Ever since I joined steem world, everyone's biggest concern was how we will make steem known to the masses. Mass adoption is probably the most used pair of words in the vast majority of the articles someone can find stored on the steem blockchain.
There are even cases where people get so obsessed about this whole "mass adoption thing" that forget the real reason why steem doesn't have those millions of users already...at least in my opinion.
It's because we still haven't figured it out what steem actually is...
We want mass adoption, right? Right.
Now tell me this. Do we want the average Facebook - Instagram user here? Of course we do. Masses are hanging around over there and probably have no clue that we even exist, or that they could do the exact same thing that they have been doing over there for so many years for free, here, while getting paid. Right?
Or maybe...wrong?
You see when money is involved somehow things are getting a bit confusing. And while we all want steem to attract those millions of users, on the other hand I am not really sure that the vast majority of the proponents of the "operation mass adoption" will be happy if we ever get there.
Why, you may ask...
I'll tell you why. When was the last time you scrolled down your feed on Facebook? Oh...I forgot...you've deleted you Facebook account, right? Well I haven't. It's still active...but I haven't logged in in months now...
A few hours ago I said to myself..."What the hell, let's see what's going on over there after so many months."
I spent about 20 minutes scrolling down my feed and to be honest with you all it was fun. Watched a few funny vlogs...read some 2-3 line "blogs"... also had some fun reading comments (a lot of fun actually) and overall it was a nice break for steem.
Now imagine those very same users here. On this very platform. Do you really think that the average user, -because when we refer to the masses we are talking about the average person out there- uses Facebook or Instagram to read top notch articles and super quality stuff. Because you are highly mistaken if you do think so.
People use these platforms to have fun, as a break from the often cruel reality. Do you really think that if the average user makes a steem account will suddenly transform himself into a philosopher or a writer or anything of the sort? NO THEY WON'T! Period.
Do you think they'll cite images and sources and pro freed and spend hours to "decorate" their blogs?
No they won't. They are not used to "our" way. And of course it wouldn't matter if money wasn't involved....
There are dozens of "Facebook type" blogs around here...Are you upvoting those authors? NO? Why?
Because we think that they don't deserve to be rewarded, right? They didn't spend much time...and effort...and sweat...
Well, I have a feeling that first and foremost we need to sort it out what kind of users are we trying to onboard...
Because when/if the average user join us, they give it a shot for a few days, and when they realize that in order to be rewarded they need to spend a couple of years to do things right, they'll say "goodbye" and never look back...exactly the very same way hundreds have done up until now...
Maybe we should finally decide what's the best way we should promote steem? Just saying...
Feel free to share your thoughts in the comment section below...