Make Short Form Content Great Again
Let me crystal clear about the 'expertise' of Jongo....
I'm pretty much, the world's worst investor. Literally, everything I ever put my hard earned money behind, didn't always pan out. And don't ask me about when I sold $BTC at $500 each because it as never going higher...So I thought.
But something I have always believed in...Is short form social media content.
Here's an example...
That's when I joined X (or Twitter) pretty much the year after it started to take off. The first time I saw it, I 'got it'. It made sense. This was were people were going to talk, and communicate. This wasn't bulky long form posts, or catching up with friends that was popular on things like Facebook. This was a real time conversation. Sometimes between friends, and sometimes between strangers. But the point of it was, there was conversations.
Fast forward to what we have been seeing on Hive over the past few years and I can't help but think...This is where our biggest (or one of our biggest) opportunities are. And here's why....
People.
Hive has always been about the people on chain. The communities that have been formed. The apps that have been built by said people and communities.
So where did we go wrong?
I think it comes down to a few factors. One, and please don't take this the wrong way, but Hive has been and continues to be managed and overseen by people that aren't the biggest communicators. They are mostly (not all) tech people. They code. They bang out amazing things on the back end. But overall, most of them have remained silent, in the background.
And for whatever reason, short form content wasn't celebrated here for years. It was actually shunned.
It was considered low value, it didn't bring anything to the table and it looked like at first glance, short form was a haven for reward leeches.
Completely understandable. And at times, I agree. Because there is nothing worst than a bunch of bots, or AI accounts, doing nothing but spewing nonsense.
But this is where I think Hive made a mistake in it's approach. We have zero fees, we can operate in a real time conversation. It's literally designed for...Short form content. Especially with all the hype and hoopla around #web3 this blockchain could be positioned to really attract outsiders.
The allure of rewards is not a marketing strategy, but I'll tell you what...If I was brand new here and I saw that after a few weeks of chatting with people, I was getting 10 cents to 50 cents per 'snap' or 'thread'....I'd be telling all my friends about it.
And this is the old truth about building a social media platform on #web3 .....People will never go to a platform where their friends aren't.
So how do we get their friends here?
A couple of suggestions, and please just take this from someone who isn't technical. But is just a user of this chain for over 8 years and continues to hang out daily and chat with people....
1. Celebrate The Apps!
Things like InLEO Threads, Waves and Snaps have been pushing short form content for a while now. This needs to be celebrated and talked about more. I've been spending a lot of time on LEO over the past few years and only about a week on Snapie / Snaps and there's literally a fraction of the Hive community using them daily. Tell your Hive buddies to get using these apps. And of course, I highly recommend @snapie right now because it's absolutely epic!
2. Start & Keep The Conversations Going
While using the apps, post a few threads and snaps. And while you are there, go and answer or reply to others as well. If people come and respond to you, follow suit! There is nothing that will drive user loyalty more than getting replies from others. It shows that our content is valued and appreciated.
3. Upvote Content
For the love of everything that's good, vote up content that you enjoy! I know we have had a culture of downvoting 'low value content' since this chain began, but if you see stuff that sucks, either ignore it or reply that it's not welcomed here. We can self police our own chain and at the same time make it attractive to outsiders. Remember, we want to attract people and years of chasing creators away, can be fixed....We just need to support good content or creators that are trying to improve.
4. Use Graphics, 3Speak Shorts, Snapie Audio
Make your content stick out! No one is expecting Picasso type stuff here, but my goodness we have some awesome apps and tools on chain. Use them! Make your content pop out from the crowd and more people will engage with it!
5. Talk About It, Everywhere!
Traditional social media is still a great audience to bring over to the good side of the force. Tell the world you have an amazing #web3 experience to share and go and show them the amazing features of this chain. More specifically, share the apps!!! I've been telling people I know recently about @snapie and so far, they have not only joined the chain but they are starting to use it as well. Slowly, people will come if they are having a great experience and can be onboarded with ease.
Hey look, I'm just a user. That's all I've really ever been. Sure I brought some people over to the chain over the years, but when push comes to shove I've always believed of being a product of your product. We have some amazing potential here and for years I've always said, I believe it will always come down to attracting people with easy to use applications.
We're starting to see that now more than ever.....Let's just keep pushing and celebrate short form content! It worked in web 2, I cannot help but think it'll work in web 3.
Posted Using INLEO
I am not sure whether short form content has so much potential, particularly on platforms like Hive.
And your reason for that thinking would be?
I think we first need more creators for long contents.
Excellent post. It's also right to talk about short formats, but we need to use them more maturely and responsibly. I think it's right to offer a balanced view that can be useful to both content creators and attentive readers. I don't even know why HIVE's short-form content apps have never captivated me either. I'm continuing to suggest Web 3 applications to my friends, but I have to say that lately I've been a bit demotivated, as a lot of time has passed and I've seen little result. For example, all my friends who used HIVE no longer use it.
I'm sure the price of the token has a lot to do with it. If Hive was $1, people would be flooding into it. But it's still not the easiest experience to onboard with keys and all
You've probably hit the nail on the head. This platform probably isn't that easy to use yet. This fact deters a large portion of new users. many of my friends who had started using this social platform no longer use it and have gone back to using classic social platforms
yeah for sure. it’s getting better but still a long way to go
As long as one person's vote can eliminate a thousand others, creating serious projects in Hive will always be a pipe dream.
This is a huge issue. I'd love to see a "block" feature that kicks in after someone downvotes 3 consecutive posts by the same person. It's obvious they don't like the content. They're just showing up to downvote. We need some sort of protection from that. I've seen a lot of good writers leave because people downvoted really good articles simply because they didn't agree with it. I get that's partially what the voting feature is for, however, it is often used in mean spirited ways or simply to silence people they don't agree with. We've needed to fix that A LONG TIME AGO.
It has however, kept away pornographers, plagiarists, hate groups, and stolen content.
I get downvoting plagiarized and stolen content, but downvoting opinions intentionally trying to silence people is really wrong IMHO.
I'm not against downvotes, but it should be a community-wide decision. Furthermore, the posting rules need to be clearly defined to avoid misinterpretations. And the penalties can't be all or nothing.
huge point. and those that love their downvote la and power to wipe rewards have a very big question to ask themselves…
the culture on chain has brought us to 9 cents a token. what happens if we have a community of rewards without the fear of wiping things out because of a grudge
Look I like Snaps and I try my best there, posting a few times a week, but when I scroll through the snaps feed, it's always like: 'good morning, here is my breakfast' - wtf does one say to that? Yum? It's not just making short form content is it, but learning to make GREAT short form content people WANT to react to, not just reacting because there's nothing else to react to. Make short form content yum again.
low quality stuff will always be here. it’s the nature of the beast. i think we highlight the great stuff and engage with that, it would encourage more people to push their efforts a bit more.
we can hope lol
Ha, yep. Can but try - again, sigh.
I totally agree. I never understood why so many people were against short form content. I personally would love to see portals like instagram, X, and even Facebook. When we fist started out on Steem I used to call what we have a blogging platform, and everyone would correct me saying, "Oh no, it's so much more." However, whenever anyone tries to do anything outside of long form blogging content, there seems to be a lot of people speaking out against it.
Like you said, people want to be on a platform where their friends are at. Not everyone enjoys long form content. By incorporating instagram and X like platforms, we onboard other people.
I'm no developer and I suck at coding. I know d.buzz tried to put a cap on rewards. That would be the fair solution. Limit shortform content to a smaller percentage of the awards and then expand our reach into avenues of social networks, ie; X, instagram, Facebook style short form content. I too think Hive could and should be way more than it is. That's just my two sats man!
for sure. ya a cap would work, it makes sense. i’m not sure my daily updates of my hikes are worth much but it’s just so that people feel valued.
Another thing to add here is that many people see this web3 thing very complicated. Some people get so scared of things like keys.
absolutely. it’s not the most user friendly experience at all
I agree 100%.
I love the idea about short form contents being more appreciated
It's literally the thing that we can control. We cant control the price or the markets, but we can support and engage more on those apps
Absolutely agree with the sentiments here on hive
we can make a difference
Yes, the more voice we have we can make a difference
Indeed!
Interesting take.
Though I got myself an X (Twitter) account back in 2007 Am not a short content form user.
It has a certain value, I agree.
For HIVE, I do wonder if short form is the way forward.
The model of HIVE, being paid by inflation, for creating content, is - I think - the most difficult form to scale HIVE users and usage. Too much emphasis is on the author and curation rewards. People come and go because when they come, they are drawn to the money. When they go, is when they discover they don't earn money and see others earning much more with perhaps lower content value. Serious content creators, espcially those with a certain higher value already in the market, tested with the presesor of HIVE for a little bit,. I guess they left again for various reasons, amongst others, no real audience, low reach, and lots of drama. PLus perhaps the money part. Who knows, not many spoke out.
Back to scaling. Lets do a little math:
This results is: 5,48 $ct per post on average
User will earn: 10$ per year
In the above, the MC of 10B$ versus active users is likely very very very positive. Such market cap equals 1k$ of MC per active user. Inflation is currently higher, but isn't healthy. For a MC of Billions, I don't think this can be higher than 2%.
10$ per year is the issue here. Well, it isn't an issue, but it is an issue when we continue to push HIVE as the social network where money is paid to content creators from inflation. I do think we need compelling social network setup, focus on one or two types and brands of frontends, and hide the money part. We need to leverage the blockchain part, and sell that, instead of showing the money everywhere. We even have trending channels based on the amount of money a post is rewarded. A major error and flaw. Perhaps it served its perpose at launch, but it is harming the growth of HIVE 9 years after launch.
Back to what we can/shall leverage and sell: The blockchain. Usually short form content has value for just a very short time. I dont see a reason why such content shall be stored forever. I do see such a feature being relevant for long-form content, content with substance, controversial content, science, history, in-depth journalist content and such types.