Editor’s note: This editorial was written prior to an announcement from Andrew Levine, Steemit Head of Communications, who said, in part:
”[…] there are no hard or immediate plans with respect to the Steem blockchain and the migration of Steem applications to the Tron blockchain.”
Levine blamed the confusion on the fact that his team had not yet fully planned announcements with the Tron team. The following article can still be read in context, with the understanding that it’s fully possible for Steemit to abandon the Steem blockchain in the future.
The urge to be critical of some recent news surrounding Tron and Steemit is strong. Steemit, who built a Graphene-based blockchain called Steem in order to create one of the most successful dApps in the blockchain world, has decided to abandon said blockchain and instead pin its hopes to Justin Sun’s Tron blockchain.
Where’d All The Good Blockchains Go?
Yes, I call it Justin Sun’s blockchain because it might as well be. The man uses it as a personal piggybank to do silly things. Nothing is ever quite as it seems with Sun or Tron.
Steemit is a decentralized mix of blogging and upvoting. Of all the blockchain-based creative platforms, it’s the most successful to date, with over a million active users. Steemit is actually just a shell for Steem, the blockchain that underlies the project.
Graphene is a blockchain architecture that is shared by EOS and others. Dan Larimer actually worked on Steem before going to EOS.
Steemit is just one way to view the contents of the Steem blockchain. It’s unclear what will become of the existing blockchain. Presumably, its contents will be ported over, including Justin Sun’s first post. Sun gets to join the platform as a “team member,” and is apparently required to show no true enthusiasm. He writes:
By committing a meaningful percentage of the STEEM token, Tron now aligns the same interests with the Steem community, to bring the value to STEEM token, to keep the core value of decentralization, to grow a one-of-a-kind decentralized social media platform.
Steem is actually decentralized. Anyone can build what amounts to a browser for the blockchain’s contents, and each viewing platform can decide what goes and what doesn’t. Steemit itself has advertising to fund operations. The platform famously has a ban list, which was used to try and suppress the release of information around 9/11. The situation enables platforms like D.Tube, a YouTube-alternative, to see only specific posts, making for a more traditional user experience.
The TRON STEEM Train
Nevertheless, existing users could fork the blockchain and continue as things are. STEEM tokens were trading for 28 cents at press time – more than TRX itself. During the heady days of 2017, Steem tokens saw a high of around $8. They could fork it, but it probably wouldn’t be worth anything. Look at all the Bitcoin forks other than Bitcoin Cash, most have simply fallen by the wayside.
While the usual abundance of supportive Tron true believers piled onto Sun’s post, some pointed out the obvious – this isn’t what they signed up for. Steemit user ‘whatamidoing’ wrote:
The more he listens to us, the more of us are likely to stay. Money Incentives will keep a few of us but if he wants what he is paying for he should make sure we don’t erase a lot of the good developments we’ve made and undermine some of the people who’ve been great gatekeepers who kept spam and reward pool abuse away, as well as those who put so much time and effort into community and content.
Steemit’s move to Tron marries two of the bigger platforms besides Bitcoin. It will likely mean an influx of new users, many of whom will do exactly as ‘whatamidoing’ and others fear in taking advantage of the system and flooding it with spam content.
Steemit is designed to reward original content – with money. It is the culmination of a dream on the part of the web, the ability to quickly move money between parties.
For Real? Okay, Upsides
While I feel crotchety about the whole affair, there are likely more positives than negatives here. For one thing, Tron users are incredibly supportive of the companies in their community. Steemit will certainly see an influx of new users. What becomes of the inevitable spam? That will have to be dealt with at a technical level.
For another thing, Tron works. It works very well, and it works very fast. Anyone who has tried TronLink can tell you that it is fast and that it works. It enables you to browse the internet of money without long wait times between transactions. The move may also do a lot to heal Tron’s image as a glorified gambling platform. And, projects like Steemit bring in regular people who otherwise might not have been interested in blockchain.
Long-term, it’s one more way that Tron proves it’s serious. But it’s no less annoying. Steemit wasn’t doing just fine on its own? And why Tron, rather than EOS or Ethereum? Why not port the platform across all blockchains, and go for your seat at the table?
One thing that’s obvious is that both blockchains were somewhat centralized for this to be a discussion among limited parties rather than a huge discussion in the community. According to Sun’s own post, the Tron foundation dealt with this by buying up a ton of discount STEEM tokens.
