Anyone else keeping an eye on VOAT.CO?

[marcosluna]

Good idea, I like Voat!

[Ander]

I would love to see Bitshares integrate with Voat. 

Reddit failed at cryptocurrency, and then they shadowbanned us all for posting bitshares comments and upvoting them.

I want to see reddit die and voat supplant it.

[Ander]

I want to use Voat.  But they are down right now due to having too many new users!

[Permie]

I think trying to convince them to change their business from a social media site into a regulated-up-the-arse gateway would be a very tough sell.

Although if they accepted fiat for 'membership' or whatever, then they may be able to use that banking relationship to convert small amounts to bitAssets.

1. Brownie points system of upvotes. Upvotes give "karma" as well as allow premium Voat purchases (like reddit gold, but more sophisticated). Maybe they can imitate Team Fortress and sell "hats", like flair or special avatars that only threshold-level users can access.

2. Lease server time from BunkerMining on a dynamic basis. Could their system be programmed to quickly purchase additional servers during peak hours? A way to efficiently manage their server costs would be AMAZING.

3. Voat want to avoid censorship, reddit's downfall. How can bts help in this respect? Could /v/ subvoats(?) utilise Dynamic Account Permissions so that only the moderators of that sub can censor, taking power away from Voat admins? BitID could help with this.

4. User logins. BitID to save time logging in. Could UIAs be used to back up user data? I'm thinking of a system where a bitID maps to a basket of UIAs that track #posts, upvotes, premium membership etc. I know hosting data on the blockchain is expensive but it may be in Voat's interest to pay the fees. "Your account data will never be lost and is only accessbile by you!" would be a great selling point.

Any critiques on the ideas I've already posted?
Any additional ways they could monetize with bts?

I think this is a golden opportunity - how often is there even talk of a 'mass migration' from one social media site to another? Incumbents like reddit already have the users, so there's less desire for them to innovate to gain more. Voat has the incentive to grow and profit as fast as possible.
They're a startup, so should have a lot of leeway in the direction they take. We should be lobbying them to integrate BitShares

[yellowecho]

yeah, but they need to figure out their growing pains.

I run v/smartcoin

Getting them to integrate bitshares at the same time as building their system could be a good thing though, couldn't it?
It would save them the hassle of re-doing work once they decide to integrate bitshares. Bts could get in on the ground floor. Voat is struggling to keep up with demand and needs funding to improve. They are currently asking for donations, but a way to really monetize their product would probably be received very well.
From sticked thread on Voat.co
https://voat.co/v/announcements/comments/194043

Voat is currently getting hit with a huge amount of traffic as a direct result of recent changes happening over at that other place.
Everyone, we’re sorry. We’re both sad to see what we once loved change in this manner, but we’re also excited about the future, but our future won't be traveling down this same path.
We won’t be getting any sleep tonight (again) and we are doing everything we can to handle the traffic.
Our budget is limited but we’ll make sure to fight to the last penny in order to keep Voat alive for this community. If you want to donate, well, now is the time. Our bitcoin address is 1C4Q1RvUb3bzk4aaLVgGccnSnaHYFdESzY.

If we can get some solid ideas for how they can use bts, I shall approach them and try and get them into a thread for discussion.
Reddit failed to integrate bitcoin into tipping, as they sacked the enginerr who was working on it - although they guy seemed to be doing well and had high hopes for how crypto could enhance the user experience

1. Brownie points system of upvotes. Upvotes give "karma" as well as allow premium Voat purchases (like reddit gold, but more sophisticated). Maybe they can imitate Team Fortress and sell "hats", like flair or special avatars that only threshold-level users can access.

2. Lease server time from BunkerMining on a dynamic basis. Could their system be programmed to quickly purchase additional servers during peak hours? A way to efficiently manage their server costs would be AMAZING.

3. Voat want to avoid censorship, reddit's downfall. How can bts help in this respect? Could /v/ subvoats(?) utilise Dynamic Account Permissions so that only the moderators of that sub can censor, taking power away from Voat admins? BitID could help with this.

4. User logins. BitID to save time logging in. Could UIAs be used to back up user data? I'm thinking of a system where a bitID maps to a basket of UIAs that track #posts, upvotes, premium membership etc. I know hosting data on the blockchain is expensive but it may be in Voat's interest to pay the fees. "Your account data will never be lost and is only accessbile by you!" would be a great selling point.

Any ideas?

Yes these are good idea ! I feel that if we want them on board we would need something that can make them money so they can become sustainable.

If they became a gateway, they would do very well since they'd get a cut of every new user.

[rgcrypto]

yeah, but they need to figure out their growing pains.

I run v/smartcoin

Getting them to integrate bitshares at the same time as building their system could be a good thing though, couldn't it?
It would save them the hassle of re-doing work once they decide to integrate bitshares. Bts could get in on the ground floor. Voat is struggling to keep up with demand and needs funding to improve. They are currently asking for donations, but a way to really monetize their product would probably be received very well.
From sticked thread on Voat.co
https://voat.co/v/announcements/comments/194043

Voat is currently getting hit with a huge amount of traffic as a direct result of recent changes happening over at that other place.
Everyone, we’re sorry. We’re both sad to see what we once loved change in this manner, but we’re also excited about the future, but our future won't be traveling down this same path.
We won’t be getting any sleep tonight (again) and we are doing everything we can to handle the traffic.
Our budget is limited but we’ll make sure to fight to the last penny in order to keep Voat alive for this community. If you want to donate, well, now is the time. Our bitcoin address is 1C4Q1RvUb3bzk4aaLVgGccnSnaHYFdESzY.

If we can get some solid ideas for how they can use bts, I shall approach them and try and get them into a thread for discussion.
Reddit failed to integrate bitcoin into tipping, as they sacked the enginerr who was working on it - although they guy seemed to be doing well and had high hopes for how crypto could enhance the user experience

1. Brownie points system of upvotes. Upvotes give "karma" as well as allow premium Voat purchases (like reddit gold, but more sophisticated). Maybe they can imitate Team Fortress and sell "hats", like flair or special avatars that only threshold-level users can access.

2. Lease server time from BunkerMining on a dynamic basis. Could their system be programmed to quickly purchase additional servers during peak hours? A way to efficiently manage their server costs would be AMAZING.

3. Voat want to avoid censorship, reddit's downfall. How can bts help in this respect? Could /v/ subvoats(?) utilise Dynamic Account Permissions so that only the moderators of that sub can censor, taking power away from Voat admins? BitID could help with this.

4. User logins. BitID to save time logging in. Could UIAs be used to back up user data? I'm thinking of a system where a bitID maps to a basket of UIAs that track #posts, upvotes, premium membership etc. I know hosting data on the blockchain is expensive but it may be in Voat's interest to pay the fees. "Your account data will never be lost and is only accessbile by you!" would be a great selling point.

Any ideas?

Yes these are good idea ! I feel that if we want them on board we would need something that can make them money so they can become sustainable.

[yellowecho]

Some great ideas so far, Permie!

[Permie]

yeah, but they need to figure out their growing pains.

I run v/smartcoin

Getting them to integrate bitshares at the same time as building their system could be a good thing though, couldn't it?
It would save them the hassle of re-doing work once they decide to integrate bitshares. Bts could get in on the ground floor. Voat is struggling to keep up with demand and needs funding to improve. They are currently asking for donations, but a way to really monetize their product would probably be received very well.
From sticked thread on Voat.co
https://voat.co/v/announcements/comments/194043

Voat is currently getting hit with a huge amount of traffic as a direct result of recent changes happening over at that other place.
Everyone, we’re sorry. We’re both sad to see what we once loved change in this manner, but we’re also excited about the future, but our future won't be traveling down this same path.
We won’t be getting any sleep tonight (again) and we are doing everything we can to handle the traffic.
Our budget is limited but we’ll make sure to fight to the last penny in order to keep Voat alive for this community. If you want to donate, well, now is the time. Our bitcoin address is 1C4Q1RvUb3bzk4aaLVgGccnSnaHYFdESzY.

If we can get some solid ideas for how they can use bts, I shall approach them and try and get them into a thread for discussion.
Reddit failed to integrate bitcoin into tipping, as they sacked the enginerr who was working on it - although they guy seemed to be doing well and had high hopes for how crypto could enhance the user experience

1. Brownie points system of upvotes. Upvotes give "karma" as well as allow premium Voat purchases (like reddit gold, but more sophisticated). Maybe they can imitate Team Fortress and sell "hats", like flair or special avatars that only threshold-level users can access.

2. Lease server time from BunkerMining on a dynamic basis. Could their system be programmed to quickly purchase additional servers during peak hours? A way to efficiently manage their server costs would be AMAZING.

3. Voat want to avoid censorship, reddit's downfall. How can bts help in this respect? Could /v/ subvoats(?) utilise Dynamic Account Permissions so that only the moderators of that sub can censor, taking power away from Voat admins? BitID could help with this.

4. User logins. BitID to save time logging in. Could UIAs be used to back up user data? I'm thinking of a system where a bitID maps to a basket of UIAs that track #posts, upvotes, premium membership etc. I know hosting data on the blockchain is expensive but it may be in Voat's interest to pay the fees. "Your account data will never be lost and is only accessbile by you!" would be a great selling point.

Any ideas?

[fav]

yeah, but they need to figure out their growing pains.

I run v/smartcoin

[yellowecho]

From their wiki:

In June 2015, Voat had both its web hosting and PayPal accounts closed due to content on the site. Co-founder Atif Colo said, "we will have to carefully evaluate our long-term options of providing a platform of free speech if we are to stay online."

Unlike PayPal, BitShares account would be protected from seizure or closing. 

Seems the FollowMyVote crew could also have some opportunities.. plus Voat is a cool name.

How do we integrate tipping?

Not sure but it's open source so someone smarter than me could figure it out.

[rgcrypto]

How do we integrate tipping?

[clayop]

Extremely awesome idea!

[yellowecho]

The web traffic is impressive: https://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=voat.co

If it becomes a viable alternative to Reddit, there could be some business opportunities for BitShares such as integrating tipping with bitUSD early in the game and taking advantage of a first-mover network effect.  Thoughts?