Most people on the internet have at least two services they subscribe to, charged monthly or yearly based on individual preference.
About a week ago, I did a personal finance review. I found that I was spending way too much money on “entertainments” and also discovered that I was strangely keeping an active subscription of services that aren't contributing monetary returns.
It was time to review why this was possible because I don't consider myself very comfortable financially, so how was I able to pay for these services without giving much thought to them every single month?
Truth is, I figured that these things simply became a habit, and as humans, we always find ways to feed our habits.
For instance, most people have the habit of consuming Soda, including myself and I found that if I cut my Soda intake, I could afford to pay for at least 3 more services online.
Why am I talking about subscriptions and habits?
I'm talking about it because I want every author that reads this to think of what's to be proposed here as something that would give them the same satisfaction as any habit would (because it will eventually become a habit) +, but also understand that this could be far more rewarding as it is an investment in ourselves, given that Hive's growth benefits authors too.
The funding problem
As an ecosystem that is big on staying decentralized, funding is something that has to be crowdsourced as opposed to VCs, which is what most other crypto projects rely on.
When it comes to Hive, the primary funding source we have is the Decentralized Hive Fund(DHF) @hivefund. According data from Peakd, $15,524.741(HBD) is paid out daily to fund Hive projects.
12,000 HBD, which is 77.3% of said amount goes to HBD stabilizer, an automated market maker to stabilize the price of HBD, which sends back these funds, generally with profits, so if we remove this amount, we have $3,524.741(HBD) actually funding Hive projects.
In a year, that's about $1,286,530.465. Of course, this number can change if new projects get funded or if some drop out of funding by either the return proposal receiving more votes or the individual proposals losing votes(support) for whatever reason, but as of today, this is the number we have.
Clearly, this isn't a lot of money, especially in comparison with the rest of the cryptocurrency ecosystem. That said, there are always going to be many projects that may not be able to access DHF funding or sometimes, the DHF funding may not be enough.
This possibility is a direct threat to these projects. Of course, right now we don't seem to have cases as extreme that I know of, but that doesn't take away from the fact that the community has to come together to acknowledge that to preserve our decentralization and ensure continuous growth, we have to figure out ways to support builders to build.
What you can do as an author
You know how in traditional economies there's these little guys at the middle to bottom of the chain that does a lot that contributes significantly to the stability and growth of said economies?
Here on Hive, authors are those guys. Now I know that you immediately might reflect on how the referenced people are generally not appreciated, but it's different when it comes to decentralized economies as Hive, growth here benefits everyone.
So what can you do as an author?
On Hive, as an author, you play a significant role in the expansion of the network's economy. The hive’s reward pool is how you do this.
When you post text to the chain, you create a means to move value across the ecosystem. Curators are in charge of handing this value to you based on several individual factors.
However, you have a say in the process.
About 11 days ago, I started an experiment on my account.
I wanted to redirect some of the rewards I earn as an author to projects I believe are working to make Hive great.
When I had this thought, I first reflected on the United States approach to a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve. The strategy in play is a budget-neutral way of acquiring more Bitcoin.
From an individual perspective, it's a way of saying “how can I pay for something new without touching my money.”
On Hive, everyone knows that you don't actually own any rewards that may show up on your articles or comments until they are paid out. So technically, said rewards are budget-neutral while pending and given that the actual amount is not determinable beforehand, it creates a scenario where the upside of how much can be given out is technically “infinite.”
So far, I have 8 days records of payout outs and I was very actively creating in said week and I like what I discovered.
Personally, here's what am doing to fund projects I believe are working hard for Hive and you can directly copy this or adjust to what you're comfortable with.
I set my author payouts, even this very post, to pay out to 3 to 4 different accounts from mine.
3 of said accounts is @leofinance @poshtoken and @null.
Leofinance and Poshtoken receive 5% each and null receives 2% of the author rewards since June 11 and that will continue. Every single post I make includes these accounts as beneficiaries.
This means that I redirect 12% of my rewards to these accounts, and sometimes my curators receive an additional 4% but that's not a consistent case and not very relevant here.
In said 8 days.
POSH and INLEO have received $1.63935 while the @null account, which burns the rewards, received $0.65574.
These values may appear little until you realize that in a year, both projects would have received $150 in total and null would have burned $30.
This is just from one account. If all Hive curators did this, we would individually be able to direct funding up to $150,000 to projects and burn $30,000 from the rewards pool.
I know this because as of 2024, there are 15,000 creators, earning on average 500 Hive in a year, so even the lowest earning authors could contribute $10 to project funding and $2 to be burned. These creators stats are from “dalz’s 2024 report”
Of course, technically speaking, the real value of rewards redirected can be significantly higher or lower due to several factors including Hive's price since prices here are based on $0.20 per Hive token, which may not always be the case.
Also, individually, as authors, we can choose to adjust the percentage overtime as we deem necessary.
The important thing is that we can direct as little as 5% of our rewards(voluntarily) and it would add to something significant to aid these projects building on Hive.
As an author, we can make small steps that matter. Remember, this is a blockchain economy, we have to grow accustomed to crowdfunding because the alternative is forced taxation, and last time I checked, we all are running from the system that does this because it isn't right and it generally makes the funded parties unaccountable.
On June 20 or 21, when 365 days of payouts would have rolled in, I will look over the numbers and write another article to report on how much I've personally been able to redirect to these projects and burning.