First off, Wow. EOS is an exceptional block chain concept.
As I expect some of you know this isn't the kind of thing I usually write about, but because I've been doing a lot of research into EOS recently I thought it would be a good idea to share with you some of the promising and exciting things I found. As I'm a bit of a novice when it comes to the technical aspects of block chain technology I've decided to look at some of the general uses for EOS, as well as taking a look at some of the trends and social media chatter surrounding EOS and their rivals.
To believe in EOS it's worth understanding what the creator of EOS, Dan Larimer, is all about. If you didn't know, 
BITSHARES
The bitshares exchange is essentially just a BTS wallet that comes with it's own full spectrum decentralized exchange built in. It was designed from the ground up to be able to process more transactions a second than both VISA and MasterCard combined. It looks and feels like any other exchange and allows you to trade common crypto currencies. It even has price stable currencies as well, so you are able to weather the storm during dips in the market.
I urge you all to take a look at Bitshares if you haven't already. It's the same set up as Steemit. The more people that use the platform the further the price of BTS goes up.
STEEMIT
The STEEM block chain is easily the fastest block chain out there right now. In fact it does more transactions per second than all the other top 10 block chains combined (excluding Bitshares). At time of writing the STEEM block chain just broke its own record for the most amount of transactions in one day.
It took me several weeks of posting to Steemit before I realized I was posting to a block chain which is exactly what Dan envisioned. He believes that decentralized platforms should be indistinguishable from centralized websites or application. Steemit and the STEEM block chain are a perfect example of how if you remove barriers to entry anyone can get involved in the cryptocurrency space.
EOS
In current business models companies are incentivized to make as much profit as possible for their share holders, but this often has a negative effect on its customers, and usually means if anything goes wrong with the company it's the customers and employees that are usually the first to lose out. In the Decentralized Autonomous Company (DAO) PoS model the token holders are the share holders and it's they're responsibility to bring value to the company. Because ultimately the more value one bring to the platform the greater their investment will increase. Much like how Bitshares and Steemit work now.
Both BTC and ETH work on the Proof of Work (PoW) algorithm, which means people who want to mine BTC or ETH have to spend vast amounts of money on electricity in order to run the servers that are producing the blocks. This works out to be highly inefficient. EOS on the other hand uses the Delegated Proof of Stake (DPoS) algorithm which Dan invented whilst developing Steemit and Bitshares. This means that EOS holders are incentivized to use and develop the EOS platform because the more people that use EOS, the more the price will rise.
Imagine if Bitshares and Steemit were seamlessly integrated into a single block chain along with the BTC and ETH. Now also imagine having a 1000 or so different tokens that could be instantly sent free of charge between applications using human readable wallet addresses. Well, that is just a small part of what EOS will be capable of.
The EOS network will be self funding by increasing the number of EOS in circulation by 5% (45 million) each year. This goes into a group wallet and it's left to the block producers (witnesses) to decide what to do with it. Out of that 5% increase the block producers will need to pay themselves. The rest can be put back into projects that bring value to the community making the EOS network a perpetually profitable autonomous organization. It's an incredibly simple yet revolutionary way of building businesses out of, and for, communities. They have even allocated 1 billion US$ from the EOS token sale to fund developers in the early stages of the EOS network.
EOS COMPETITION
Technologically speaking most of these platforms have the potential to become the market leader at this moment in time. They all seem to be working toward free and instant transactions. But one big advantage EOS has over these other platforms is that Dan has a proven track record of building fast, and reliable decentralized platform like Steemit and Bitshares. With this brings a whole community of people that already support, and use his block chains.
This isn't a technical comparison, instead it's a look at some of the groups and communities that are backing the other platforms. EOS has a lot of competition out there at the moment, but the main ones I thought would be the greatest potential threat to EOS were Waves, NEO, Lisk, Cardano, and Stratis. So lets take a look at some of the online activity surrounding rival platforms.
EOS
Telegram Chat Members: 28403. EOS also has the majority of the Bitshares and STEEM community behind it as well.
Global Website Ranking: 20547
Twitter Followers: 98.9K
Subreddit Subscribers: 28,922
WAVES
Telegram Chat members: 13 063
Global Website Ranking: 32870
Twitter Followers: 99.4k
Subreddit Subscribers: 7721
NEO
Telegram Chat Members: N/A
**Global Website Ranking: **24143
Twitter Followers: 258k
Subreddit Subscribers: 71815
LISK
Telegram Chat Members: N/A
Global Website Ranking: 42577
Twitter Followers: 93k
Subreddit Subscribers: 25348
CARDANO
Telegram Chat members: 4786
Global Website Ranking: 11894
Twitter Followers: 97.7
Subreddit Subscribers: 49575
STRATIS
Telegram Chat Members: 4210
Global Website Ranking: 60378
Twitter Followers: 125k
Subreddit Subscribers: 9953
TRENDS
As we can see from the Google trends chart below people have been searching for EOS token more time than any of the other tokens.
So that's about it. I hope you find this useful. Looking at the chatter and trends on the internet really helps us to understand where these other platforms stand in the public sphere. After reading and listening to everything I could on Dan Larimer and EOS I truly believe that that this time next year EOS will be a fully functioning busy block chain with a market cap as big, or bigger than, ETH.
