This is interesting. Glad to see openbazaar is doing it's thing and still going.
We have our own marketplace at the IFC and it was doing really well at first when the value of steem was higher and we had a bunch of transactions and stores that opened, but ever since the value of steem dropped it's been really quiet in there..
I think that's one of the main hurdles right now, I feel like if the value of steem went back up even to just a dollar or a couple of dollars that would make a huge difference, but as long as it's below a dollar I think it makes it really difficult for business.
I still highly believe in our marketplace as well, though not sure how to really help it grow much right now with the market where it is and with steem as slow as it is..
But.. There's a few other people trying to do similar as well. I remember hearing about Dstor? And it seemed like they had a bunch of drama and not sure where that's going, there was also steembay I think? or steempay? And a few others.. There's been quite a few attempts to link steem to real world value and I think there's a tremendous amount of potential here. Also this sort of links into our other conversation about freedom and going in a new direction as I think if we had our own currency which we could set up marketplaces for and buy and sell and trade physical items.. That would be a major step towards obsoleting the old forms of power. Will that be steem? I can't say for sure, but I do think that's an important part of the equation to freeing ourselves more.
RE: Check Out My OpenBazaar Store