Removing paywalls and getting paid

Sometimes when I write about Steem I feel like I have split personalities as I will write about my positivity for the future and then in the next article, look at something that is a huge negative. How I see it here is that there is an ecosystem that replicates the real world, crammed into a small space in an environment that is highly volatile and subject to change. This means that the complexity is very high which indicates a whole range of areas of various strengths and weaknesses that interplay with each other to further complicate the dynamics and, any prediction of the future position.

Uncertainty is the order of the day. But...

I take a long-term view of the platform (and most things) which means even though the everyday issues of the platform need to be dealt with, dealing with them gives the future a good chance of being positive. How I see it is that if we are able to get our ducks into some kind of row, even if not completely aligned, given the capabilities of the blockchain and the potential to build an array of communities quickly upon it, the chance of success is high.

There are a lot of people who are in crypto who don't seem to be in crypto currently meaning that they are trying to take all they can and then buy back into the fiat world before it collapses.

Like @crimsonclad commented on this post yesterday:

They swing from new thing to new thing fuck-you-got-mine-ing with the intrinsic unshakable belief that they need to take everything they can before it all blows away in the wind...

This definitely happens with people at Steem and it definitely happens in the cryptosphere as essentialy everyone wants to take what they can get and then hand it over to the very bank-run conglomerates that kept them from having those things before. Those that have done this haven't beaten the system, they are perpetuating it.

But, it is those very banks that are the indicator that crypto is here to stay, at least for some time to come and the current lull is the calm before the storm. The banks and investment firms are scrambling to jump on the bandwagon by setting up exchanges and making it easier for average folk to get into the cryptomarkets without quite as much risk as it has now. This means they need to have enough volume and holdings to be able to anchor markets and reduce volatility.

One thing that reduces volatility in a marketplace is a lot of holders who are unable to dump and run at every tremor and this is something that Steem itself offers as it is already anchored heavily in SP and, it has a growing community (albeit a strange one) to back it.

Introduce SMTs on top of the Steem blockchain and it means that there is the possibility for business models to compete for viewership without threatening the core infrastructure. From my understanding, an SMT could potentially outperform Steem in market value if it is able to build a compelling enough solution for some kind of problem. This doesn't reduce the value of Steem though, it enhances its stability.

I don't know much about SMTs yet but I kind of visualize them as websites on the internet. Websites can be built and be successful or fail miserably but, the internet itself remains unscathed by the demise. What the sites need is the infrastructure of the internet to function well as in be reliable and offer fast enough access. This is why I am all for Steemit Inc not caring too much about the interface or day to day troubles of the Steem community and instead working on what makes the backbone flex for the coming range of businesses and users.

However, the day to day issues must also be addressed as it is these things that will affect the working of the SMTs and the communities that populate them. Addressing these issues now provides a multitude of lessons for how to develop for the future iterations and spinoffs. I suspect that the first few SMTs are going to fail quickly because they are not going to incorporate enough of the lessons and instead do what they know. That is okay if you think, how many websites still exist from 1995 in a similar form to then?

If the Steem blockchain infrastructure is in good working order, the development of SMTs will become a process of evolution that is able to remove the current internet paradigm wall of unpaid content, with a way for content producers to get paid without having to rely on the platform selling advertising space. Potentially, some middlemen can be taken out and producer gets paid directly by consumers, like a farmer's market.

How I see this playing out is that in the future, there is going to be a premium for good content producers who are able to provide an audience with compelling content. With the masses of people that could potentially be involved, it won't be as necessary to produce as often as rewards on individual pieces of quality could be very high which means, more time can be spent in development. There are various models that can be based on just this and professional content teams will be the norm for very highly rewarded stuff but, there is also going to be the freelancers who provide this and that for niche audiences.

Again, this is just how I visualize these things now and in the future but I think that is vital that the community spends time dealing with the day to day nonsense as it is this that will lead to the ability to build well thought out concepts in the future that attract investors and users alike which means, more Steem stability. Essentially, Steemit Inc needs to build the infrastructure and the community needs to work out how to be a functioning community.

It is interesting to think about it though as the internet if you consider what happens with Spam and harmful websites. They get blocked. Ads get blocked too. The days of the internet operating the way it does is numbered as the IoT and superfast connections take hold and I think that cryptocurrencies are going to tie into it all quite nicely and blockchains are going to underpin it all.

But then, WW3 could destroy us all. Who knows.

Taraz
[ a Steem original ]

Btw, the picture is a super lucky shot I took :D