Ladies and gentlemen, 2018 is HERE! Let's get ready to rumbllllleee!
Before the end of January we're likely to see our first hardfork of the year, Hardfork 20. For those of you who are new to the community, hardforks are basically major changes to the Steem blockchain and Steemit platform that affect things like voting, curation, delegation (which was nonexistent a few hardforks ago), as well as others.
Hardfork 20 promises to bring real and exciting changes to the Steemit platform. There are plenty of things going on with this fork and you can read about them here and here. In this article we'll be focusing only on the things that are likely to have a huge impact on your average Steemit user (i.e. not a witness, not a dev making apps on the Steem blockchain, etc.).
New Account Creation
The thing in hardfork 20 that has everyone the most excited is easier new user onboarding. To understand why this important, it's important to understand where Steemit is now. Although Steem has managed to avoid small fees with most transactions (actions) on the platform, one place where there is still a fee associated is in account creation. Moreover, accounts without a certain minimum amount are currently unable to perform actions on the Steem blockchain... not exactly an optimal first impression for new users accustomed to platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, where you can do as much as you want when you want and are even encouraged to do so as much as possible.
Hardfork 20 will change this, making the account creation process essentially free.
Also, those of us who created an account had to wait days or weeks before getting to actually utilize it. This might be in part to blame for the current user retention rate. Well, the devs have worked their magic and this next hardfork should see much faster account creation as well.
Changes to Curation
I have to say, while the easier onboarding change is incredibly exciting, I differ from most people on the platform in that I am much more excited about the changes coming to curation. In the current curation scheme, authors have much more incentive to upvote themselves, shortform content is basically screwed, and voting circles are effective.
But the changes to curation will effectively discourage voting circles by creating minimum thresholds of voting power (in other words, voters below a certain power level won't be able to spam their way to higher SP and payouts).
Unbeknownst to most people, Steemit's voting system is basically a reverse auction. This is mostly irrelevant to very new users, but becomes important to know as you grow on the platform. By 'reverse auction', I mean that up to the 30 minute mark, the earlier you vote, the less you get and the more goes to the author. So if you vote as soon as the author posts, you get nothing and the author gets everything. After minute thirty this maxes out such that the curator may collect maximum rewards (though some portion will always go to the author). Well, this number is going to change to 15 minutes, instead. This will help out those who post shorter form material and give curators a better chance to stay on top of the most recent material.
Moreover, self-voting will get seriously shrunk under the new rules, which will make an author's vote on themselves worth about as much as that same vote on another's entry. This solves so many problems that it's ridiculous.
Communities
Everyone is waiting with baited breath for communities. We don't know exactly how they'll be implemented, but we know that they are basically going to change Steemit irrevocably once and for all, making it more social and less isolated and blog-y. If hardfork 20 is likely to be implemented before month's end, then communities will likely have their own hardfork in the next two to three months.
Smart Media Tokens
This is the big one, folks. Likely to be implemented last, SMT's will likely have their own hardfork separate from hardfork 20 and the communities hardfork (likely to be hardfork 21). Last year Ned promised that SMT's would be available early 2018, but I think what was meant by that was 'before half the year is done'. Don't expect to hear much about SMT's before the end of April.
For those of you unfamiliar with what SMT's are: in essence they allow anyone with a site to create their own token 'on top' of the Steem blockchain. There are plenty of good articles on the subject, but feel free to check out the Smart Media Token site.
More Reading:
For more about hardfork 20, check out the most recent post by 
For more on Smart Media Tokens check out the original announcement by 
Wednesday, January 3rd, 2018
Other Posts:
Author's Note:
The big post is coming along! I have a trip planned next week, and will hopefully get it out before then. Can't wait to hear what you guys think!
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