[IMAGE: https://i.imgur.com/UdayPpH.jpg]
Redefining how you find information on the internet
The
internet has always been a decentralized store of information ever
since its inception. Harken back to the early days before Web 2.0 and
we'd see an online world full of .html article pages where anyone
could register a domain and start typing away their ideas,
observations, records, information, literally anything. An
"information highway", as they called it in the 90's.
It
soon became clear as to what the Internet had done to information.
The ability to find curated information provided by the whole of
humanity right in front of us seconds after we search for it is an
ability unknown to Homo Sapiens until the very recent past. Think of
any topic and there is likely a heated discussion this very moment if
not whole libraries of information at your disposal.
The spirit of Information
Over
the years, there have been many platforms where people from across
all cultures and borders could come to together to ask and answer
questions, a Question & Answer (Q&A) Platform. Among the most
famous so far had been none other than Quora, a Q&A platform that
at this moment, is valued at an excess of $1.8 Billion USD. A company
that hosts content that answers surgically specific questions that
people tend to ask on the internet.
From
a tech-business perspective, serving this niche is extremely
lucrative. Get search engines to index your content, and more than
likely, people will type in questions that are hosted on your
platform almost down to a tee. There is no better way to drive page
visits and grow a website than the ability to serve the curiosity of
anyone regardless what questions they ask on the internet. Page
visits equal potential monetization revenue.
This
is great and all, But Q&A websites fail to address one very
important issue. What's in it for the content creators? Why do users
bother to answer questions without any seemingly direct benefit to
them? Some may argue altruism and social capital, but people will
only do so much in the name of those things. It is human to pursue
incentives for what they do. Quora "solves" this by
mimicking other major social media players, making their platforms
addictive by design. Using subtle but powerful design techniques to
keep their users coming back asking and answering questions, with
little to no obvious returns to them.
This
is how incumbent content platforms whether social or otherwise, have
been designing their websites when it comes to user-generated
content. It's very clear that it is very unfair to users who use the
platform. Where they themselves become the product for the websites.
More users = More pageviews = more revenue. "Free platforms for
users" is no longer a valid excuse when users are not the real
customers, where truthfully such models makes the users the workers
for the websites who disproportionately benefit from their activity.
Tokenization of Web Content
The
advent of the Steem Blockchain signaled the change in how people
would interact on the web, specifically, by removing the restrictions
on how content creators make a living while pursuing their passions.
Traditionally, relying on ads is the only source of income for the
majority of content creators. By endorsing or advertising certain
brands and products alongside their content, creators often face
restrictions on what they can or cannot do.
As
for Q&A platforms, it is all too often for answerers to put
endorsements together in the answers they give to questions. Asking
"What is the best xxx for yyy" and you will see this
phenomenon in its full glory. It's unavoidable, why else would people
answer questions and build their identity on such platforms full
time? There are rarities, sure. But the exception proves the rule.
Tokenizing
web content removes such restrictions and bring about the possibility
of a fully transparent and unbiased Q&A Platform. The incentives
now shifts to being able to provide the best answer to a question,
rather than endorsing products in hopes for commission.
A gap to fill
The
Dapp Ecosystem made possible by the Steem Blockchain is the perfect
platform to create such a Q&A website where users answer
questions to answer questions. Where good answers gets rewarded
rather than answers that advertise. Of course, users are free to
endorse their favorite products or answer questions as brand
ambassadors, more power to them. But now, thanks to the Steem
Blockchain's system that rewards content creators directly from
content consumers, creators are incentivized, period.
Musing.io
is one such website. Built on top of the Steem Blockchain, users need
only a Steem account to start asking and answering questions. And
we're proud to inform that we already have a running website and a
working product on Musing.io. As of this today there are over 21,000
questions and answers posted from the website, and the growth
opportunity is just massive.
The new Internet
We
strongly believe that the Internet will be Tokenized - that Content
creators will be rewarded directly by their consumers without the
need of a middleman and that the users will own their data. We also
believe that this makes it possible for the digital environment of
the future to transcend the 1% Rule of the Internet, because everyone
has something to offer.
