Sapien Platform and SPN Token Overview: Eliminating Fake News and Decentralizing Content Creation

Update 02/12/2019: SPN was de-listed from Ethex. See here for more info.

Sapien Platform Overview

For several years now, people have slowly begun to realize that Web 2.0 social media platforms are broken. Fake news, content censorship, lack of content creator compensation, and improper data usage are just a few of the many problems that have plagued major platforms. Sapien is an excellent example of a Web 3.0, blockchain-based social news platform aiming to solve these issues.

For Sapien, the SPN ERC20 token and the platform’s functionalities provide a glimpse of what’s possible with Web 3.0 social media. Unlike most sites that are limited to highly specific content niches (i.e. Youtube for longer videos, Instagram for photos and short videos, Twitter for short written posts), Sapien allows users to easily upload and view a variety of content types (articles, videos, photos, GIFs, and more) via one platform.

Now that we have a better understanding of what Sapien is, let’s look at the platform and its native ERC20 token in further detail.

Using the Sapien Platform

First, you’ll need to sign up for a Sapien account. Note that you’ll have to verify your email account.

If you’ve used Reddit, you’ll probably be familiar with the layout of Sapien. Posts are categorized by “Hot”, “New”, and “Top”. There are also two content layout formats. The default view is a summary list that links to a separate page upon clicking. The second option allows you to view the entire post at once.

The platform allows users to participate via upvoting and downvoting posts. In order to participate on the Sapien platform, you’ll first need to stake 100 SPN. These tokens are needed for upvoting, downvoting, and commenting.

Here are some GIFs that show how to complete the staking process.

When trying to participate on Sapien, you’ll need to stake a minimum of 100 SPN tokens.

Associating a MetaMask account is simple to do. You can even associate multiple addresses.

You’ll only need to stake a minimum of 100 SPN. However, I decided to stake 3000 SPN to start using the platform.

At the bottom of the screen, you can verify your SPN balance.

Interacting on the Platform

Once you’ve staked SPN tokens, you’re ready to start participating on the Sapien platform. One noteworthy aspect when using Sapien is the fact that actions on the platform (i.e. upvoting or commenting) don’t cost you any SPN funds. Instead, if you to go to your profile page, you’ll find that this gives you extra “points”. Upon signup, you should automatically have 500 points. As you interact on the platform, you’ll receive more points.

With two upvotes, I received two additional points.

After verifying my phone number, I was able to start earning SPN rewards by participating on the Sapien platform. With each interaction on the platform, the ‘available’ funds went up. Available funds also increased over time.

Proof-of-Value

For anyone who follows consensus protocols, proof-of-stake and proof-of-work are certainly well known. Sapien, however, utilizes a different consensus mechanism known as proof-of-value. In addition to utilizing technologies (i.e. machine learning and identity verification) that other social media sites also have, Sapien’s proof-of-value also introduces ‘something-at-stake’ with the use of SPN tokens.

Proof-of-value uses a reputation score, which dynamically changes based on a user’s contributions to Sapien. This is an important part of how Sapien is aiming to reduce fake news. A reputation score reflects an individual’s expertise and reliability on a given subject.

Users with a greater reputation will have more influence with a community and will be able to promote valuable content and reduce the spread of content that is opposed to the values of the community.

The platform also has friend requests, similar to other social media sites.

Other Notable Sapien Features

Sapien also has a few other features of note. If you expand the left sidebar, you’ll notice five categories: My Branches, My Friends, My Groups, Saved Content, and Custom Folders (coming soon). My Branches are essentially popular hashtags for posts.

The site can also be customized to the interests of the individual user. For example, you can create up to five shortcuts to various branches and/or specific friends at the top of the page. This functionality allows you to access niche-specific content a lot quicker than having to scroll through a traditional news feed or manually search for a specific topic.

Here’s an example of how you can create a shortcut to access niche-specific content faster.

Distributed Governance with DAOstack

At this point, you might be wondering how exactly Sapien will be able to accomplish its goals of becoming the go-to social news site for Web 3.0. One way to do this is through partnering with other blockchain projects. To build the Proof-of-Value protocol as well as distinguish and reward valuable content, Sapien has partnered with DAOstack. According to the announcement from February 2018:

Sapien + DAOstack equals a democratized, decentralized network to create autonomous, self-governing, reputation-based communities that empowers millions of users.Interoperability between Sapien and other platform integrations (similar to how Zynga is built on Facebook) will further push new applications and businesses to build on top of DAOstack.

SPN and GEN Listed on Ethex

You can find both Sapien (SPN) and DAOstack (GEN) on Ethex, a decentralized exchange that only lists useful tokens. If you’re part of a project that wants to list your ERC20 token on Ethex, feel free to complete our submission form.

Want to easily store and trade ETH and ERC20 tokens directly from your mobile device? Check out Ethex Trade Wallet, available on both iOS and Android.