Likes fade quickly, show your appreciation with digital time
There is a lot of noise about how we use social media, how much we use it and how it affects us individually, and as a society. But we often forget to ask why we use it in the first place. The answer is straightforward: we each crave a reaction. Perhaps this is obvious but we seldom think of the psychological and societal fallout of such a mass craving.
Be it a positive reaction to an image of ourselves, agreement with a political opinion, or even a vicious argument in the comments section. There is usually a clear and instant action and reaction to each post. For this reason, a post without likes, an action without a reaction, can be quite traumatic.
This system, or at least the existing versions of social media, are based on action and reaction, not interaction. The user gets a kick of dopamine in the brain from receiving an instant reaction from a friend or stranger. Any further contact, any meaningful dialogue often acts as secondary to this initial hit, the initial flashing red notification.
This kick, this instant, sensory reaction is extremely short lived, and quickly forgotten. The joy of likes quickly leaves the bloodstream. It does not encourage long-term, mutually-beneficial interaction on an online or personal plane. It simply prompts the user to make another post, to throw more of themselves out into the ether.
But what if these likes could be maintained, what if an important opinion you shared, or a beautiful photograph you took, or a hilarious video all contributed to your lasting welfare and social status within your online community, a community that is intrinsically attached to where you spend time and which friends and acquaintances you interact with.
What if these likes didn’t just raise your popularity. We know that instagram likes can sometimes be equated to wealth and influence. The more followers you have, the larger the audience you can promote a product or service to. Many instagram celebrities make a fortune in sponsorship with designers, restaurants and various lifestyle brands. But what if the likes were currency themselves. What if in order to place a like you were giving away a finite and irreplaceable resource, a true sign of appreciation — minutes of your own life. In such a world, if a photograph or post is appreciated, the content creator (or “influencer”) receives digital value from other users as a sign of appreciation. This means that creative bloggers can become influencers purely out of the worth and quality of their content, and are not obligated to ‘sell out’ and promote products to support themselves.
Such a world is emerging right now. The new integrated anthroposystem of Nimses offers a solution to the ‘action-reaction’ binary of social media. A successful social media influencer is rewarded by their followers in nims: a digital unit of value based on a minute of human life. This means that a good, popular action generates a reaction that will serve as a long term benefit to the Nimses user.
A Nimses user gains one nim every minute of their life after they have registered on the app. Their time gains actual value. Any verified user can use nims to ‘like’ other users’ posts; imagine giving away literal minutes of your life in a form of nims to show your appreciation of another’s content. These nims do not disappear, they are stored in a recipient’s ‘wallet’ and can be used for any other services the Nimses platform offers.
Nimses is more than a social network, it’s a new anthropological reality. Modern society and its economic systems don’t recognize borders anymore thanks to the planet-wide integration of the internet. Nimses wishes to complete what the internet started, to find a universal online unit that respects the intrinsic value of a Human Lifetime. This means that users are incentivised to create content, or offer goods or services on the app that will be beneficial to the entire ecosystem of the app. This new anthroposystem, despite being entirely global, is linked to the exact location and surroundings of the user and helps the user find out what is going on around them, and who are the largest influencers in their area. It encourages interaction both on an online and offline plane, with real people near you. This geographic community or ‘Temple’ can become a permanent audience for your public. An audience that appreciates your content and supports you with their appreciation to continue posting.
This means the end of fleeting likes, the end of the constant hamster wheel of social media. Now you can relax, rest on your digital laurels and reap lasting rewards for posting good content.
