The Blockchain is Hungry: Looking Beyond Software and the Sharing Economy?
Software Is So 2011
In 2011, Marc Andreessen made a claim that still resonates loudly today. He claimed, most notable in a popular Wall Street Journal article, that “software is eating the world.” Since then, software has fulfilled this predictable 2011 prophecy by systematically consuming everything in its path. First slowly, and now very quickly, software is seeping seamlessly into every crack and crevasse of our lives — leading to what we now call the sharing economy.
Some of the biggest companies own almost nothing and employ almost nobody.
How do these companies survive (and thrive) with little/no employee base or physical ownership of any kind? Very simply, with well-written software; crafty code linked to computers making almost any aspect our lives easier and more efficient (ok, this is an oversimplification, but there’s accuracy in the essence).
So what’s next? Do we march forward as software giants continue to infiltrate our lives like capitalistic, well-intentioned cancers spreading amongst cultural cells of the past? Inevitably, the answer is yes. There’s no reason to think that the next Airbnb or Uber are not already well underway. But there’s also a new player in the game; one which has the potential to systematically eat software, in the same way that software is eating the world. What that means for our future is anyone’s guess.
The Blockchain
Here’s where things get interesting. Just as software continues to eat the world, blockchain and decentralization could eat software in similar respects. With the rise of things like Bitcoin, and more importantly for this discussion, Ethereum, we could very well be on the edge of a compounding effect that would make Uber seem like Pong on a mainframe. While blockchain-based technologies are still reliant on software, they allow for a new level of durability, interconnectivity, and most importantly, processing power.
There’s an assumption that this technology is only infiltrating the economic domain (mostly due to the hype of Bitcoin), but the simplicity of Merkel trees and blockchain have quickly blossomed into an entire ecosystem of software-hungry technologies with appetites that will grow exponentially and well beyond finance. Take this less than exhaustive list of software-slayers that have already gained serious traction:
- Hyperledger (eats business infrastructure)
- Trutheum (eats media & journalism)
- Brave (eats browser advertising)
Startups Be Warned
Whether or not you buy into the idea that software is eating the world (by the way, it definitely is), there’s very little downside in trying to better understand our inevitable future (one which is always much different than predicted). Especially among software-based startups, there’s no reason to be unaware of what this movement might mean to your efforts. Too often, we dig our heels into what works comfortably(software) instead of hedging our bets on the hungry and unfamiliar — that’s the blockchain!
For anyone attending Denver Startup Week, I recommend the following session to get a glimpse at what’s to come. That said, I would advocate for and anticipate a devoted Blockchain track for DSW 2018.
Much ❤
@Tayken
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5 hours and only 5 views? Nobody is interested in technology???? Hard to believe! Maybe you should have posted some cute kitten picture instead? Everyone loves kitties. Probably would have made 5 bucks!
You see where my posting reluctance comes from. Discouraging to put such significant effort into something that hits blind eyes... Might be right...time to turn to kittens and rainbows 🌈
Yup, That's why for now, I'm holding back on posting my own articles that I want to post but feel it would be a waste to do so. In the meantime I am continuing to post up my game and contest and up-vote all who participate. I also encourage each participant to also up-vote each other's comments as a way to build up our own little support group without the use of any bots. Just actual people voting on people. It is slowly catching on I think and my article about bots seems to have started a furry about cleaning up the SPAM (or maybe its just coincidence that its happening at the same time).
Respectfully, I think that's the wrong approach. Always post your best content, even when rewards are low. Vote for vote and follow for follow doesn't improve Steemit. It just means everything becomes noise with no signal. Votes are supposed to indicate which content is better than other content. Without that, votes become spam.
My initial comment was that the post received only 5 VIEWS. If nobody even sees your post, how can you tell if it is worthy or not?The last sentence regarding the $5 was more of a reference to how people react to technical posts versus posts that affect the emotions and the money was simply an indicator of acceptance.
I'm actually very glad to see that you saw the post, made a comment and supported the author with a nice up-vote! That is a rare phenomenon for us redfish.
As for my contests and games: Do you disagree that having a fun game is a method of building fellowship and community? Do you think that buying votes is a better way of bringing a social aspect to a social media site? If so, I would love to know your reasoning. If it makes sense, I will alter my own position on the topic, but for now I am of the opinion that all these vote-buying bots are doing a lot of harm and the evidence is ubiquitous. I believe that at this stage (even with over 220 followers), my BEST CONTENT is in fact something that is fun and exciting to participate in. By having fun and belonging to a small group, friendships can grow and the social aspect of this site is formed and built upon. Later, when I have a greater audience, the time to split that audience into the various facets of my many interests would be more appropriate than doing it now. Does that make sense? What kinds of initiatives would you be willing to support? I'm trying my best to help this concept grow, but with limited resources, it's not easy. I'm trying to alter the mindset of a few people at a time about voting behaviours. Once those behaviours are instilled, they will carry on to other pages and be an example for others to follow. Sometimes it takes small steps to start a revolution. I'm trying to bring back the SOCIAL part of this social media platform.
Why not instead teach them to write posts and comments which are valuable enough to be voted on by that community and others? I see "up-vote for up-vote" as more destructive long-term than voting bots (as I outlined in my first reply). I'm not a fan of voting bots either, but they are better than some other things.
Building a following isn't just about numbers. In the few months you've been here, if you're just building a following of vote-for-vote Steemit users, you may not be attracting the type of community you're looking for. Your wall is all about your zombie game, and I personally have zero interest in that. Others might like it, but when you have posts like "Is Steemit dying" and "Where have all the intelligent Steemians gone?" I'm not attracted to your blog (especially with the wall of zombie posts). If you want to attract intelligent people, write intelligent posts and comments.
I didn't randomly find @tayken's post. I'm here because of an intelligent comment they left on one of my posts. As I often do, I checked out their blog and voted up a post I liked.
What I'm trying to say is: be what you're trying to attract. If you want to attract people who are interested in playing zombie games on steemit, you're doing well, but they may not have much Steem Power to upvote your posts or fill your days with interesting conversation.
Thanks for the informative reply @lukestokes. I read the article you linked to in your initial comment and I see your point. It does make sense. I don't wish to belabour the issue, but if you don't mind, I'm having a problem understanding your comment
I agree that simply exchanging upvotes without any valued content is not ideal, but it happens among friends and from what I've read amongst witnesses. The argument is that its our vote and we can do with it as we choose. Even self-voting is 'permitted'. But that is not an area I want to dive into at this time (it has been argued to death already by many and I can't see any consensus on the issue). What I would like to know is why you think that voting manually for each other is MORE DESTRUCTIVE than bot-voting? This is a subject I have not read much about.
I began by writing what I thought were intelligent articles and was very disappointed in the number of readers that saw those posts. Likewise, I was disappointed by the 5 views this article got. Its not my article; I don't get rewards from it, so obviously it is not the rewards I'm upset about. It's the exposure, or lack thereof.
You mentioned 2 of my articles but didn't specify if it was the articles that you didn't like or simply the titles. The first actually did generate a bit of discussion, so the title did its job and drew the attention of readers so that they actually opened the post. The 2nd was my frustration after having written another "intelligent" article that was almost completely ignored.
So, I can continue to write articles that practically nobody reads and become depressed, or I can play my games and enjoy my time on here while writing my "intelligent" comments on other people's articles. I believe I have found a compromise to a delicate situation. So what if my zombie players don't have vote power? This platform wishes to expand its user-base and if playing games can achieve that then why denounce it? These players will one day gain vote power and we all grow together slowly. Everyone sees things from a slightly different perspective and that's the wonderful thing about being able to chat with each other in a civilized manner. We get to expand our minds by learning about the perspectives of others.
I respect your opinions and eagerly await your further response so that I may gain more insight into your thoughts.
If you tweeted to very few engaged/interested followers and got no response would you also be disappointed or would you recognize your expectations should change?
Sounds to me your expectations aren't aligned (that's when we get frustrated, when and it can lead to depression: when our expectations aren't met). Maybe this post can help, I don't know.
I didn't, I said "you're doing well" if that matches your expectations for this platform. Your comments implied it was not and you were frustrated, so that's what I said about it. It may be a great thing, but if it's not great at what you are trying to accomplish for yourself, there may be better approaches for you.
As to your articles, I didn't dive in much. Write an "intelligent" article and link me to it in a comment sometime and I'll give you my honest a opinion as you seem to genuinely appreciate that (and I tend to give mine, whether or not it was asked for, hehehe).
I exchange votes with friends because I consistently like their content (that's probably why we're friends). Bots are just extensions of individual's preferences. Nothing magical there. For example, I use steemvoter.com to vote up some accounts automatically because they consistently provide great value to the platform (in my subjective opinion) and I want to use my Steem Power to ensure they get consistently rewarded, even if I miss reading some of their posts. Sometimes I unvote stuff that's not my favorite, and that's part of it too.
That's true, but I don't think that's the argument. The argument is what is helpful and what is harmful within the category of doing whatever you choose. Some self voting can be good (sean argues for that here and I've discussed it here as well), but voting "without any valued content" is not just not ideal, it's really bad. It's spam. It's noise with no signal. To say "Well, that happens among friends and whales" is not okay, IMO. If everyone did that (especially when whales do it) the value of the whole platform is put in jeopardy. This has been debated endlessly for months here and massive flag wars have happened over trending posts that some feel do not deserve the value they receive. Some people have practically been driven off the platform for whale voting without regards for quality content while others (for a time) decided to start "the experiment" to suspend all whale voting for a time (prior to hard fork 19) to prevent what was even considered abuse of the rewards pool. So yes, there's a long history here and voting for content that does not deserve a vote is not a good thing. It would make votes meaningless and new users who come to check out Steemit would think the trending and hot posts are terrible and this site is a joke. The value of STEEM would eventually reflect that assessment as would the Alexa ratings. Good authors wouldn't bother writing here either as it would negatively impact their reputation to write somewhere that others thought only had crap content.
If people really want to have an impact here, they should buy STEEM. That's how votes matter more and how people get influence.
If my vote wasn't worth anything, this conversation wouldn't be as interesting, right? :)
Don't get discouraged if you don't get noticed right away with your posts. It takes time to build a following. Posting without a lot of followers is like tweeting to no one and being surprised to not see a result.
@lukestokes it's not a matter of being discouraged (suppose I need to refine my verbiage), more just a matter of personal prioritization. I'm happy as can be, but also a bit obsessed with fine-tuning my life at the moment. 100% agree that patience wins and that votes need to be tied to quality content. Does the spam train concern you at the moment?
It's not really much different than what I've seen for the past year, but yeah, there are always new challenges to work through. Before projects like cheetah bot, for example, things were really bad with plagiarism and the like. It will adapt and survive or it will not.
Good luck with the fine-tuning! :)
I like the view of a pragmatist and realist. It will survive...or not :)
Might as well enjoy the ride in the meantime eh??
It sucks to put effort where there is low reward. I wish steemit was forked
Maybe it's just not interesting, don't push people to read what they don't like.
Who's pushing?...I agree, quality is a major variable, but I just happen to think my experience and education lends itself to worthwhile words on the page.
I'll have to check out those links because I have never heard of these things before. That is why I love this site... lots of new things to learn! Thanks for this very interesting article!
Each of those technologies have very real implications. Take a look and let me know your thoughts.
Brave seems interesting as a browser. Avira also has its own browser (I use Avira Free as an antivirus), but I'm reluctant to try its other offerings because I hate filling my computer with software. I prefer to keep it lean and clean.
Trutheum seems interesting, but I wonder how much use it will get. This opens one up to libel and other attacks if offering truths. I wish they had some examples to show. Also, how can you verify your truths? Anyone can fake screen-shots of text on a mobile phone and make fake news articles easy enough.
Hyperledger is something I really have no clue about. There was not a lot explaining what it is in language I can comprehend.
Brave is worth trying...the speed difference is significant. I agree that Trutheum is utopian with some major potential, but there's a range of concerns given what we know of humans. Hyberledger gets technical but it's very REAL. Already a number of large companies leveraging it to infuse efficiencies into infrastructure and product chains.
Point being...we're not in Kansas anymore
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Great post! Followed.
Thanks Luke...always appreciate your support!
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STOPvery valuable insights, thank you for the gems you provide here! I'll follow the link. I asked me a while ago if Brave can change something, i'm not sure currently. It runs on my iPhone but it lacks of speed and comfort and i must trust that it maintains what it promises, but changing to this far less comfortable browser for the masses.. hmm i don't know if this works out.. great idea of course.. but just a thought
The idea that blockchain eating software was also on my mind but couldn't grasp it at the time. The decentralisation will disrupt local distributed software? In the past open source projects battled with commercial software with varying success. What's your point on the blockchain technology, what's the game changer, do we get even more monopolies?
Microsoft already uses blockchain technology and nobody would realize it if they hadn't published something about
The entire landscape is shifting and evolving daily, but the reality is that we're still at such an early stage of change. The tech that ultimately wins out is anyone's guess.
That's a cool analysis.