Why Esteem is The Best Dapp to connect to steemit for Newbies; #Part 1, Advanced Account and User-profile Management

Before the creation of steemit, there were lots of other centralised social media that had already been largely adopted. Facebook, for instance, had long been in existence and was the most adopted social media. When you mention social media, the first platform that comes to most people's mind is Facebook. It is the first social media platform and still the most dominating in terms of adoption.

Looking at the decentralized world, as Facebook is to the internet, Steemit is to the Blockchain. There are lots of similarities these two platforms share with one major difference; Facebook is centralised while Steemit is Decentralised. Both are still social media, but Facebook has the edge based on adoption due to its vast popularity while steemit might be the most adopted social media on the blockchain, but it's nowhere close to the adoption rate of Facebook.

With the Emergence of Steemit, although it had a quite user-friendly interface, people wanted something they are already used to. Something that's looks similar to the Facebook interface. That's the Dapp I am talking about today, the Dapp is Esteem.

What Is Esteem

Esteem is a platform owned by @good-karma which a steem user can use to manage, monitor and customise your steemit account.
It consists of two platforms;

• Esteem Mobile App
• Esteem Surfer (Desktop app)

This blog will dwell mainly on the esteem mobile app and why it would be a better dapp for newbies to relate with steemit.

Whats Makes Esteemapp Better for Adoption

Like I explained at the beginning of this blog, people are used to the Facebook platform and would most likely adopt platforms that look similar. The esteem mobile app provides the perfect picture to give users that facebook feel while steeming. The user interface provides many features which are not available on Steemit. Those features come in handy for a better understanding of how steemit works and how well to use Steemit.
Let's look at some of the features that make Esteem better to use than steemit.

• Better Editing Of User Profile
  We are all aware of the complications that were initially involved in filling your user profile on steemit. There were initially no direct means of uploading your profile picture and cover photo. You had to copy the links to images for your profile picture and cover photo. Although these features have been provided, they still do not look presentable when compared to that of Facebook.
  The Esteem App has corrected that look. It has provided a more familiar interface for new users when they are editing their profile. To edit your profile pic, you simply click on your profile pic and different ways to edit/change it pops. For the cover photo, you simply click on the camera icon on the top right screen.
  To edit other items of the user profile, you simply click on the pencil icon at the left edge of your profile box.

• Add Account and Switch Account Feature
  This is another feature that makes it similar to facebook and also a good management tool for steemit accounts. The Esteem mobile app has the capability to store more than one login detail and enable you to switch between those accounts at any given time. It's common for people to own more than one account for different purposes. As a project owner or a community leader, you definitely will have to manage the accounts of your project and community official account.

Instead of going to get the password from whatever safe zone you stored it before you log in to the other account, with esteem app you get to do this only once. Once logged in you can switch between those accounts anytime you want.

• Notification About Your Steemit Account
  This is one feature that is lacking on steemit but is definitely important. This is something most people look for to help them monitor their social media accounts. On the home page of Esteem app, there is a bell icon at the top. You get notifications on all activities related to your steemit account on the blockchain. You get notifications of upvotes (likes), downvotes (dislike), resteem (share), follow, unfollow, mentions (tags), replies (comments), and achievements. No better way to be active on a social media without the availability of these monitoring tools.

• Advanced Search Button
  The steemit button uses the Google Search engine and it's almost not useful when using it to search for things on the steem blockchain. Although works have been done to put results related to steemit from your search at the top, it isn't still as reliable as an internal search system. Esteem provides a better search system than steemit, something that's commonly used on Facebook.

You could be searching for a particular user whom you are not so sure of the spelling. Normally to search for a user on Steemit, you would have to edit the URL with the username. This requires you to know the correct spelling of that username. Esteem, on the other hand, provides the closest options to your search as you type. This would be a good way to access accounts you are not sure of their spellings.
It comes with 3 search categories

• search for tags
• search for users
• search for posts

All of these function with the internal search system and are very useful in surfing the platform.

Some Problems Facing The Adoption of Esteem App

Esteem is not a totally independent dapp. It still uses steemit as a front-end. Unlike Facebook which has its official app, esteem is not the official app of Steemit. So some steem users may lack trust for the app's security from compromising their private keys. Unlike Facebook which is centralised app and you can easily recover your account if stolen or hacked, a decentralised platform has no way of recovering your lost password or reversing actions on your account if your password is compromised.

source: wiki commons

Irrespective of guaranteed safety of the app, many would rather have sole ownership to their private keys and would not input them on any other platform aside Steemit.

CONCLUSION

Generally, I think esteem has led to better adoption of the steem blockchain. I once did a post on how people prefer to use apps due to a better user interface that websites. Esteem app provides new steemians with something familiar which they won't find hard understanding. Also using the app comes with some advantages as active users get upvotes from @good-karma and @esteemapp on their posts.

source: Esteem

Thanks For Reading

Links

Project Repository: https://github.com/esteemapp/esteem

Github Profile: https://github.com/tony-duke