Oh no! Sun is buying Steems to get Hives!!

What a weird title, but less obtuse than many of my others I have chosen over the years.

There seems to be some concern about Justin Sun buying large amounts of Steem in order to get the airdrop of Hive, as if it is a threat to the new Hive blockchain. It really isn't.

Firstly, I don't think there is enough Steem available on the exchanges to centralize the governance completely, plus, there will be the 30 day period where it wouldn't be able to vote on witnesses anyway - which means it could be addressed in numerous ways.

However, if Justin Sun does want to be part of the chain by buying in, I see this as a good thing for both Steem and Hive, as he will be heavily invested into both. On Hive however, he will have had to have bought that Steem at market price, not at the heavily discounted price that he bought it from Ned. This means that he will be highly incentivized to get a return on his purchase, and Steem if he is buying 'Steem at the highs in order to get a honeydrop from Hive, it is likely he will be realizing some percentage losses post-launch.

What this would mean that with whatever stake he managed to buy and keep hidden and out of governance voting so far, and whatever he might be buying now, he has two main paths. 1) where he uses his Hive tokens to try and destroy the value of the Hive blockchain or 2) where he uses it to do what he should have tried to do initially, grow the platform.

With option 1) he does have a big ego and doesn't seem to like the concept of failure, so if he sees it as a reputational win to destroy Hive, that is what he will try. I predict that this would go very, very badly for him as he will have heavy push-back on chain with far less stake support backing him and, he will be thoroughly chewed on social media for the second time trying to do and fail at the same thing, buy and control a community of people - the same people who drew a painful victory last time.

Option 2) would be a much better path to take and if he is buying in and only cares about the profits, which is what he has indicated several times, he and his team would work alongside the Hive community and actually add value. With the stake he could purchase from the exchanges, it is likely that he would have a lot of sway, but as a community member, not as an authority. As it would really be his Steem, he would have the full autonomy that is offered all Steem holders and it is up to him what he does with it.

In general, when there is money involved, people will adjust their behavior to suit and for example, countries that may have recently been at war can very quickly start trading once the fighting has ended.

Hive is not at war with Steem, there is no need for competition there, even though there is a lot of similarity, as there is a massive amount of room in the market for both to reside comfortable and both generate value. The blockchain social economies are currently a tiny, tiny sliver of the marketplace, but this is going to grow. This means that concurrently the Steem and Hive communities can go their separate ways, but that also opens up for some interesting business models, as an application for example will quite easily be able to build end user experiences that can straddle both with minimal configuration changes.

I predict that @theycallmedan from @threespeak will be looking to harness the energy of both chains, which is why he is likely fighting so hard for Steem at this time, while also supporting the Hive fork. This is business and business will generally trump emotional reaction - in time.

The emotional driver is a fantastic hook and is why this community is so strong, but it works in waves and can't be maintained at any level consistently over a protracted period of time, as people do not have that emotional energy - Feelings come and go. However, the economics of a community is where there is the stability to handle the good times and the bad, and that model has to provide stability of experience. This is crypto though, and due to the small number of participants, volatility whips like a flag in a stiff breeze.

But in time, that volatility will subside as more participants come in at various levels to create a base and, at various entry points. This includes multiple blockchains and communities. On Steem and Hive, this will be supported through the creation of SMT and owned communities internally, but also will be delivered through the options of having both chains, where people can pick and choose or take a hybrid option.

This is the maturing of the industry, but we are still very much in the infant stage as a whole. Internally though, perhaps we are in our toddler phase where emotional tantrums are the norm, but this is a phase only. In time and once the benefits of stability and thought are recognized, the business models start acting as a model, meaning more predictability.

While I have heard several people worry about Justin Sun buying Steem and some using the idea it to try and create FUD, if it is him driving the price up 200% in order to get Hive, it is a great sign. There have been plenty of people asking the question,

"Why would anyone invest in Hive?"

And it seems that there are some willing to buy what has been considered by many, underpriced STEEM, to get what will later be considered, underpriced HIVE.

Justin Sun is an investor of some kind and has some wealth behind him, but the problem he really had when he invested into Steem was, he didn't invest into Steem. Instead, he invested into whatever Ned told him Steem was - a purchasable community of active users. If he is still buying STEEM to get HIVE, what this means is that he still sees the value of the community. But this time, rather than investing into Ned, he is investing directly into the community itself.

This is all speculation of course as it is very possible (and I consider likely) that there are many other large investors taking a punt on the chance at backing two winners. If you consider that Hive might do very well long term and that Steem might get pumped and perhaps even be successful, for one price, there is twice the opportunity and unlike many users - a lot of investors are not risk shy and are willing to take those odds.

Whatever Justin sun does or tries to do on Hive though, there are going to be a lot of eyes watching. This can work in his favor as if he operates like a business man, he will increase the value of his stake by empowering the community that adds that value. Has he learned anything since Valentine's Day?

Taraz
[ a Hybrid original ]