Bitcoin's Baby Brother, STEEM, is Growing Up -- The Early Signs

Sibling Rivalry

Bitcoin came into existence in 2009 as the first crypto-currency to use a distributed Block Chain. It was quickly adopted by many while enjoying its advantage as a "single child" for several years. Bitcoin was the only "digital cash" or "computer money" that truly solved issues that could not be overcome by prior attempts at virtual currency. Bitcoin is considered the first to solve The Byzantine Generals' Problem as a result of its ability to provide proof of work as well as prevent counterfeiting and double-spending.

The World, like happy young parents, quickly gave birth to its second crypto-currency and named it Litecoin in 2011. It is just like Bitcoin but improved. Litecoin uses a different "Hashing" algorithm than Bitcoin and has a faster transaction processing speed. Soon thereafter the World spawned Namecoin followed by Peercoin in 2012 and the World has never been the same since.

Crypto 2.0

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Since the launch of Bitcion in 2009, there have been somewhere between 700 and 800 cryptocurrencies created throughout the World today. Some have already failed and there are others that have "Hard-Forked" or split in two separate crypto-coins. Most if not all have attempted to improve upon Bitcoin until the launch of Ethereum in 2015. Ethereum (more like a step-brother/sister to Bitcoin) is more like a cloesd loop payment system, where smart contracts are created, executed and payment finalized in Ethereum. This allows Developers to launch or create their own Apps and receive payment in Ether from within their own App, essentially bypassing traditional payment processors such as Banks or Credit Card Processors like Visa or American Express.

Then, in March of 2016, STEEM (and shall we say its fraternal twins STEEM Dollars & STEEM Power) came into Crypto-Existence. Michael Grose titled his book "Why First Borns Rule the World and Last Borns Want to Change It," in regards to family dynamics, which perfectly describes the Bitcoin/ STEEM relationship. STEEM took Bitcoin and Ethereum one step further and initiated a whole new Social Media Paradigm. It took everything that is good from both as well as other crypto-currencies and added its own enhancements. Steemit.com is a social media website much like Facebook or Reddit.com, except that on Steemit.com its users and the content creators are incentivized in STEEM similar to how Bitcoin miners are rewarded in Bitcoin for securing the Bitcoin network through "mining."

Growing Pains

In family life, having older siblings is always a benefit to the younger ones (or so we like to think), and so too in the crypto-currency World. The newer Alt-coins such as STEEM have learned from the trials and tribulations of the earlier crypto-coins, and have been able to implement and adopt solutions into their "DNA" from the very beginning in order to avoid the pitfalls that the early pioneering crypto-coins experienced.

Two examples of this are Steemit.com's three Token system (STEEM, STEEM Dollar & STEEM Power) as well as Steemit's Govenrance model including the Witness Program. Volatility and long term commitment are two issues that are addressed by having 3 tokens within the Steemit system. By having Steem Dollars trade for the price of one U.S. Dollar, or at least attempt to stay pegged it to, the days of Bitcoin's $100 or more daily price swings are removed from the Steem system. STEEM Power are simply STEEM tokens that have been committed or "locked up" to the STEEM system for a longer period of time, similar to a Certificate of Deposit in a U.S. Bank. STEEMIT'S governance includes 19 Witnesses, who run nodes/servers, for the STEEMIT network. When changes are proposed for STEEMIT, it is these Witnesses who must elect the change. When in majority, they create a hard fork in the STEEMIT Blockchain, thus creating a new STEEMIT Blockchain, but More Importantly, and as @dan stated, "they kill the old fork so we don't end up with Ethereum/Ethereum Classic situations," while @ned smiled widely.

Despite STEEMIT's many great features it has had some growing pains. It is believed that growing pains are caused when a child's physical growth is taking place in a relatively short amount of time. STEEMIT, is less than a year old, with the signs that it is growing, and fast. STEEM is traded in several different exchanges. Then, STEEMIT's robustness was immediately tested in July when the first payouts took place and the price spiked rather than crashed causing a huge amount of traffic and user sign-ups. Also, not long after that, in a sign that STEEM was a valuable crypto-currency, Hackers attacked STEEMIT user accounts but were immediately thwarted by STEEM's built in defenses against such occurrences.

Terrible Twos

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There have been many studies that show that a child's position in a family can have a great impact on his or her success in life. Having older sibling seems to benefit the younger siblings, especially the youngest siblings. Older brothers and sisters make the younger ones tougher while also providing advice as well as being Role models. The older siblings also pave the way for the younger ones, usually softening up the parents so that by the time the final child is born, they are usually the "spoiled one." So too in the Crypto-currency family. Bitcoin is the pioneer paving the way to the masses, navigating the laws of World Governments, opening the doors to finance and commerce and creating a Role Model in success for other Alt-coins.

STEEM is currently the "baby" in the crypto-currency family at less than a year old. Yet it already has a market capitalization of about $90 Million. It is currently traded on several exchanges, has many users with new users signing up daily, has been hacked and recovered, has had its first price spike and crash now followed up by a bottom and gain. These are all signs that STEEM, as the youngest member to the crypto-currencies is following in the successful footsteps of the earlier coins while attempting to avoid their missteps. STEEM has proven this early on, and now projects such as PeerHub and others are continuing to enhance and validate the entire World changing Steem Ecosystem as we approach year two in the Life of STEEM.

09/25/16
Full $teem Ahead!
@streetstyle
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sources:
Investopedia
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