Facebook crypto plans pose no threat to Steemit

In 2002 I was working at a small family-run software company here in Ottawa. It was an all-Linux environment, and gave me my first extended exposure to that operating system. And the more I talked shop with my colleagues, the more I became swept up into the Free Software mindset and all things UNIX and Un*x-like. This pivotal time in my life served as the moment I stopped running Windows or any proprietary software on computers within my personal domain.

At the time, while discussing the infamous Halloween documents, the owner’s son and I jokingly mused about the idea of Microsoft cranking out its own Linux distro as a way to dominate that community and then choke it to death. I felt a distinct shudder at the thought of seeing “MS-Linux” on an installation CD. (Yes, although Microsoft has in recent years begun embracing Linux for Azure, the Microsoft desktop will likely remain a Windows affair for the foreseeable future. And besides, I no longer hate Windows – I simply don’t use it.)

The news that Facebook is working on its own cryptocurrency and exploring its business potential elicited a similar shudder of dread as the prospect of “MS-Linux” once did. Once I actually thought it through, however, my anxiety subsided.

My initial fear, that Facebook sees the Steemit model as a threat and wants to attack it head-on, may in itself be valid – after all, with ongoing concerns over Facebook’s privacy missteps, many users may be looking for a new home for their social media lives. Also, Facebook may still be ubiquitous but it’s becoming “your mom and dad’s social media platform”. Surely its management knows this if it can see through its own corporate hubris, and so it is totally understandable if it feels the urge to squish Steemit like a bug.

But while Facebook may indeed incorporate its own cryptocurrency into its current platform, the worst that can happen is that it ends up giving cryptocurrency that much more credibility on Wall Street and Main Street, which to me would seem to be a very good thing overall for crypto.

As for displacing Steemit (and/or whichever imitators are spawned by its model), I’m not worried, because firstly I'm not convinced that's what Facebook has in mind, and secondly because the true appeal of Steemit for me (and for many others, I assume) is the difference in values between it and a corporate behemoth such as Facebook, and it will be this values differential that will keep Facebook from sending Steemit to the trash bin of history any time soon. FacebookCrypto may end up going big – real big! - but that’s not the same thing as displacement.

Facebook, for one thing, is a top-down oligarchy in which its users (who themselves comprise the product/service being offered) and all of the users’ information are sold to Facebook’s clients and partners. It is the clients and partners who comprise the ‘stakeholders’, and so it is these stakeholders’ interests that Facebook defends in pursuit of its own profits.

Steemit, on the other hand, is more like an anarchistic gift economy in which the users are the stakeholders, and in which the users are directly motivated to participate in a meaningful way in the community. (I believe I am properly characterizing the Steemit model – please feel free to correct me in the comments below, as I’m still a Steemit newbie and as such may not have it right.)

Facebook may indeed try to compete with Steemit, but at best it would only be a deformed version of its current iteration, as it is hard to imagine how Zuckerberg and Co. could win some sort of social media culture war against Steemit while also lugging around the baggage of its true stakeholders. In short, in trying to compete directly with Steemit, Facebook would need to be serving two masters at once, which could only weigh it down.

As it is, it is already too late for Facebook to head Steemit off at the pass, and so now it could only play catch-up to a platform that is already chugging along and making new inroads in the broader online community. Facebook may be ahead in terms of monetary value and market share, but Steemit is gaining in relevance with each passing day.