Why blockchain is the next step in social media
By BIDITEX Exchange on The Capital
Things in the digital world are always upgrading. Innovators are always thinking about the next step and how to improve the user experience. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest have become household names and are the main social media channels we know of.
Until recently, most users were happy to feed their data and content into a centralized system without really thinking about the ramifications. However, infamous scandals of data misuse have given societies across the globe a cause for concern. Suddenly, people started to wonder exactly how their data and content was being used. With the exception of major influencers who are compensated (to put it mildly) for content creation, for the average user, being a part of a centralized social network means sharing your data and being rewarded with a barrage of bots and fake accounts that fill our news feeds with forced content. Needless to say, this degrades the user experience immensely. As a result, scrolling through your feed becomes just like opening an inbox full of spam.
Users are no longer willing to be the product
Since social networks are rich portals of user information, data can easily be collected and sold. Not only is this process easy for traditional social media platforms but it’s also legal. If you skim the Terms of Service, of most social networks that uploading content itself constitutes forfeit of the user’s ownership over their content and the networks are free to access your content for their own purposes. Some networks even go so far as to say that users own their content but at the same time make it clear that it will leverage user information to target advertising and customize engagement.
People want more control over their content
The goal of a blockchain-based network is to get rid of the central server and make it impossible for a single entity to be able to enforce monitoring and controls over user-generated content.
This, of course, doesn’t come for free. A transaction must occur so the hosts can run. This is where a cryptocurrency comes into play. The cryptocurrency rewards node hosts so that there will be a financial incentive to run a decentralized network. This actually takes the decentralization a step further, as it takes away any financial incentive for the network company to run ads or sell user.
Better security
Social networks certainly have their place in the world in terms of business networking, collaboration, and exchange of ideas, but data security has become another focal point of concern.
The decentralized nature of the blockchain ensures privacy and security through a distributed consensus mechanism.
By decentralizing and encrypting all data and uploads, blockchain-based social media networks eliminate all invasion of privacy that large corporations are currently performing.
Freedom of speech
Many markets where blockchain social media is blossoming are the same parts of the world that have only recently gotten access to the internet and some of whom even live in repressive regimes or a place where censorship is an issue. Here, a decentralized approach to social networking allows communication metadata to be scattered across the globe, therefore circumventing censorship.
Payment Means
Apart from posts, likes, and comments, peer-to-peer commerce is another area being explored by social networks. This is particularly important in parts of the world where most people own mobile phones but not computers.
Since cryptocurrencies are blockchain-based, users can easily exchange coins or tokens through the same social network. In addition, smart contracts can make social networks function more like a trusted network, wherein users can make actual deals or exchange of value through cryptographically-signed and executed contracts. There is potential for all kinds of industries integrating social with all sorts of transactions.
All.me digital network
All.me is an international IT company with 7 offices across the globe and a talented team of over 170 specialists. The company has a growing user base of over 500,000. All.me is a visual-based social network powered by ME Token, the network’s cryptocurrency. One of the most important features is that the platform gives users full control over their data. Users are incentivized to create quality content by receiving rewards in ME Token, which can be used on all.me’s marketplace (meMarket) or exchanged for other cryptocurrencies.
No matter which way we look at it, blockchain-based technology and decentralization is the future of many in many fields and especially in social media. Meaning there is no central organization or overseer controlling value. This, of course, gives a huge advantage to people who use these technologies since they are collective contributors to the product and have control over its value. In an industry like social media, where many users feel that they are being taken advantage of, this is a huge selling point. Try a crypto-based social network and check out the experience for yourself.
