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How to build a killer Web3 social media platform?

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Web3 social networks that merely clone Web2 social platforms often fail.

Original title: " Livepeer CEO: How to build a killer Web3 social platform? "

Original author: Doug Petkanics

Original compilation: Bai Ze Research Institute

Since the rise of Ethereum in 2016 Since then, the blockchain community has been searching for paradigms that go beyond financial use cases and have real-world impact.

Can a Web3-powered equivalent be disruptive, cross the chasm, and achieve mainstream adoption relative to its Web2 counterpart? So far, promising examples like Cryptokitties and Axie Infinity have momentarily captured the world's attention and ignited a massive crypto movement, but they themselves have not had the sustainable staying power to provide the world at large with a sustained success story.

While social media apps have gotten a lot of flak in recent years, the category is clearly ripe for disruption via Web3, but again it hasn't. Successfully achieved mainstream adoption. Early experimental protocols like Reddit-style communities Steemit and TikTok-style apps like Pepo haven't gained mainstream attention, while emerging social protocols like Lens, Orbis, Farcaster, and DeSohave aren't yet at the product maturity level to inspire real-world adoption. cannot convince mainstream users.

A lot of the protocols we've seen so far are trying to clone the functionality of existing social networking sites: Web3 Twitter, Web3 TikTok, Web3 Reddit, Web3 Twitch . It’s often a near-cloning but sub-par experience, having to make users pay for gas per interaction, and “vaguely” promising better creator monetization or data ownership.

But the choices of mainstream users have shown that they are unlikely to switch to the Web3 platform just because they care less about data ownership. Unless the app actually offers a better, sustainable way of monetizing and distributing creators, there's a ton of premium content to gain traction with mainstream users. Web3 applications that combine mainstream users with token-incentivized content often fade into irrelevance.

The breakthrough killer social platform is unlikely to come in the form of a "Web3 version of X", but rather will introduce a paradigm shifting behavior that is truly native On top of a decentralized network coordinated by blockchain.

Web3 rapid growth - surprising

Let's look at the blockchain ecosystem Some uniquely disruptive concepts in the system:

Crowdfunding and Capital Formation

Permissionless Access to Global, Digital-First Financial Services< /p>

Digital ownership and verifiability

Collective, global coordination

The above list can be simplified to 1C0, DeFi , NFT, DAO.

While we all try to point out how innovations in these areas can change and improve society as a whole, I don't see this as an extension of the real world, but rather as a digital the boundaries of the world.

DeFi protocols are far more efficient at interacting with composable on-chain assets, transactions, and digital goods than they are at securing loans for new home purchases.

NFTs representing digital assets such as in-game items, PFPs, or collectibles are more attractive and disruptive than NFTs representing tickets or contracts. In either case, they often create more friction and legal overhead than they're worth.

Token Coordinated DAOs themselves bring together strangers digitally through chat rooms, code repositories, and online tools far faster than any company or nonprofit can form, scale, and achieve its goals.

I accept the above signals and recognize that a digital-first, Web3-centric world has Use case exists independently. But I think this becomes especially powerful when the Web3-centric world is growing at an incredible rate.

I used Echo Chambers (echo chamber) this Words, I think deserve debate.

Six years ago, when I threw myself into the blockchain industry, my biggest fear was that it was purely an echo chamber - a bunch of optimistic forward-looking Sexual thinkers (and a bunch of amoral opportunists) talk to each other about their dreams of data and financial sovereignty, and better economic alignment between creators, users, and platforms. Even if that fear still holds true, it's mind-boggling to see this echo chamber rapidly grow in size. Seeing more talented developers, entrepreneurs, creators, investors, social scientists so deeply captured by Web3's flaws and dedicating a lot of their time to it is the most inspiring thing I've seen while working in Web3 One of the aspects of the human heart.

In the early 2000's, New York City used to host Internet Week, conferences like SXSW used to bring the entire Internet industry together in its own echo chamber. Before long, the Internet touched every aspect of people's lives, and the idea of Internet Week became irrelevant because there was no way to gather a single community in an industry that touched almost everything and meant something different to everyone. We see something similar in blockchain, where there are many unique domains - core infrastructure, scaling solutions, gaming, NFTs, governance, Web3, metaverse, etc. - all of which rely on blockchain features and use cases, but thrive in their own domain.

So how big must the echo chamber be before Web3 becomes the latest version of the internet?

A few opportunities to build killer apps

Some of the best Web2 social apps Originated from the "come for the tool, stay for the network" approach. Instagram originally allowed users to apply filters to their phone photos and make them look great, so it's useful whether you have followers or not. You can record and share clips of you singing or lip-syncing, with short audio clips that go viral and eventually become trending on TikTok after being layered by social networks and recommendation algorithms.

Because the next disruptive Web3 social application will not be just a clone of the Web2 application and it will be difficult to recreate the existing social graph in Web3 , so it is very likely that a large-scale social application centered on Web3 will start as a tool to solve some problems of users in Web3. Given the success of DAOs, NFTs, DeFi, and more, there are clear new opportunities around some themes around social and content.

DAOs need a trusted "safe home" to organize and distribute content that aligns with Web3 values.

Content curation and moderation services in Web3 social protocols are missing and not well incentivized.

The discovery of high-quality Web3-centric content remains highly fragmented.

I mentioned earlier that blockchain-based DAOs have the power to enable rapid global coordination, and they incentivize people to take similar actions without direct communication. These DAOs communicate through digital tools, and content distribution is often in the form of video—community meetings, core developer meetings, project demos, project overviews and reviews, Token analysis and commentary etc. These activities often don’t have a safe “home” on traditional social media platforms—they can be arbitrarily removed at the content level, or worse, account banned.

Traditional social media platforms have incredible control and can make changes at will without the consent of individual creators, which is very important for Extremely unfavorable for individual creators. Content around a new permissionless financial system is a threat to the status quo, so we need a "safe home" unencumbered by Web2.

There are still many projects and DAOs that rely on tools like Google Meet and Zoom for calls and presentations, use Youtube to record and archive their calls for playback, and are very Few have their own content curation sites to distribute this content outside of their Youtube channel.

Opportunity: Building Web3 native Zoom

Huddle01 is off to a great start. Using open standards like webRTC to support conferencing, and Livepeer to stream and record content, there is now a viable alternative to Zoom + Meet. But to make this Web3 platform native, it's upgraded - with anonymous wallet logins, NFT PFP avatars, and rules around who can join and view meetings Token access control system. It truly embraces Web3-native thinking and is suitable as an echo chamber for the fast-growing Web3 project.

Opportunity: Building a Web3 Native Video CMS for DAO

Many projects use conferencing and live streaming tools After calls, demos and meetings, the next step is usually to upload the interview directly to Youtube. However, there is a great opportunity for this content to be organized within the project's own "home" for easy access, search, comment, discussion, education, and utilization. That said, the missing piece in the Web3 world is a video content management system (CMS) for DAOs. What are the opportunities beyond traditional video CMS platforms?

Token The access control system can be based on the logic on the chain (such as NFT held in the user's wallet or Token ) to determine who can access the content. This is more accessible than proprietary CRM technology licensed from large technology companies and built into the browser.

Crypto-native payments can be instantly monetized for users anywhere in the world without the need for complex credit relationships through a limited set of payment providers and banks.

ENS and other on-chain identity support allows users to take their identities and reputations outside of this application and import existing identities into more In multiple applications - instead of using Facebook account based login.

Decentralized storage, streaming and playback mechanisms provide these applications with an independent infrastructure to ensure content persistence instead of letting Content is subject to cloud platforms such as Amazon and Google.

These and many more opportunities address the unique needs of the crypto ecosystem, and nascent tools like StreamETH are already being used to organize Systematic meetings and archived content.

Opportunity: Build a curation/management DAO for Web3-centric content

One of the often overlooked steps in the early stages of Web3 social applications is content management. The homepage of "Decentralized Youtube" simply displays recently uploaded videos, and the disorganized content is not a good content experience for users.

I think there should be a DAO that filters content according to a clear guideline. The initial idea of the mechanism is that this DAO consists of a Token to coordinate, Token Will be distributed to those who successfully identify content before harmful content appears, review content quality, and screen out tag types for content, tags include DeFi, NFT, Token analysis etc. This will greatly enhance the good experience the platform brings to users and retain new users.

Putting together a Web3 killer social application

Used and followed by mainstream users, It's something that's difficult to plan perfectly ahead of time -- often requiring a combination of the right timing, product vision, and a lot of luck. So, the suggestions articulated below are just my thoughts on how I would like to see a killer breakthrough app emerge.

Start with the tools. Build a content management system for a DAO and convince them to use an app like Huddle01 to host their minutes and distribute their content. Every DAO that uses it gets a page that lists all of their historical videos, makes them easily navigable, discoverable, searchable, and includes access controls (or possibly a monetization mechanism for creators). This is useful for single DAOs or isolated projects.

Enables some value-added management in all content created by users of this tool. Web3 content is often public by default—stored on a decentralized network and widely distributed. Use the aforementioned curation DAO to start curating content homepages for the highest quality Web3 information across the ecosystem, including archives and sorting by categories as needed - DeFi, NFT, Token analysis etc. The model here is a video-specific reddit - the Web3 homepage of the internet.

Identity layer around Web3 social network - based on wallet, identity, soul bound NFT as user's reputation. Users can interact with content across DAOs and communities, i.e. across multiple platforms, so having a reputation for portability is a sticky feature for building network effects around social apps.

Consider the creator. Creators choosing Web3 social media applications will have a compelling reason - content distribution to target audiences is more valuable than uncontrollable content distribution in Web2 social, not to mention other monetization and control enabled by Web3 Advantage.

The above proposal shows a path to a Web3-centric Youtube/Reddit, but really getting mainstream attention will depend on the project being Innovation in product mechanism, user experience and incentive mechanism.