Subsocial- A Blockchain-Powered Social Platform

Sep 28

Subsocial is a blockchain-powered open platform that offers decentralized censorship-resistant social networks and marketplaces. You can think of it as a unified version of Facebook, Medium, Twitter, etc with the concept of decentralization, privacy, and monetary value. It will work as a Parachain in the Polkadot ecosystem and use the Substrate blockchain framework and IPFS technology for decentralized file storage.

The project aims to resolve the existing issues with the centralized social platforms i.e censorship, selling of users’ private data, and the lack of monetization for content creators. The project code is open-source and highly customizable that will allow users to customize it as per their needs.

Users can create space and defines rules for it. These rules will decide who will be able to write posts, delete, or edit them. They can also set whether they will be the sole owner of the space or any other users will share the space permission. Space owners can also issue tokens that will be used for voting, giving access to private content, or can be traded for other tokens of the Polkadot ecosystem.

These spaces can even act like a DAO community, allowing the community members to change/upgrade the community rules and running its operation and governance.

Subsocial Components

The Subsocial interface comprises spaces, posts, comments, likes, and follows. These words sound familiar to you all as we have come across them while using any existing social media platform. You may think

Spaces are similar to:

· Publications on Medium

· groups or pages on Facebook,

· Accounts on Twitter and Instagram,

· Channels on YouTube,

· Servers on Discord

And, Posts are similar to:

· Posts on Facebook,

· Articles on Medium,

· Tweets on Twitter.

Pic Source

Token utility

The project has a native token named, SUB with a total supply of 100m tokens. It has multiple use cases in the Subsocial platform. Below are the main utilities of the platform token:

· Pay for transactions

· Content Monetization

o   Tips
o   Subscriptions
o   Sell or rent your space

· Deploy smart contracts

· Provide access to special contents (special spaces)

· Deploy new tokens (Users who wish to purchase tokens of a particular space need to hold Subsocial main tokens)

· Governance

· Collators need to hold SUB tokens to run a network validator node of the Subsocial parachain

How You Can Use And Earn SUB Token

Users can sign in to the Subsocial dapp that is live on testnet by visiting this link. You need a Polkadot.js extension to access the platform and sign in your transactions.

Here is a golden chance for you to earn some SUB tokens. The platform has planned to distribute 100 SUB tokens to certain account holders, out of which it has already airdropped 10 SUB tokens, and the rest 90 SUB tokens will be distributed over the next 3-6 months. The first round is already over, and the next token drop will take place anytime before October 10th, 2021.

Who Are Eligible For Drop

Below are the rules listed by the platform to be eligible for the token drop:

· Two account snapshots of DOT and KSM holders will be taken during April 15th and May 21st, 2021. Only those accounts are eligible who holds at least 1DOT or 0.1 KSM during both snapshots

· Users who participate in winning Kusama crowd loans are also eligible

· Crowdloan contributions done through exchanges and wallet balances on exchanges are not eligibility

· Claims must be done before vesting begins, or until 10,000 claims have been made

Monetization

Subsocial allows the users to monetize their content. The platform offers the following features to support the content creators to make money:

·       Tips- If you like any post or comment, then you can reward the author by using the tip
·       Message-delivering tips- Pay a tip to pin and highlight the comment. Space owners can set the price for these tips. The more popular the space owner is, the more will be his space to grab attention
·       Subscriptions- Subsocial offers the subscription features that will help the content creators to increase their fan base and connect with them closely
·       Sell or Rent your Content- Post author can rent their popular post to another space and can even move it to other user’s blogs with complete control over it.
·       Future Plans- The platform planned to implement some additional features like pay-per-view, shared monetization for content with multiple authors, and deployment of smart contracts that will introduce more advanced payment features in future
·       Ads- sell advertisement slots directly without any third party. On-chain and fully controlled by you

Supporters

The Subsocial platform is supported by many big names from the blockchain industry like Master Ventures, Alameda Research, and many more.

Recognition

Subsocial is one of the active members of the Polkadot Ecosystem. The project has received two technical grants from Web3 Foundation. It has been selected by Parity to participate in Substrate Builders Program.

The project seems to be quite innovative. It is giving spaces for free to major Polkadot projects. If it can bring them into its platform, then it can be a huge hit.

Resources: Subsocial Blog