Subscribe to Own and Curate to Create.

Over the last couple weeks, Steem has changed considerably as the Economic Improvement Proposal has been implemented and as expected, the downvotes have played a major role in changing behavior. While there is of course the abuse aspect they are tackling at various levels, the other thing that has changed considerably is the usage and behavior of the bots, with many of them moving to a partial paid, free curation model.

This has meant that the massive amount of draw they have on the pool has shifted its targeting practices and instead of being callable, they call on posts instead as they can benefit from the 50/50 curation return. While many people assumed that they would make more under the EIP because of the curation return, this is not the case as while they will still earn relatively well, their largest and most stable buyers are no longer buying and many of those who were, are now benefiting from the increased manual curation so do not need to buy.

This is something that a lot of people didn't seem to predict or even consider. As the bidbots have moved to manual curation, due to the downvote pool, they can't just curate anything as it will likely get flagged and their earning s further reduced. This means that they still have to aim for content that is somewhat worthy and the community will choose to support. What I have noticed in my feed is that quite a few of the people I have been following for sometime are getting increased Steem attention on their posts.

Since everyone is still looking to maximize returns of some kind or another and the bidbots are looking solely at financial returns, it has been in their best interest to increase their manual efforts, rather than leaving the stake idle.For those that delegate to them, remember that due to the cut that they take, it might be a better return for you to undelegate and manually curate or follow a trail. The other thing to be on the lookout for is whether the bot is maximizing for your return, or its own.

With so much stake still locked up in the bidbots, there is incentive for the manual curation teams to "reward themselves" rather than take the time to look for the posts that help the community grow. Because so many delegators have been passive for so long, they might not have the habit of checking what their delegation is actually being used for.

If the changes of #newsteem continue in this vein, the major increase of value is going to be through the increase of Steem value, not the holdings. While increase Steem holdings is of course great, we are getting to the point that the increase in Steem price is going to be the largest attractor to the platform, but as we saw in the last massive bullrun and followed by the long bear market, price itself is not going to be enough.

The next moves on the platform have to be toward increasing price organically by building a community and ecosystem that see value in participation beyond the value of the Steem itself. The next hardforks are going to be vital in this process as they introduce tools of community ownership, processes to build them and expand the tokenization of the platform.

The fuller and more diverse the ecosystem becomes, the greater the stability of it and when there is growing demand in a maturing economy, value mass builds while scarcity of resources start to come into play. Currently there is a about 110 million liquid Steem floating about but it is possible that after the next hardfork or two, this amount begins to drastically reduce as the value of having it powered up and active outperforms the value of selling it on the market.

This of course would then increase that scarcity factor and push the price higher meaning that a push and pull is created between powering up and selling where each offers a premium. Yes, people could sell for more on an exchange, but those who do will decrease their potential to earn on platform. This also means that even though the immediate sell might be higher than the immediate value on platform, the fact that Steem earnings could be increased without decreasing holdings has to come into consideration.

Many of us understand the general idea of buy and sell of stock markets but when a company is performing well and the outlook is good, the dividends earned without selling is what increases wealth without risk. This requires making sure that there is a stable foundation and one that is expanding and generating more value - two things that Steem is working toward now.

The stable foundation is the group of holders who keep their Steem powered up to create scarcity and hold the floor price and, active so that they are supporting the growth functions of the ecosystem. The growth of the ecosystem is of course through the people who add value to the ecosystem, not those who extract it.

Even though there s going to be plenty of opportunity to earn and extract value on Steem, I believe that we are not at and quite far from that stage for most people. I also think that the contributor earnings are going to come through SMTs, not through Steem itself unless one is a Steem holder. Those who sell their stake will eventually find that they are locked out of the pool as it will be reserved for foundational members, not earners.

This will mean that eventually the only way to get actual Steem will be off the exchanges, and if the earning potential through powering up and getting access to the inflation pool, delegation and rent of Resource Credits and the expanding ecosystem is very high, Steem scarcity can happen very quickly indeed. While 110 million liquid Steem appears to be a great deal, with a market value of about 17 million dollars, it won't necessarily last long.

At what price would it all sell at? Most likely, there will be a great number of sellers who will sell for 30, 50, 90 cents and as more sell, the scarcity builds. If that Steem is powered up due to the increasing value it holds in that state through various dividend models, there might not be that much Steem to sell and as the price increases, the scarcity increases too as even though many might want to sell, it might have a "kill the goose that lays the golden eggs" scenario where holding is worth more, even despite the price.

Of course, there will always be sellers as the price climbs but over time, an equilibrium point will be reached and as the ecosystem expands, the floor price will keep increasing so that those who sell too cheaply will have to pay a premium to get back in. While they might not be willing, the new floor price of Steem might be attractive for tose who are looking into the future, not into the past and while those who sold are waiting for a floor price that will never arrive, the new buyers are creating a demand to drive it to a new all time high.

As an investment opportunity , Steem is quite unique in that not only is it a cutting edge technology in a cutting edge industry, it allows active participation for investors to affect the direction, uptake and therefore the market demand for it. Not only that, its usecase is perfect to align itself with Web 3.0 applications and processes as well as reach and enable a global audience in a host of different ways. All for free, or near free.

But, while Steem is currently so liquid and the pool is available for anyone smart enough to earn from the pool, that tap will eventually close and as it does, it will become more and more a subscription and premium model. What Steemians have to remember is that while we might be used to getting something for nothing, most of the world is used to paying for their entertainment through Spotify and Netflix type applications and, the shift toward paid distribution is increasing online.

This means that the next crop of Steemians might not care much at all about taking 10 dollars of Steem off the exchanges as a subscription fee or, doing that every month without ever thinking much about how much Steem they have, as long as they can get access to the applications and content they want.

It would be an interesting subscription model where while the subscription gets them access to the application, the application provides the service of buying the Steem off exchanges and powering into the user account each month. Rather than a SaaS model of Subscription as a Service, it would be a StO model, Subscribe to Own. As time goes on, the more membership fees collected, the less Steem on exchanges and, the more holders there would be able to reward their favorite contributors.

There are so many potential revenue streams and models on Steem and through SMTs and owned communities, they can all be implemented simultaneously and adjusted on the fly as they learn from their experiences, and the experiences of others in the Steem network. What I think is that over the next couple of years, the amount of liquid Steem will come down dramatically as the ecosystem finds new and innovative ways to reward holders of Steem Power.

The powered up stake has increased by about 140,000 Steem in the last 8 days, and while this is likely due to the increased curation rewards not being liquid, what is going to be of interest is whether the holders who are earning it will power it down to sell, or keep it powered up to increase their curation returns from supporting the growth of the platform.

The alignment of the ecosystem is continually getting better and while contributors might feel they got a raw deal, their time is coming and it will arrive when incentives to hold and buy are higher than those to sell. As said, once components align, creation and curation will take precedence on Steem and expansion will be rapid.

Practice active patience, and we will get there soon enough.

Taraz
[ a Steem original ]