I've been trying lately to fully grasp the concept of selling pressure. I know, trust me, that it's simple, and yes, I do tend to overthink things, but my new found curiosity has been fueled by a comment made by Starkerz in recent conversations about STEEM.

As far as I know, I've never heard anyone make the direct connection of an upvote adding selling pressure. Maybe it's mostly due to the fact that most of the voices who feel they deserve more upvotes, would find themselves working against their own interests, if they even explored the line of thinking.

All that being said, as much as it is technically true, it will always be true. Which is to say, that no matter what changes we make, how the economy of the STEEM ecosystem is setup, upvotes will always add selling pressure. So, the better question is how to compensate, if you will, the selling pressure. How do we create demand, as to make the sale of the tokens less frequent, if not insignificant for the big picture.

Here's what we seem to know...

Reward System != Business Model

Yes, we talk about the distribution of STEEM tokens as "a business" and at face value, I understand and agree. But, if all businesses add selling pressure, then they we are literally adding more weight to columns expecting them never to collapse.

We've seen the results of this expectation, we've seen it all too clearly, so it's imperative we begin to walk away from those business models altogether. In other words, speculation, which is all we have, cannot sustain a blockchain long term in any significant way. If we believe it can, we are tacitly implying that we need more suckers to buy our tokens as we onload to them, and it's hardly an action done in the name of benevolence.

So, what does this mean for STEEM as a currency, as an ecosystem? Well, among other things, that the line between STEEM as a network of resources, and STEEM the currency is being solidified every day. It seems to me that the maturation of STEEM the blockchain, in what we could only call it's long term sustainable form, is one that would focus on resources mainly, on access to an audience, to a flexible network, and it's able to leverage these digital + human capital as commodities to provide a business a framework to operate in.

Again, the main point I'm trying to make is that any business built on top of the reward pool of STEEM, is likely to fail in the future, and attempting to keep things the same, ignores the necessity of walking away from the gambling approach of the speculative markets.

At this point it seems I'm bashing most, if not all the business models on the STEEM blockchain, but my concern, or my observation, is more to clarify our direction, and not so much to criticize past actions, past ideas. If bidbots, gambling games, etc, created demand when they did, and became the first applications built on STEEM, they were necessary to mature the ideas we are currently contemplating.

Content Business Model

For content creators, which we have a ton of here, it's quite worrying that we may be moving away from the idea of getting paid to post. I think that's a valid concern, but it's also one that seems unlikely to be entirely true.

As I mentioned before, one of the important resources of this blockchain is the people who are participating of it, and those who will join in the future. So, if there's an audience, there's sure to be a reason why it showed up, and a demand that follows it. How those environments will look, is a whole different conversation, but the recent sprouting of tribes on STEEM-ENGINE, gives us a sneak peek into the possibilities.

Now, if hypothetically we had a particular community or tribe, to be consistent with the lingo, that is able to grow massively, then the human capital it would possess, would be monetizable almost right away, and thus sustainability can be achieved, if it's leveraged just right.

Some time ago, I wrote a long piece inspired on the upcoming release of VOICE on the EOS blockchain. It seems to me that a human capital/content business model built in this manner is not only sustainable, but also incredibly scalable. A business model that solves both the problem of sell pressure, with the realization that most users are not interested in being investors and/or speculators to begin with.

Why am I still positive?

As someone who is sitting on a considerable amount of STEEM, not only on this account of course. I don't feel fear regarding the future of this blockchain. Now, I would not say I'm not biased, since being invested in STEEM as much as I am surely influences my thoughts. But, having skin in the game has given me enough motivation, if you will, to dig deep and understand the possibilities.

In my view, we are witnessing an evolution of not just technology, which of course is obvious, but more so of the philosophies of understanding resources and human capital. And, this makes me grateful to have a front row seat.