Ever since I read about Protoshares, I've always felt like Bitshares is run by the dumbest smart people in the room. As other people on the forum have said, Daniel Gordon Clark Larimer is good at R&D, but then all the other decisions are like, "please, no more cocaine, Gordon Larimer", as shares are diluted/merged, or other strange ideas. I remember reading about stuff like "Keyhotee" back in the day. I'm just sitting there like, huh, Keyhotee, what the hell is that, it sounds like Peyote, are you supposed to get high while using this program?
Having said that, through either sheer accident, or infinite monkeys with typewriters phenomenon, he's finally created something good, he just doesn't know exactly why it's good or what to do with it. First of all, Bitshares is a platform based around a blockchain, but too many people are caught up in the idea of trying to do everything on-chain. Integrating off-chain features can be what gives the on-chain features their actual value, explained below.
Since this is a multi-purpose platform, the things that you want people to use it for don't necessarily need to be the only reason someone would download it. For instance, lots of free to play video games only have a small percent of users making actual purchases, but it's still enough to make money. What I would do is the following course of action:
1) First, add a simple to use, peer to peer, off-chain, encrypted messenger that doesn't utilize 3rd party servers to Bitshares, with a non-bloated interface, something resembling Aim Lite. Possibly add an on-chain option to send offline messages for a fee as well:
2) Next, expand on this messenger functionality by allowing users to set file permissions, using both global variables for any contact, and also allowing to set more fine control per individual, giving directory access to each other. This would basically be a way more cut down and less bloated version of the program DC++, which is open source file sharing software, so might be able to have some donor code for this use.
3) Since you now have a monetary system, a dollar peg, and a file sharing system with granular control over users and permissions, you now have the backbone for users to open their own stores like GOG.com and Steam, or just individual game studios or software developers themselves operating them. Bitshares would just be the front end, while a business would have to integrate their back end into it. You of course have all the technical difficulties of monolithic vs compartmentalized approach, but I'm sure it could be sorted out somehow. The messenger friend list is just a database entry on their back end, for all intents and purposes, so a game company could just auto accept new user invites, auto share demo folders with them, then have a trigger to increase folder permissions when a purchase is made to be able to forever download the game. This could be done as easily as browsing a folder directory, then when you click it, it comes up with a message saying it requires 20 BitUSD for access to this folder, or proprietary store interface menus could be launched within the program or built in browser as well.
The free services, such as messaging and file sharing, would attract one spectrum of users, while the business infrastructure, also built on the same backbone as the free services for people opening their own stores, would attract many other types of users. An increase in users means more likelihood of people using things like BitUSD, decentralized exchanges, or just the monetary system in general, which increases the price of each share. This also has the side effect of drastically increasing network security since, for instance, a game developer who sells something on the platform would probably run as a delegate as well, then you end up with the non-anonymous, NGO DPoS model indirectly that people such as Tim Swanson talk about.
This is the main strength of the Bitshares platform I see at the moment, it just requires integration of some peer to peer off-chain services. Bitshares 2.0 should be a much more powerful platform than anything else out, with the possible exception of Emunie (but I'm not convinced Emunie will work at all), so it's not hard to imagine each Bitshare being worth a dollar each within a year or two if a plan like this can be developed and reach success.
Topic: I'm going to make all of you rich (Read 4702 times)
