New Platforms Share Profits with Users
An increasing number of blockchain-based social media platforms are being launched, helping users make a profit by producing and consuming content.
These new platforms are inspired by Steemit, a social media platform where everyone gets paid for creating and curating content.
Steemit differs from portal sites, such as Naver, and social media platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram or YouTube, that monopolize the huge profits generated by user-created content. The blockchain-based new platform shares the profits with users.
New platforms seek to help users make profits with the content they produce and consume by integrating existing social network services and blockchain technology.
A case in point is South Korea-based UNNIO. This company is preparing to launch a blockchain-based social media marketplace service dubbed “UNNIO.” It plans to follow Steemit and allow users to post video clips as well as texts and pictures so that they can make money from them.
In particular, UNNIO formed a partnership with blockchain firm INK to open a safer and more convenient content trading market that can protect intellectual property rights and help make transactions,.
In addition, UNNIO will release services for both advertisers and users. The company will make advertisers reward those who watch their advertisements with cryptocurrency dubbed UNNIO Coin.
An official from UNNIO said, “Users cannot make any profit on existing social media platforms even when they consume advertisements. However, they will be rewared on UNNIO for watching advertisements.”
A similar move has been made in China as well. The TTC project led by Chinese firm TTC is a blockchain project introduced by a company called Tata UFO that offers services similar with Instagram. The TTC project uses a TTC Coin. The Dapp that is driven on the TTC platform is Tata UFO. The firm said it is a service that combines the strong points of Steemit and Instagram.
Particularly, the service is expected to overcome the disadvantages of blockchain technology which slows trading speed. Texts, images and video clips will be stored and played on offline servers, with only transactions recorded on the blockchain distributed ledger.
Moreover, U.K.-based Verasity is also setting up the platform that enables users to directly sponsor creators without fees by directly connecting video clip creators and users through blockchain technology. The company is seeking to build a kind of YouTube that utilizes blockchain technology.
Asia Innovations Group, a leading mobile entertainment group in Asia, is also planning to launch “GIFTO” service that allows users to send gifts via social media services based on cryptocurrencies. The company will apply the service to one-person broadcast platform “Uplive” which has 35 million users in Asia.
An official from the industry said, “As Steemit successfully released a model that provides cryptocurrencies to content creators as a reward, a growing number of companies are coming up with similar business models. Expectations are growing that blockchain can solve a long-time problem suffered by content creators who have been trying to receive reasonable prices for their works.”