I agree deeply with your statement, that Steemit is an anarcho-capitalistic experiment. It's truely is and I am excited to be a part of it. But I have to disagree with your thoughts about the socialist aspects of Steemit. Nobody gets a free lunch on Steemit. Rewards are not given for doing nothing (except the 3 SP for signing up). Curation is a job, posting is a job. And the market decides how much the reward for your work is. Also I have to add one point: With our greedy selfish aim to get Steem by posting and curating (at least in my case), we are creating something bigger: a new crypto-currency. So, it's just like Dan and Ned told in the DollarVigilante interview: we are creating a new economy based on Steem. The best thing: there are no taxes in this economy. :-)
There will be taxes for sure.
yes totally agree ! while i am eating, walking , showering, i am always thinking how to write my next post.
after watching that interview with dan and ned and dollarvigilante, i am much more confident, that this experiment will have a decent chance.
Its funny, but i imagined Dan totally differently, i had only seen Ned in a picture, but to see Dan, the crypto enthusiast, it made me feel much better. Both seem to complement each other well, Dan the brain behind how the whole thing works technically, and Ned seems to cover the business aspects pretty well.
i heard 100s of investment pitches from founders in my life, but If i had them pitch me their story, i think i might have given them my money right away as an investment.
about the social aspects, i think that there is a circle of users, helping out others. i am giving myself 10% of all my SMD earnings out to others, to encourage them to keep pushing and to stay a bit longer. I think its important that people stay at least 30 days, and really try to give their best. if you are a bit lucky, someone will notice you and help you get more followers and voters for your posts.
If there is a social aspect on Steemit, that might be ok too, there is enough money to be made, that a part of the money might be distributed to others. the beauty is, that we only have to vote, and not to invest our money.
so the job miners are doing for bitcoin, the community is giving time instead of mining power. And is rewarded. I think the fact that every user has just to invest time, will be the most important differentiator to other platforms, and this might be the key to success for Steemit.
I would have guessed, someone going by @capitalism would have a skewed perspective of socialism. :) Socialism doesn't mean "rewards for doing nothing". Well, maybe in some extreme form of socialism. But that's not what I mean. All I mean is Steem takes some influence from the best of socialism - and brings it to the largely capitalist model. Giving users a stake and encouraging re-distribution of wealth are socialist influences that work surprisingly well in a capitalist system.
Socialism is not the devil - yes, it is deeply flawed, but there are things one can learn from it to improve capitalism. And that's what I applaud - it's a mature approach.
Enjoyed you post, but I too think you socialist comparison is incorrect. What you are mistaking for socialism is in fact simply the act of bootstrapping an currency and economy. The whales, "fee" curation and the redistribution effect will not last forever. This is simply a plan for the initial stage of the project...... It's pretty hard having a useful circulating currency if a very small group of early investors own it all.
You may be right. The re-distribution effect at this stage is pretty dramatic, but like I mentioned, I don't know how it will play out when inflation rate settles at 100%. All that said, I bet curation rewards and stake-holding rewards aren't going away.
I knew I would get called out on this! But, I will keep saying it over and over again - I don't mean that the system is socialist in any way. I'm just saying the founders looked at some libertarian socialist leaning ideas as a way to improve their capitalist model.
IMO there is maybe a misunderstanding between Americans and Europeans. Here in Europe anarchism is deeply connect with communist-socialist ideas, think of Proudhon and Bakunin, whereas in the US anarchism is deeply connected with capitalism. There's also a different understanding of socialism. Did you know, that the US had never a real socialist party? Nor, real socialism - compared to Europe. I was raised in East Germany and have a good feeling, what this (european) socialism is all about. But of course your understanding of socialism maybe differ. When you define socialism as "giving users a stake and encouraging redistribution of wealth", then every company that gives a annual bonus to the workers and discounts to the buyers of their products would a socialist entity. Ok, that doesn't match exactly. But my understanding of socialism is simply different. Nethertheless, I fully understand your point and agree with it. We are doing here something that is more than raw capitalism. Something like the open source movement, which is in my view neither connected to socialism or capitalism, its a form of communitarism.
Once again, all I'm saying is Steem takes some good ideas from libertarian socialism. That's all. You are taking it too literally. Let's not get into semantics! I do have a feeling that you are mixing communism - an extreme form of socialism previously used in the USSR and East Germany - with the broad umbrella of socialism. Libertarian socialism, for example, is pretty much the exact opposite of communism.
If a company rewarded stake holders to pass on re-distribute some of their stake to lesser stake holders, then yes, that is indeed a socialist idea. That is very different from giving an annual bonus and discounts to buyers. The important thing to note is that this re-distribution actually helps grow capital. So, best of both worlds! The top guy gains, the bottom guy gains too.
This entire system is 100% voluntary, and thus it is not communist, statist, or socialist. An there can never be "taxes" as taxes require theft from individuals(outside of protocal/ hacking flaw). Thus this is also not a nightwachtmen state either. As such a state requires taxes.
Steem is obviously 100% voluntary.
However, Night-watchmen need not necessarily require taxation. Either way, we do pay for bandwidth. There have been people who have been unable to post or interact with Steemit if their Steem Power is too low given their activity.