Who Will Host/Witness Blocks for the Steem Blockchain When Witness Rewards Are Gone in 20 Years?
This is something I had thought of long ago, but never posted about to ask if there was a solution to it or let others be aware of.
For those who don't understand what I am talking about, the production of the STEEM token will cease in about 19 years. STEEM is "printed" (created) by the blockchain at a little less than 25,000,000 each year right now, and declines as the years go down to hit around 6,000,000 by the 20th year. This shrink because the inflation rate goes down each year, meaning less STEEM is created each successive year (more or less).
*Chart courtesy of @fyrstikken
So after 19 years (give or take), no more STEEM will be created. That's how things are setup right now.
That yearly created STEEM is divided into daily reward pools. Each day, a portion of the reward pool gets allocated to posts, comments, curators, witnesses and also as an interest/dividend on holding STEEM POWER.
By that time (19 years from now) the blockchain will probably be very very big (it's about 80 GB now in March 2018 after nearly 2 years), and need a lot of RAM to host/witness. It will make hosting/witnessing even more expensive.
If there are no more STEEM tokens being created to reward witnesses for witnessing blocks and hosting the blockchain, what will happen to the blockchain?
Is that going to be the end of the Steem blockchain because no one will be paid to host the chain as a witness? Who will host it?
If it doesn't stay up, then all the data on the chain disappears from the net because it's not being hosted online anymore.
I am curious as to how people see this playing out in 19 years or so.
Does anyone know if I am wrong and this is a non-issue, how the hosting will be done, etc? How do we keep Steem alive?
I appreciate the feedback :)
I hope Steem is around 19 years from now,and more :)
Thank you for your time and attention. Peace.
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The way I understand it, the rate will stay at 0.010 each year after that. That was one of the reasons I decided to invest more in the site. Without it, the investment wouldn’t likely do well.
Yup, I misunderstood hehe :/
Hmm very interesting conversation to have. Hopefully as the rate of inflation reduces, the value of steem will increase as well, and may go some way to alleviating this situation.
However, I think it is inevitable some kind of of scaling/compression/2nd layer solution has to be implemented in the future in order to reduce the cost of running the servers as a witness. Akin to segwit / lightning network (Bitcoin) or sharding (eth).
As I'm not particularly tech savvy, would love to hear what others know about this predicament.
Also love reading your posts on psychology @krnel ! One of the first posts that I look out for on my feed
I was wrong about no more STEEM at 20 years, only the % inflation stops going down :)
Awhh I knew that inflation would stop at 1%, but thought you meant that the 1% inflation wouldn't produce enough steem tokens to pay both witnesses and curators/authors.
But I still think with inflation dropping to 1%, the value of steem itself should increase to counterbalance this issue
Thanks for this post and for @phgnomo and @inertia's replies. Even though it turns out it isn't a problem, it's a good practice to get into thinking about the sustainability of all these various crypto projects. Steemit is a particularly good one in that at least it's actually doing something NOW, but in general crypto space needs more discussion like this.
Yup, I wanted to know, so now I know I was wrong, and it keeps going ;)
I don't see where it goes to zero.
It looks like it bottoms at 1% and stays there.
Since steem is an inflationary currency, i do not see any reason to stop inflating it. If it does indeed go to zero, than witnesses and posters will not get any further payout.
Yeah, I thought year 20 was the last year of creating STEEM, but it's just the last year of inflation dropping, woopsy. :/
Sorry, but you are wrong here.
Steem will still be created in 19 years an foward. Steem is a inflationary coin and doesnt have a supply limit.
What Will happen is that the inflation rate Will be fixed at 0,95% (gotta check the number).
This means that, at that moment, If in year 19 100,000 is created, on year 20, 100,950 Will be created, and so on.
This is How the steem production Works.
Yeah, I thought it was like Bitcoin, as I recall Bitcoin will stop being printed after some time, no? But Steem avoided that issue, good ;)
Bitcoin have a supply limit of 21 million BTC issued. The miner "pay" will come from the transaction costs.
STEEM have no limit, only a fixed inflation rate.
BTW, Ethereum also don't have a supply limit.
@inertia please I need you urgent attention to my situation. On discord steemit ramble, I mistakenly share sbd to @banjo . Please I was told that you are the operator of banjo bot, pls return my sbd I am @versatilemind, just a new user pls
Don't worry @versatilemind am sure @inertia will send you back your SBD as soon as possible
How soon
A.S.A.P
Do you know anyone who likes Justin Bieber?
I don't have nightmares for you to torment me in good sir.
I never said that.
@krnel
We dont have garentee of next day & u buzy in thinking of 19 yrs ahead thats seems to b funny...
Enjoy today forget of 2morrow...
Cheers
Thinking about this is very scary. Steem is the best thing that has happened to me and saying this I know I am saying the minds of as many as will read this post. I have read in multiple places about this 19 year goal but I do fast and pray that somehow, it will be extended. I mean I would like my children to key into this amazing opportunity. It hurts me to even think that its possible for it not to exceed anymore by the time those cuties are grown😢
Thanks for the chart @fyrstikken
Thanks for this thought-provoking post @krnel
I was mistaken/wrong about it ending. The last inflation value of 0.01% keeps going forever ;)
I always follow you, and thank you for sharing a very good post @krnel.
They can fork the blockchain and increase these numbers, as long as there will be people who want it. And there will be, because old chain wont provide monetary incentive. Alongside other improvements can be implemented. It is like forced upgrade.
I was wrong about year 20 ending crating STEEM, it's only about dropping inflation % that stays steady instead, sry.