Yours.network | A 'Steemit-like' platform that uses Bitcoin | Built by a reddit guy
Let me just tie this noose, nice and tight around my tiny little Steemian neck...there, how does that look? Better? To the gallows... :-(
I have been holding off on posting this here or not now for a couple of hours. I have finally decided to publish this post, because I think it is important for all of us here at Steemit (in particular @ned) to stare our competition in the face and understand the environment in which Steemit exists, and, I want us to be aware of what is coming, this month.
Better the devil you know, right?
Yours.network is a platform just much like Steemit, except it uses Bitcoin.
For a brief but glorious time, I was the cryptocurrency engineer at reddit. Yes, that was my actual title and it was actually awesome. Although I was publicly hired to work on cryptocurrency, we actually had a secret, higher priority goal: we wanted to decentralize reddit.
You can read their first blog post here.
This. Is. Massive.
It is launching this month, and, as much as I am a fan of Steemit (100% power upperer), I believe that via the simple incorporation of Bitcoin, yours.network will be a major threat to the Steemit market-share of socially based micro-payments. Particularly if it works in the way everyone has been wishing for (in regards to the 'problem' with 1% whales, and so-forth).
source
Now, I don't know too much about the yours.network just yet, but what I do know is that BTC obviously has a significantly larger market cap than that of Steem, which in turn will mean the 'barrier-to-entry' to such a platform will be significantly lower than it is to Steemit.
Steemit devs, the first thought obviously is, is there anyway you can add BTC here? In any way, shape, or form?
Or something?!?
@ned, I am pretty sure that is akin to asking for an extra floor between levels 6 and 7 of a completed 100 storey building construction, but, I think you guys are really going to need to stay on your toes here. Seriously.
With the launch of Synereo, and now yours.network looming, I certainly hope that Steemit can stay relevant.
I also, really hope all of you can understand why I have posted this. This was really a hard post for me to write, but really, it is not exactly information that I would like to keep from you guys, and I hope it doesn't come across the wrong way, because I love #steemit. Really I do.
I personally find this news a little concerning and I am just wondering if there is anyway that Steemit can 'pivot' in anyway to ward off this threat, because, as far as I can tell, this could potentially pose a big threat to the Steemit platform right in its infancy stages of gaining traction.
p.s - Whales - please, don't hate me for posting this. I am actually coming from a good place with this post. My intention is to make the devs here at Steemit aware of the competition that is creeping in, in hope that they can perhaps alter course and/or change priorities in order to win this battle that is about to begin in this space. Steemit will need to address this issue, in some way. I can guarantee you that much. Because, as we all know, traction is king, and so is Bitcoin.
p.p.s - Upon a couple of us researching this further, at the moment, we have concluded that the yours.network, is not as cool as Steemit. We believe the yours.network is much like a ChangeTip platform, meaning, to curate content costs the user money at yours.network. This is a different paradigm to Steemit, and, in my opinion, Steemit still has the upper hand in these regards. However, in the interests of being completely transparent, I do find the idea of a Bitcoin based micro-payment social platform to be compelling none-the-less, and I do certainly hope that they can co-exist side-by-side and bring more eyes and fiat into the crypto space, in general.
Kind regards,
Optimistic
I may have to start to produce two versions of my articles and posting the other on this other platform. Eggs in more than one basket never hurt.
Cheers for this.
I'll have to look more into this.
If you could, that would be great. I am about to sleep, been up all night Steeming. lol.
I read about it. The bitcoin element is smart.
An honest stare into the mirror - brave @darknet
@ned and every single Steemer needs to know this. I think it is very important. I think it is worthwhile sacrificing myself, for a higher cause here. Whales. Please understand where I am coming from. My wallet should tell you the whole story here. <3
If they cut your throat, they will cut mine as well! Solidarity for us BIG posters!
Thanks mate, that actually means a lot. I kind of feel like a traitor posting this. Believe it or not guys, this is for the long term benefit of the community as a whole. Either we find out now, or we find out in a month. #steemit and @ned need to know. Thanks again.
Traitors act alone - your not alone here ;) It's either wake up now...or later! I think Bitcoin integration is inevitable. Allow the 2 eco-systems to co-exist together. I'd still hodl my SP, SBD etc.!
I see some potential problems with Yours, namely the fees involved. I also see the payouts being far less than here after the initial hype phase. Curation rewards will be a battle to earn your tip back as well. And I'm not sure how they will address early-vote bots.
All that said, I will definitely be on Yours and hope that it does succeed. I think it will be different than what we do here and if anything it may bring more people into crypto who would then become aware of Steemit and join us here as well. Most likely, they'll both exist side by side to each other's benefit in the long run.
Apparently, they have been able to reduce the fees via a lightning type network. I am still looking into it myself though. Yes, look in the interests of transparency, I have signed up for a preview account, and, I am sure most Steemians will as well in a month or so when this thing launches and is being advertised everywhere I think it is inevitable). This is why I am posting this here now so the devs are aware of what is coming.
As a 100% 'power upperer', I certainly hope that is the case, although, it is quite obvious, that more market cap = more users = more votes = more money = more win.
Can't Steemit 'just' add BTC too, or something?
I think it would be best for Steemit to find a way to integrate fiat on/off ramps, or for a third party site to emerge that can address this. Maybe we get big enough someday that Coinbase, Circle or someone else considers a direct Steem/USD market.
As far as adding Bitcoin, I assume Steemit could add a Bitcoin wallet hosted through another 3rd party to enable tipping, while also adding a way for people to allot money for Steem and power up whenever they see fit. I bet the latter is more in the plans than the former, as SBD serves the purpose of a tip vehicle, and there's no need to reduce one of its use cases.
We've seen Bitcoin tipping essentially fail with ChangeTip, and that was across pretty much all major platforms. Granted, there were no curation rewards, but it still never really got going. Brave is now introducing it into its browser, in a sort of ProTip fashion. I think Bitcoin tipping is great...for people with Bitcoin. Everyone else gets their tip and cashes in/spends it and moves on. I believe Steemit has a better retention ceiling in the long run with its design.
Also failed with ZapChain...
Yours and Synereo are going to have a big hurdle to overcome in terms of adoption for the same reasons as Steemit. The biggest difference is the currency, in that regard, and unless Yours works some simplifying magic, the difficulty of picking up on how to use BTC right out of the box will be a tall order for most casual users... the exact types a network needs to grow.
Forgot about zapchain... It's just so hard to make people cling to this sort of tipping idea when it costs them money that they don't even really understand how to use. I wish Yours well and will be on there since I love Bitcoin, but I don't plan on filling up my wallet aside from when I first deposit a little. Everything I make will be siphoned off and turned into Steem Power here XD
You're dead on with that. The key differentiator that Steemit has (from my perspective) is very low levels of friction to onboarding new users and for new users to understand how to use the platform at a very simplistic level. If Yours can't make that easy, they'll basically be waiting for new cryptocurrency users that adopted it through Steemit to come to their platform.
Also, if the user bases of /r/bitcoin and /r/btc are any indicator of the type of content and demographics of the users, it will basically be like those two subreddits with bitcoin rewards for content creators. There is very little diversity of thought over there. Part of the downsides to censorship -- when you send dissenting voices packing, new voices don't speak up and will leave. Well played, Theymos.
I hold no ill will to Yours either and am happy to see competition. Though I will admit ... I would be happy to see the BTC maximalist crowd STFU at some point down the road when they hopefully realize that this Highlander "There Can Be Only One" mantra is simply destructive. But that's just me :)
Some really good points here. I think I need to go and meditate on this stuff.
What I am most curious about yours.network, is how are the upvotes weighted etc. Is it a straight linear line, based on how much BTC you hold in your account with them? I see a lot of people here on Steemit complain about the whales, the 1% (not me, I love the whales). Save the whales. lol.
I think depending on how that is handled over at yours.network will determine how much of an impact it has on Steemit, because from the various bits and pieces I keep picking up on, this is their biggest gripe with Steemit (again, not my opinion).
As far as I understand it, you preset your tip amount with a slider of sorts under settings. I'm sure early on there will be whales tipping large amounts of btc to quality creators trying to get them to stick before tapering them off.
The problem with Yours is that their profit model relies solely on fees, else they want to introduce ads or track people's data. Steemit doesn't have to worry about any of these things. Steemit will just cash in its Steem when the company needs liquidity.
Since the value of Steem is essential to their profit model, short and long term, coupled with the fact that they hold the majority of tokens, together means that they have every incentive in the world to increase the value of Steem in the longrun. They do this by building out Steemit to become a hub of sorts, while enabling additional Steem apps to emerge across the Internet that exist in tandem with Steemit.
To me, that is the gamechanger in our future and what really has me so passionate about what's ahead. It's way bigger than blogging.
Yours is interesting no doubt. Depositing BTC not sure if that is good. But, competition is good!
Yo @steemitqa! ;-)
I hear you, but don't we do the same here? In essence? I agree 'competition' is good. But really, isn't this like apples and oranges?
Because Bitcoin?
I mean, this may not even be a competition. It could potentially blow Steemit, out of the water with the BTC market cap alone.
I am only trying to be pragmatic about this situation. Excuse any sharp tones lol. :P
So it's another social site that pays for upvoting? But in BTC? Hmm. That sounds cool.
How does it pay for upvoting if it's not printing/distributing it's own currency?
Or is it more of a social marketplace?
I'm going to look into this site more... But at first glance it doesn't seem like much of a steemit competitor to me...
Apparently, one deposits BTC into their account, and they can author content, upvote and receive authoring/curation rewards, just like Steemit. :/
Yeah, looks like another ChangeTip to me... I really don't think people are going to spend their own bitcoin to curate content in hopes of being one of the few that gets more bitcoin back.
Steemit has a great incentive structure built right in, which I don't see in "Yours".
But I'm all ears if someone can convince me...
That is right.
Yours looks cool and since Bitcoin is my favorite crypto I can not wait for this.
A little competition is good too. Another one that looks promising is Decent.
Yes, I am also following Decent. They currently have a bounty program, follow them on different types of social media and you receive a payout when their ICO comes. Twitter, LinkedIn, FB, etc etc all payout different amounts, apparently. Guess we will see. ;-)
Need to get in on that bounty!!
Nice.
I don't see why you have to apologize. Exploring other ideas is fine and, using that exploration to help your loved platform is also good for both sides.
Synereo is not for beginners. Their spot is creepy and it's focused only on the people that want to be "decentralized" - while this concept is popular here but not the ONLY one.
Yours is the real threat. It could be a big enemy for steemit, but that's GOOD in my point of view. They could both be up and competition is always good. Twitter, Facebook and Reddit are up at the same time and nobody blames you if you use them all.
Just take that concept into using Steemit, Yours and so on but with... profit! (instead of the other socials x) )
I am here