The True Potential of Steem

Now that more and more users have joined and we've gotten a lot of the introductory posts out of the way, the question arises, where do we go from here? Steemit.com might seem like a new toy the day after Christmas: opened it and played with it, now what? Well, as even more people join Steemit and get through the introductory phase, I anticipate the following happening. First, market cap will obviously rise. But so what? Ethereum's market cap and the market cap of the DAO rose spectacularly in recent weeks only to crater once the rules of the DAO were taken advantage of (I don't call it a true 'hack'). So we know that market cap is, if anything, only a rough guess at the true value of an enterprise, especially in cryptocurrencies because so much of this tech is as-yet unproven. The second thing that I predict will happen is the thing that will truly cause Steemit to blossom: the realization of a platform for professionals.

Steemit As More Than A Blog

Imagine if you will Steemit has 10-30k active users. A good deal of these will be mostly commenters and upvoters. More will be casual bloggers. But the true game-changers are those with skills and experience for sale. Imagine being a Spanish teacher on here. Imagine making hundreds of dollars for weekly lessons that eager future-translators are dying to gobble up. Or being a musician who provides the knowledge on how music works so that you can become a musician yourself. All of a sudden, Steem's market cap starts to make sense. All of a sudden it's not just cat pictures and random intro posts, it's value. Imagine being a programmer and writing a coding-for-dummies series. With 10-30k users, there are bound to be those who have an interest in using this platform to learn top-notch skills for free, and who are willing to upvote you for it. This is the true power of steemit! Its a positive feedback loop. The more value you bring to your audience in the form of content that can improve their skill-set, the more upvotes you receive. Soon you could be teaching English or Japanese from your living room.

Of course, as in everything your qualifications to provide these skills would need to be verified. Can you actually speak Spanish? Do you really know how to code? But that kind of thing can easily be proven these days with a short video clip, or github account, for example. In short, the true power of steemit is the ability to bring powerful, yet esoteric knowledge to the masses. This is more than upending the blockchain; more than taking over Bitcoin and other cryptos. Suddenly, you're taking on universities that charge thousands of dollars for watered-down and time-consuming versions of the information you're able to provide for free, while still getting paid for it! The possibilities for disruption are massive, and within a year we should start to see the implications of this coming to fruition. Today we're on Forbes.com for tripling our marketcap, tomorrow its because people stop enrolling in college because the skills and training they want can be found right here for free. Its all I can do to hold back my excitement!