Tokenization Makes The Link Between Social Power and Economic Power Transparent On Social Networks
Introduction
I'd like to talk about one thing that just occurred to me about tokenized social networks that makes them different from non-tokenized social networks. What tokenization does is make them transparent in some ways that non-tokenized networks are not.
Stake As Naked Economic Power Is Convertible Into Social Power And Vice Versa
Monetization or lack thereof is far from the main difference between tokenized and non-tokenized social networks. The concept of monetization has gained a lot of attention on Steem and Hive but mainly because most of the everyday users on non-tokenized networks earn nothing while on tokenized netoworks it is possible to earn something, however little, right out of the gate.
The biggest difference is how stake as naked economic power is convertible into social power and how social power is slowly convertible into stake if a popular author who earns stake so chooses. In contrast, on non-tokenized social networks, all economic transactions are done behind the scenes. In particular, how capital can be turned into social power and vice versa are not transparent in the same radical way as they are on tokenized networks.
For example, when someone with deep pockets comes to Hive, buys a million HIVE, powers it up and starts curating, that makes instant news on the entire platform. If the owner of an account with a million HP starts creating content, engagement is pretty much guaranteed. That process is amplified by how that much voting power can be used to reward loyalty. At the moment, a million HP only costs about $120,000. As far as I know, @coingecko is the only well-known business in crypto that has used the opportunity to buy stake and become an influencer on the platform (that was a couple of years ago, IIRC).
Opportunities for fledgling crypto businesses?
Since HIVE is so cheap at the moment, wouldn't it make sense to ask around if any crypto business were interested in acquiring stake on Hive to reach a highly engaged user base of 10,000 all of whom are in crypto? 10,000 may not be a huge crowd but engagement matters a lot. As a result of the nearly three-year bear market, those who are left on this platform tend to be pretty hard core. Remove competitive curation from the base layer and you get ideal conditions for influence building on a tokenized network for a fledgling crypto business perhaps still in the process of building a core community.
This is something to think about particularly for Leo. If the platform manages to grow by orders of magnitude in the coming years, a small crypto business in the early stages could leverage the Leo community to propel its own growth.
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