RE: Steemit Update
It's great if you can use different API endpoints; basically this is what a decentralized infrastructure should offer, anyway. However, when it comes to running API endpoints and other services reliably and at scale - so that other (professional) services can depend on them - it's not a simple operational task and it certainly isn't cheap.
I suppose it's important that we start stressing actual business models on top of Steem. If anybody is running an actual business that doesn't take its revenues from the reward pool, that person or organization would have an intrinsic motivation to have its own infrastructure under control, therefore could run it and potentially offer to outsiders, as well. Is anybody out there?
The next question then is: would anybody be willing to pay for API services to access and interact with the Steem blockchain? Would that make a business model of its own?
Hi @grintsch! We're building @dstors and I can tell you that our revenue model is not based on taking out of the reward pool. On the contrary, the objective is to distribute the existing reward pool to those on the blockchain who perform any and all economic activities related to their sales through their own @dstors. You can peruse the executive summary of the whitepaper that was released a few days ago on our blog. Yes, we're out there! Focused exclusively on giving back to the users as much as possible while introducing new models of interaction with the blockchain beyond what steemit.com initially offered through blogging.
Right, thanks for pointing that out. Great to see that, and I'll definitely check out your site and material.