These suggestions were initially posted as a comment to the request for feedback post of in this comment.
1. Distribute Storage Among Users Following A Model Similar To Witnesses
Problem
At the current growth speed, the Steem blockchain size will become unmanageable. A complete snapshot is around 160 GB and it's growing fast. A more reliable solution for solving this problem is needed.
Proposal
Create a new role in the Steem governance: content host. This role will be similar in many ways with the witness role - it should carry stake in the game, it should receive votes and it should be part of a schedule for hosting blocks of blocks.
A content host will bid for hosting a specific block of blocks. We can predict quite accurately when a specific block will be produced, so this bid can be made days or weeks in advance. In order to minimize the risk of failure, blocks of blocks should be relatively small: minutes up to an hour, maximum. The scheduling could be made in a similar way with the witness scheduling.
Needless to say that the type of equipment and availability should meet specific standards and content hosts should prove this in their bids.
Rationale
- it will keep the stake in the network (as opposed to using external systems like IPFS, Sia, Storj or Burst)
- it will engage many people in a healthy competition for providing and maintaining resources for the Steem blockchain
- it will be transparent (just like the witnesses history is transparent)
2. Optional Pay Per Post Operations
Problem
Spam is a very difficult problem to tackle. As long as our only way to fight it is heuristic filtering, people will always find ways to circumvent these filters. Spam lowers the quality of the content, increases the size of the blockchain and discourages mass adoption.
Proposal
Introducing a new type of operation, optional, related to the posting mechanism. It will act in the same way like the payment options: 50/50, 100% SP or decline payment. An author could choose to accept comments only if they are paid (pay to comment). A website could choose to make a specific type of layout available only if the author pays a certain fee (either ads / banners, or different, "premium" layouts). A video creator may choose to accept comments to his post only from advertisers.
The operation should allow for various destinations:
- tipping the author (100% author)
- splitting it among all commenters (arbitrary beneficiaries on steroids)
- to a specific charity
- to a specific Steem fund (new account creations?)
Rationale
- it will add more economical value to Steem by creating an ecosystem in which the token is actively used for specific content related operations
- by keeping it optional, it will provide intelligence about the trends - how many people will use it, for what, what is the destination of the funds.
- it will significantly limit the number of meaningless comments, and prevent rewards-farming by comments
As always, looking forward to your criticism, comments or suggestions.
I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me .
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