Will Bitcoin revolutionize the way we're using social networks?

Social media is changing the world.

People that couldn't communicate before can now interact directly and freely, globally. Bitcoin and the Blockchain technology are changing the world. People that couldn't trade with each other before can now do so directly and freely, globally. Combining them both - oh, the possibilities!

Admittedly, this has been apparent for a while now. But sometimes even obvious ideas take a little longer to be built. In the early days of Bitcoin, people would simply post the Bitcoin address, expecting to be tipped by others. An example were this still happens today is GirlsGoneBitcoin (NSFW) on reddit. Tipping evolved and stretched to other platforms. Changetip is being one of the most used platforms for Bitcoin tipping that is not bound to any specific site, but offers Bitcoin tipping on any major social media site. However, tipping never really took off.

And frankly, tipping wouldn't use the full potential of Bitcoin and the Blockchain. So people tried to create new social media sites that are specifically designed around this new technology. Most of them failed over the years. However, this is about to change.

Full steem ahead!

One of the killer applications for mainstream acceptance of a Blockchain based solution might be the social media platform steemit. It's inspired by reddit, where users can upload and vote on content. But steemit has a twist: Being upvoted not only makes your post more visible, but pays out Steem dollars. Every user is both a curator and a contributor. Steem dollars are tradable like any other cryptocurrency, with one Steem dollar trading at roughly 2.20 USD at the time of writing, giving Steem a market cap of 230 million USD. This makes Steem the 3rd largest cryptocurrency after Bitcoin and the hardforked branch of Ethereum (even though Ethereum Classic is fighting hard to get that 3rd position).

Sincerely, yours!

Slightly more ambitious, but not yet functional is the social network yours. It was developed by former reddit employee Ryan X. Charles and will stick to Bitcoin as its core currency. Content creation and curation will be rewarded in Bitcoin microtransactions, but yours will also be used for crowdfunding. Even though this sounds like it's been tried a hundred times already, yours again has a twist: It'll be the first major site to utilize the Lightning network - once its functional. Since yours heavily relies on the Lightning network, it'll take some time to become real competition for steemit. They might enter the game just a little too late.

Whether it's steemit, yours or some entirely new site - Blockchain solutions are already making their impact.