So, most people seem to think that the "Crypto Bull" is at the door. If history is anything to go by, 2024-25 could be very good.

Of course, then there's a whole group of people moaning and groaning about "Why is Hive so undervalued?"

I'm not going to get into the details of that... it has already been discussed to death.

Do We Want to Catch This Next Wave?

So what can be done to ensure that Hive actually "catches the wave" when the surge comes, rather than getting left sadly behind? And yes, I know, "a rising tide lifts all ships."

But do we really think that's good enough?

So if we have such a great DAO and such a great community, and such great developments... what's missing? Where's the "secret sauce?" Moreover, where's the "blockage?"

I mean, we have cool things you can do here... blogging, post videos, play games, make threads and so forth. Unlike a lot of blockchain projects, Hive actually has functioning utility across a number of areas. Don't believe me? According to DappRadar, Hive is ranked 11th of all chains, in terms of number of transactions. We're also top-20 in a few other categories.

Current rankings, by transaction count Source

Of course, we talk a lot about all the great things we have going here, from INLEO to Splinterlands and beyond.

There's a problem, though... which is that we mostly talk among ourselves. Which is a bit useless. We're already sold on the idea, so it starts feeling more self-congratulatory than a sales pitch.

I am not sure what the reticence is, when it comes to Hive and publicity and public relations.

Note that I am not saying "advertising" or "marketing."

Publicity and Advertising are NOT the Same Thing!

I think what Hive really needs is an active and involved "Public Face."

I'm not talking about our individual grassroots efforts, I'm talking about a dedicated "staff" whose sole purpose is to beat down doors and get on every conceivable crypto-related news show, channel, blog, YouTube webcast, vlog and beyond, work with the information aggregators (CMC, CoinGecko, DappRadar, etc), and serve as constant liaisons to every conceivable DEX/CEX on the planet, solely for the purpose of putting "Hive" in the face of all those organizations.

Look what you get when you go on Litecoin's page on CMC:

Partial screenshot from the LTC page on Coinmarketcap Source

Is somebody doing this for Hive? Has anyone representing Hive even claimed Hive's page? And please don't give me the whole "Yeah, but we're DECENTRALIZED!" song-and-dance, like that somehow exempts us from playing the game the entire rest of the world is playing to get their slice of the pie!

It's not Like We Can't AFFORD This!

Maybe someone can set me straight here, but we have this giant DHF... why are we so gosh darn covetous of it only being for developers, and not for other things that benefit Hive, in the broader sense of the word? Why not fund a PR and Publicity effort?

Instead of this laborious process of trying to pitch individual bits of the Hive ecosystem on an individual user/developer level, why not put energy (and funding) into simply generating awareness, from a top-down perspective? If lots of people are talking about Hive and hearing about Hive... actual users will surely become curious and want to check things out!

Some of those with long memories might insist that "it's been tried before," but actually that particular Proposal (whatever happens to the record of OLD DHF proposals that have run their course and expired?) mostly got booed off stage, mostly by developers and witnesses who insisted that it should be "plenty" for Hive's users to promote the site voluntarily to put us on the world map.

What CAN Happen...

I'm going to dial up my personal "Wayback Machine" here for a moment... to sometime about 10-12 years ago, to a prior — and long failed, for unrelated reasons — site that tried the "social media for rewards" model, except their model was based on traditional VC funding and stocks.

Much like Hive, they had a good idea... and were busy going... pretty much nowhere, after fumbling around in Beta for a couple of years.

Then the two principals went on a whirlwind media blitz tour of the legacy financial media... and suddenly they were everywhere, on CNBC, CNN, The Motley Fool, Money and more; some of these clips and press releases were picked up and distributed by Reuters, UPI, AP, BusinessWire and so forth...

Unfortunately, it was a great idea, but executed without sufficient infrastructure backbone in place. Seriously bad planning! Ironically, while the project failed, remnants of their media blitz can still be found ten years later!

The site went from less than 100 new signups per week to close to a quarter million. And promptly crashed. Hard. And never fully recovered because that quarter million people had a shit experience because the site crashed.

Point here being that this surge didn't come from advertising for new users, it came from publicity and PR.

Could it be that it is something like that Hive needs, to truly get on the map? Unlike the preceding case, Hive's basic infrastructure has already been tested under fire by the Splinterlands launch, as well as the craziness of the 2017 and 2021 bull runs.

We have a lot of talent here... could such a "team" be pulled from our own ranks? Surely there are folks here with strong PR and publicity backgrounds, who understand not only how Hive works, but how the media systems work.

How Now, Brown Cow...

I look at everything we have here... and sometimes it strikes me that we have hand built this amazing "race car" that we keep fine tuning to make it world class... BUT it just sits in a garage, in a remote village in Alaska where they don't even have paved roads! And we keep assuring ourselves and each other than "people will find us."

How the EFF will they do that, if nobody even knows to look for us?

The bull market is waiting. Are we going to ride it, or are we just going to watch it sail by while we continue to complain that "nobody loves us?"

=^..=

Curator Cat, March 28th, 2024