to get a large user base to switch even if you have a better product.
And as you mentioned most people are here to make money - so any platform that wants to attract those users needs to be able to pay them at least as well as Steem can. Steem currently has a token with a $1 billion market cap - that is going to be hard for any new token/platform to compete with as far as earning potential goes.
I still disagree with you here. All you need is good and reliable product (with a good user interface), and some money to do some well placed marketing. The new generation (z, millenials, whatever is the new name they give), switch things they use on a very quick pace. As an extreme example, let's say a new plaftorm work out some kind of millionaire partnership with pewdiepie for exclusive content, as long as he exit youtube. Boom. Instantaneous million userbase.
The question that should be asked is: Could Steem retain it's userbase? As things are now, my guess is no.
Which was achieved within 2 years, with a pretty broken platform. I could say that a better product, with better content, and a well placed marketing could easily achieve this at the same time or even less.
From what i see how things are going, the big hope in long term for steem is the SMT's. If this turn out badly (which i also hope won't happen), then steem will only survive until the better competitor arrive, which will eventually happen.
All I can say is that if it were really that easy, someone probably would have done it already.
Maybe, but we are still on a brand new world, and there is a lot of projects being built. I bet that the next 5 years a lot of things will change on the cryptoworld....
Hi @yabapmatt
I have a suggestion, can you set the bidbots with fixed rate? This will protect the minnows to take a loss. This would stop overbought too. If not enough buyers, the leftover will be rollover and the bitbots will have less recover time for the next available upvote again. I have seen some1 spent 25sbd but got the vote just $50+, this was a loss one before curation.