A couple of thoughts regarding the 'Proof of Publishing' protocol, especially the opening sentence:
"Let’s Talk Bitcoin is a content distribution network, the value comes largely from the content being published on our network, for the network audience to enjoy. "
I think it's essential at this stage that we agree where the value is created in the publishing process.
Is it the content that's valuable by itself (and then measured by the amount of information generated - from text being the least information dense to video being the most information dense)?
Or is the the subjective impression of value generated by that content in people's minds that really matters. (measured in attention, engagement, traffic, tips received, shares etc)
This is a key question in the 'subjective vs objective' theory of value debate and in my view it's very relevant to what we want to achieve with LTB coin.
To illustrate my point I'd ask a simple question:
What generates more value for the LTB network?
a) a 140 character post by Satoshi Nakamoto - who resurfaces exclusively on the LTB network - resulting in a huge wave of publicity, reddit posts etc. (not gonna happen but just imagine that for a sec)
b) a 2 hour 1080p video show by an average bitcoiner that goes unnoticed - zero views
Most of you would agree that 'a' is a correct answer. That's because content's value imho lies in perception of users and NOT really the type or amount of content itself.
To give you another example - lots of 'soon-to-be-viral' videos go unnoticed for months with only a handful of views and then get discovered by some social media celeb, shared and suddenly get millions of views. Where these videos valuable from the very beginning? Or just became valuable only when they generated a few seconds of entertainment for the actual person watching it? We come back to the 'objective vs subjective' theory again.
Personally, I'd argue that we should try to align incentives more with the 'perception side' rather the 'production side' only.
Don't get me wrong - I'm not advocating for a purely pageview based model, as clicks are not the best indicator of value, it often leads to linkbaiting etc and other plagues of modern CPM based media.
However, we could open up a discussion and come up with a formula for estimating the 'subjective value' of LTB content.
Existing solutions have their issues (views, clicks, shares, comments) as these can be easily inflated for free, but combining them with more innovative approaches could be the solution i.e
- sharing + tipping an individual piece of content rewards you and creators (split tbd) with more LTBcoin than just sharing
or we could go even further
- sharing + tipping an individual piece of content at the beginning of its lifecycle would get you more rewards than sharing + tipping later on (people who discover & share new stuff deliver more value that the ones who repost old memes)
or even
- by sharing + tipping an individual piece of content that later becomes successful you get more rewards than sharing + tipping content that goes unnoticed by others. In this approach we treat publishing of every piece of content as an 'IPO' and early tippers & sharers get more stake in it's future success - represented in LTBcoin.
These are just rough ideas - some easier to implement than others. Just wanted to really open up a discussion and hear everyone's opinions.
Thanks Adam for the enormous amount of work you put in this project. I'll be buying some LTBcoin for sure!
