Align of the times: Aligning Steem with the future

I was having a discussion through replies with @raj808 about various aspects of the platform concerning content creators like himself and realized that a lot of people don't necessarily think through the timing of their presence on Steem. Timing matters a great deal in this life, right time right place, right discovery at the right time, right opportunity when resources are able to take them.

Steem is not an ecosystem that is large or supported enough to support everyone in everything they might be interested in doing, so those who are here writing in niche categories, the support that might be required to continue might not be present. Support requires active SP to vote which often means there has to be interest in the content of some sort. Even though the platform has been around for a while, the early investing stake was tech based which means there was and still is more support for that kind of content. Not many poetry connoisseurs were willing or able to invest large sums into a 7 cent Steem.

What changes this over time is the distribution of stake and hopefully the introduction of niche platforms that are able to attract decent contributors with a compelling enough approach that will also attract stake. This will happen and the RC pools that will come into play combined with SMTs are a step toward making it a reality but, all of this takes time to come together to crate an environment that has enough active support to provide incentive for contributors.

What I see happening though is that while the focus is currently on the technology and currencies, as more and more mainstreaming happens in the new industries, the user base becomes on average less and less tech focused and much more content-centric. They become more consumer of content rather than seeker of coins. What this leads to is a shift in the development to create user experience models that best serve content to consumer, which translates as content creator value.

Part of the end goal of Steem is to be able to put value on the content we provide the blockchain through group consensus and distribute it to those who are seen as adding informational value. This means that consumers will be the drivers of where the stake places its weight even if they themselves don't have staked weight to throw. The RC model is a part of empowering unstaked users to become social proof for content types. This is still going to be affected by trends though as people generally gather where others are gathered.

No matter how good a poet or a writer may be, the chances in the real world for earning significantly from it is much less than someone who provides a service that is in mainstream demand. In the real world, everyone generally holds some form of stake and we use it to empower people and products by what we use.

In Finland for example a ticket to the movies is about 15€ (~17 US) and people are happy to pay that to go and see the latest blockbuster that lasts 1.5 hours and will gross a billion dollars world wide. That same value buys 21 Steem. There is no risk in going to the movie but, there any real gain? What about the potential of the 21 Steem? That same Steem could be used to reward users, reward the self and appreciate in value. The movie ticket buys what? We make these decisions daily across a large number of areas. Although the prices are ridiculous, no one expects to walk into the movies for free.

What would happen if rather than supporting movies in this way, people globally made different buying decisions to support each other on blockchains? How fast would the movie industry be onboard to give people what they want in a form that people are willing to pay for it? This can't happen yet though because the global film industry is worth more than the market cap of all cryptos and once all the associated industries like the ludicrous price of popcorn are factored, it is enormous. The stars are not yet aligned. Time is not yet right.

But this means actors, producers and directors have very little space on Steem since most people do not currently see this as a place where they are going to watch a movie but, this doesn't mean that in the future they won't play an increasing role in the ecosystem as the users start to demand their services. Supply and demand is still a thing isn't it?

There is no point supplying if there is no demand for it unless one is able to make a demand for it. Oil was not much of a commodity until there were machines that could use it in large quantities, sword blacksmiths have been in decline for quite some time. To be a contributor, one has to align product with consumer and this is a difficult process for most creators. It is difficult to build the skills necessary to contribute value and develop the network required to support it consistently.

On Steem, there are curation project to unearth users of quality across various niches but, they are never going to be consistently able to do so as their stake is limited and the more they support, the larger the pool of creators gets as value attracts contributors. They are a stop gap measure that can help randomly but over time will struggle more and more as they have limited resources and the ecosystem is continually developing outside of their eye line.

For this to grow into a healthy ecosystem where people can get supported requires people to support it, not just rely on what comes out of the pool. However, it isn't the kind of place yet where people are willing to buy into or seemingly even power up their earnings consistently to support the growth of the ecosystem. This will hopefully change however as new platforms are created that take the nonsense out of sight so users can just be users without having to concern themselves with the day to day technical issues Steem faces. This is not now though is it?

The benefit of being here now is an increased chance to build a position whether through network or stake for the future but being here now also has drawbacks.This is especially true for contributors in niches as there just isn't the SP support for all at the levels desired and there aren't the number of user eyes on work that would encourage investment. On top of this, there is a great deal of complexity and poor behaviors that take away from the experience of being here. I it s a challenge that not everyone is able to deal with well as for the most part, very few of us have been in the true startup phases of anything.

It is not good enough to class oneself an early adopter if one isn't able to deal with all of the FUD and nonsense that comes along with it as for the most part, it is part and parcel of the process. I remember the descriptionfrom university and although not a great model in my opinion, does simplify the development of an organization.

Forming, storming, norming, performing

At the moment I would say we are well and truly still in the forming stages and it is not just on Steem but Steem within the larger crypto ecosystem. As we and others develop, there is a going to be a bit of a rough ride as the storming phase that is going to identify industry leaders comes about and then the norming phase where 'rules' are set and real mainstreaming begins. At that point, the performing stage is where we will be at as things just seemingly happen.

All of this takes time and trial and error for some parts where what didn't work before might work now and what was working becomes irrelevant. It is not an easy ride but it could be a valuable one, both for the economic profit of making it and the community aspects that would come with empowering creators to create and consumers to reward in a more free market system.

It is not an easy ride though is it. And, it isn't going to get easier for some time but for those who are able to stick it out and develop themselves, their network, their stake , their communities and still put up with and affect all of the negatives of the platform, there is a lot of opportunity. But, be under no illusion, this is not a place where everyone is suited either through content or personality. As it develops though and decentralizes stake, control and content platforms, it will expand out to be always more inclusive of individuals.

I said to @raj808 that I will talk more with him at SteemFest when we meet for the first time but hopefully there is something in here that provides some perspective for the contributors. I hope a lot of them are very stubborn and stick it out but I also know that many will not be able to handle the turmoil that can be Steem. Eventually though, even those that have left today are likely to come back when there are communities and niche platforms that welcome their type of content in and have the ability to support them if the community chooses.

Will the tech align with the times? I don't know but, I am planning on being a small part of nudging it into position.

Taraz
[ a Steem original ]