Author Topic: Delegates Should Have a Business Plan  (Read 4432 times)

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Offline wackou

It is called brainstorming.  Not all monetization ideas are good, but you need to allow yourself to think outside the box.

Sure, please keep thinking in the open as you always have, if there's something I love about this community and you guys is the openness and the freedom of thought / talk in the forums (and the awesome technology, of course, this goes without saying!)

I think lots of people had the knee-jerk reaction with respect to ads because it becomes more and more apparent on the internet that if you're not paying for a service, you are the product (been said 1000x, but oh so true), and we definitely don't want BitShares to give this impression. As you know, image (and trust) is something that takes time to build up, but can be lost really fast, and I think lots of people here would lose a lot of confidence in BitShares if ads started popping everywhere (like: that's the business model, really?).

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Offline RenaudGagne

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Driving visitors outside your website with ads is actually missing the point. Give me a place to put my email in so I can follow your blog more easily!

Offline matt608

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Its about cultivating a particular entrepreneurial mindset.  Not a dependency mindset.

BitShares is all about stimulating an entire decentralized ecosystem and one of its tactics is to encourage start-ups and spin-offs.  Throughout this year we have experimented with various ways to encourage the emergence of a decentralized community of entrepreneurs.  Grants and bounties and stipends and rewards and prizes have been used and now paid delegates are part of the mix.

Some delegate jobs make sense to be permanently funded exclusively by the blockchain.  Others may just need a temporary start-up boost - and that should be part of their proposal.

Then people can vote for whether they like sponsoring a delegate who plans to be dependent on the blockchain forever vs. one that just wants help bootstrapping a profitable business that grows our ecosystem.  I expect the market will produce lots of variations on this for voters to consider.

We need to make it socially acceptable, even praiseworthy, for a delegate to combine multiple income streams one of which comes from the block chain.  (Until 100% pay reaches the value of a full time salary, this is almost essential for some delegates.)

While BM may be the classic example of someone who can easily justify being 100% paid by the blockchain forever, sometimes he has to lead by example. 

Any trickle of funds he might raise from his example are incidental to the point he is trying to make.

I can see the merit of this approach.  It generates lots of questions though in terms of ownership of the content. 

Is his blog owned by the stakeholders because it's delegate funded, or is his delegate pay not enough to fund the blog on top of dev work, and he is claiming independent ownership of the blog?  These websites (bitsharesblocks, metaexchange, bm blog) are all BitShares assets and I have been assuming, due to them being delegate funded, that they are owned by BitShares, not the creators.

If I used delegate pay to pay for Spanish + Chinese translations of BM's blog, it would all be owned by the stakeholders, like state-owned media.  I could be free to assume BM would be fine with me doing that as it would all be done for the good of BitShares.  If his blog is not not owned by the stakeholders, he might want me to pay him for the right to use the content on another site, which would cost BitShares more money.

Important BitShares sites could become worth a lot of money in the future.  It's necessary that its sorted out early on who owns them.  The bitUSD Argentina portal being created by me + team will be owned by BitShares, because I will pay myself + team back for the expenses so there can be no ownership claim.  If the site became really popular and I realised I could sell it for $xxk, I will be bound not to, as it is not my property.

These websites, owned by BitShares, could be used to help back the market pegged assets.  In the very unlikely event of a blackswan creating uncollateralized bitassets, BitShares websites could be sold to create a bail out fund.

I thought about the idea (just theorising) of launching a crypto-media company that had a startup fund from BitShares for say, 6 months funding.  BitShares would own perhaps, half of the company in exchange, and would receive half the advertising revenue and if the site was sold, half of the income.  BitShares could become invested in many businesses in this way.  I've about the legality though as BitShares is not legally defined (or is it?) so I don't know how well it can interact with companies.

Offline Rune

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It is called brainstorming.  Not all monetization ideas are good, but you need to allow yourself to think outside the box.

Absolutely. The discussion about how it is appropriate for delegates to monetize is perhaps the most important issue for our DAC going into the future, and having a wide and open debate about it is beneficial for everyone.

I think it would be a good idea if you posted this kind of brain storming ideas directly on the forum in the future, though. Your blog carries a lot of authority and many people will take what's written there more as the "official" bitshares stance, compared to here on the forum where we are more used to you writing and presenting your ideas and thoughts in a free and unreserved manner. Just a suggestion to improve communication. :)

Offline Stan

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Its about cultivating a particular entrepreneurial mindset.  Not a dependency mindset.

BitShares is all about stimulating an entire decentralized ecosystem and one of its tactics is to encourage start-ups and spin-offs.  Throughout this year we have experimented with various ways to encourage the emergence of a decentralized community of entrepreneurs.  Grants and bounties and stipends and rewards and prizes have been used and now paid delegates are part of the mix.

Some delegate jobs make sense to be permanently funded exclusively by the blockchain.  Others may just need a temporary start-up boost - and that should be part of their proposal.

Then people can vote for whether they like sponsoring a delegate who plans to be dependent on the blockchain forever vs. one that just wants help bootstrapping a profitable business that grows our ecosystem.  I expect the market will produce lots of variations on this for voters to consider.

We need to make it socially acceptable, even praiseworthy, for a delegate to combine multiple income streams one of which comes from the block chain.  (Until 100% pay reaches the value of a full time salary, this is almost essential for some delegates.)

While BM may be the classic example of someone who can easily justify being 100% paid by the blockchain forever, sometimes he has to lead by example. 

Any trickle of funds he might raise from his example are incidental to the point he is trying to make.
Anything said on these forums does not constitute an intent to create a legal obligation or contract of any kind.   These are merely my opinions which I reserve the right to change at any time.

Offline bytemaster

It is called brainstorming.  Not all monetization ideas are good, but you need to allow yourself to think outside the box. 

For the latest updates checkout my blog: http://bytemaster.bitshares.org
Anything said on these forums does not constitute an intent to create a legal obligation or contract between myself and anyone else.   These are merely my opinions and I reserve the right to change them at any time.

Offline wackou

 +5% to most of the reactions in this thread, please oh please don't start puttings ads everywhere, this is the worst you could do... To be honest I'd rather be diluted than start seeing ads on bitsharesblocks...

Quote
Delegates that are not thinking about how to free themselves from the need of delegate pay will bring far less value to BitShares than delegates who do.

I beg to disagree, I believe core developers (like you, bytemaster) should really spend their time developing on the core code instead of trying to monetize your blog via ads or referral links. I also very much doubt you would manage to be paid enough, people reading your blog are absolutely passionate about what you write, but let's face it: you don't stand a chance even against a stupid cat video on youtube, page-views-wise.

In the end, it really is up to the shareholders to vote for who they want to see as delegates, and if they want to see a team being fully paid by the blockchain to continue developing, then so be it. If they want to fund a delegate only for a current period of time, for a bounty or a one-time job, then so be it too. As long as the delegates can convince the shareholders they bring more value than what they consume, then that's it.

Of course, it is a good idea for delegates to have a backup plan in case they are voted out, as there's no promise they will stay voted in, but I believe some do provide a core service to the blockchain and as such should be paid directly for it.
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Offline oldman

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Google ads etc. are tacky, end of story.

You don't see any large or reputable financial institutions cluttering up their websites with banners and ads. There is a reason for this. Instant loss of credibility.

I strongly disagree with 3rd party advertising on bitshares and related websites.

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Offline Rune

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Like any business there are different types of employees.

In this case we have people that work for the blockchain, like BM and toast for example, and people that create products that use the blockchain, like svk. For the former it makes sense to maintain a delegate and generate income from the blockchain. For the latter I agree with the bootstrap model where the blockchain funds startup costs until the product or service is self sustaining.

Once self sustaining the delegate position can be given up to someone else who needs the startup funds for their business or service. This would allow thousands and thousands of ventures to be funded.

Having vital infrastructure like the primary block explorer website controlled by third party financing increases systemic risk. I don't mind having third party sites competing of course, but I wouldn't feel comfortable if our DAC didn't control at least one block explorer through delegate funding. Assuming direct control of all infrastructure is really one of the most obvious steps a DAC should take, we should look at ripple for inspiration in this regard because their business model works really well IMO.

Offline Riverhead

Like any business there are different types of employees.

In this case we have people that work for the blockchain, like BM and toast for example, and people that create products that use the blockchain, like svk. For the former it makes sense to maintain a delegate and generate income from the blockchain. For the latter I agree with the bootstrap model where the blockchain funds startup costs until the product or service is self sustaining.

Once self sustaining the delegate position can be given up to someone else who needs the startup funds for their business or service. This would allow thousands and thousands of ventures to be funded.

Offline matt608

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And seriously, putting google ads on your blog??? Bitshares is going to look like a bunch of hustlers trying to nickel and dime everything if our lead developer is selling shitty google ads :p I'm starting to think this is a Christmas prank :p

 +5%

 +5%

 +5%

Google ads is dangling a distraction from BitShares in-front of readers while damaging credibility at the same time.  Businesses don't generally put up ads unless the content is their product, which it isn't here, BitShares is the product.   Imagine if Gavin Andresen had Google ads on his blog, it would be a joke, undermining the value of the product he's writing about. 

I was wondering when this topic would come up, it's an important topic.   As delegate's sites become more and more popular they will start to be worth something in their own right, in which case, who does the site belong to?  If it's BitShares funded the creator shouldn't be able to sell it or earn extra income from ads as it should belong to BitShares stakeholders, who paid for it. 

Anything funded by delegate pay should be ad free unless a pre-arranged deal was made in the delegates campaign.  An exception would be to allow BitShares referral links to act as an extra incentive for effective marketing and for tracking purposes.

The BitShares business model is sound as it is, no need to change it. Delegates can always put up ads of their sites and see if the community votes them out, but that is asking for trouble.  Ads are space for competitors.  Imagine if Ethereum put up ads, BitShares would buy all of them!  It's inviting competitors into a BitShares landing page.

Amazon referral links could be acceptable too as they are non-intrusive, so long as the content isn't deliberately skewed to get a link in, but even that is debatable, the income would have to be declared.

If a delegate proposed a business plan in advance and said they plan to use BitShares as funding initially before switching to ads after x months + burning their income, that's different.  I'd be interested in seeing these kind of delegate proposals. 
« Last Edit: December 24, 2014, 01:14:34 pm by matt608 »

Offline cass

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And seriously, putting google ads on your blog??? Bitshares is going to look like a bunch of hustlers trying to nickel and dime everything if our lead developer is selling shitty google ads :p I'm starting to think this is a Christmas prank :p

 +5%

 +5%
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Offline vlight

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And seriously, putting google ads on your blog??? Bitshares is going to look like a bunch of hustlers trying to nickel and dime everything if our lead developer is selling shitty google ads :p I'm starting to think this is a Christmas prank :p

 +5%

Offline Shentist

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I totally disagree with this. It's inefficient for someone working for the blockchain to get paid by something else the blockchain. There's a reason why people are unimpressed with the bitcoin foundation and blockstream, their economic incentives and motives are difficult to gauge, and they pose (IMO) dangerous risks of centralization.

Core developers, open source wallet developers and marketers are the groups whose work most obviously benefit the blockchain directly, but there's also examples of common infrastructure for our ecosystem. If bitsharesblocks.com had its user experience reduced by ads, it would cost bitshares more in usability than the amount of delegate pay that would be saved (assuming svk will eventually set a fair market rate USD ceiling on his salary). More importantly having svk deriving all his income from a delegate position puts him under the authority of stakeholders, ensuring our long term control of the common infrastructure and thus reducing risk.

And seriously, putting google ads on your blog??? Bitshares is going to look like a bunch of hustlers trying to nickel and dime everything if our lead developer is selling shitty google ads :p I'm starting to think this is a Christmas prank :p

 +5% on a blog without much traffic. makes no sense. you should remove them for now. Bitsharesblocks don't need ads because he is elected as well.