Cryptocurrency is filled with people who think in millions. This is no a great surprise since we do have a market. Mooning and Lambos are the talk, especially when the bull is running.
At the same time, people look at platforms like Facebook. That system has roughly 2.8 billion users. Of course, if something like Hive could do that, think of how much it would be worth.
This is the mindset many have. Nevertheless, if we sit down and truly look at the numbers, we can see how quickly things can change. Instead of trying to become the next Facebook, why not focus upon a growth rate that will radically change things?
For this reason, let us consider what Hive will look like with 100K users.
How Small Hive Truly Is
We first must take into account how small Hive truly is. This is reflected upon each area of our ecosystem.
Right now, Coingecko has Hive's market cap listed at $414 million. No matter how you slice it, this is a decent chunk of change.
The next point to reference is the existing user base. According to @penguinpablo's latest post, there are 15K-16K accounts that are transacting daily. Keep in mind this is accounts, not necessarily users.
So how many actually users (people) are on Hive each day? This is going to take some guessing but we can presume it is between 6K-8K. These are people who utilize one of the core features: posting, commenting, or upvoting. Naturally, we are seeking those who engage manually.
Framing the discussion in this manner shows how tiny Hive truly is. Yet, it still is worth over $400 million based upon market pricing. Here is where everyone involved should get very excited.
What Does 100K Users Look Like
We can figured that 100K daily users would be an increase of 12-15 times. From a growth perspective this is enormous but the raw numbers are not that large, especially online.
The most obvious example for Hive in this area is Splinterlands. That game was able to grow significantly, providing huge value. Since the project keeps evolving, we see the numbers getting bigger.
According to Peakmonsters, here is the number of players the game has each day.
As we can see, the daily average is around 360K players. Obviously, even though Splinterlands does post to Hive via custom JSON, the numbers are not in the total we are referring to.
Nevertheless, it does give us a baseline to formulate our framework. Look at the value generated by this game over the past year. With 360K daily players along with others who are investors, we see the value of assets associated with the game into the hundreds of millions of dollars. Is there anyone who does not feel, the way things are going, that it will hit $1 billion at some point this year?
For the sake of our discussion, we simply are looking to pull the core on chain activities up to 100K daily users. This is a fraction of what Splinterlands is doing, a total that is likely to keep rising over time.
Of course, it seems like a tall order at this time but is it really?
Fraction Of Traffic Available
When you think about it, 100K users is not a large number on the Internet. For that reason, we will provide a bit of contrast.
Here is a look at the statistics for SeekingAlpha. Many might not be familiar with that site since it focuses exclusively on financial content. This is a large market yet it is still niche in nature.
From this chart, we can see how many visitors they get each month.
This is much higher than the level we are discussing. Of course, we have to keep in mind this is visits so it is not exactly apples-to-apples. However, we can get an idea of how much is really out there.
Let us look at one more.
How about the site Digital Camera World? This is one that is rather niche while not being a household name.
As we can see, the numbers can get rather large, very easily. Neither site truly focuses upon engagement and, of course, does not have any incentive mechanisms in place. Web 3.0 is going to change what content consumers look for in a website.
Multi-Billions
We know the market is not the best at judging value. Not long ago, the market cap of HIVE was over $1 billion. The change in the overall market means that we saw a big fallback from that level.
For that reason, it is best to look at some other metrics to forecast what things might look like. Users are the basis for all online activity and valuations. Therefore, the key is to keep increasing all on-chain activity. This will help to further drive things up.
It is best to start with the basic engagement. Again, going to the charts, we see the present activity level.
The number of posts (including comments) is sitting around 30K per day. Ignoring the 12X-15X for a moment, can we see this do a 5X or 6X from these levels? If we see a massive increase in the users base, does that result in much higher levels of engagement?
That is very likely. We know things online do not operate on a linear scale. As more activity is generated, it creates a giant feedback loop. Others who are involved have more to engage with. This starts to balloon as "conversations" and other forms of activity grow.
Hence, we could be looking at levels of between 150K-180K per day. That is a lot of content to be generating online. Considering most of the activity is done through 3 frontends, we can easily envision how those will improve in rank.
What does this mean for the value of the entire Hive ecosystem?
Since there are so many different layers to what is being developed here, the impact would be massive. Not only would the value of the base token (HIVE) shoot up, but also many of the second layer projects. It is difficult for one to get involved without participating in a few different communities.
The Need For Resource Credits
Hive operates based upon a system where every on-chain activity is quantified. Thus, to operate, Resource Credits are needed. This only come about as a result of staking the token (powering up).
This means the governance token, HIVE, is also used to access the features of the blockchain. Here we see the hidden gem. As users increase, the demand for the token has to follow a similar pattern. Even with the upcoming implementation of Resource Credit delegation, someone still has to stake the HIVE.
If there is a 5X-6X increase in activity, will there be a similar demand on the token? Since most of that activity will come from newer users, it only stands to reason. People are going to be forced to get the ability to interact with the blockchain. That means someone is going to have to provide Resource Credits.
All of this means the market cap of HIVE will likely hit the multi-billion level. There is simply no way around it. As more people engage, the need for HIVE grows. It is a fundamental aspect to the ecosystem.
Of course, an appreciating token price tends push people to wanting more. Of these newer users, how many will want to add above what it simply takes to operate? It only makes sense that a fair portion will seek to grow their holdings.
Ultimately, this is where communities enter the picture. Pulling over 90K more people to Hive is a tall order. However, attracting those who are interested in finance, technology, business building, or Axie Infinity is a much different story. Each of these groups can serve to increase the number of users.
That said, if we are really going to hit the honeypot, we might see the formation of groups that focus upon politics, sports, or entertainment. These are enormous markets that are yet untouched by the Hive community. Big numbers come from tapping into people's passions and, it is safe to say, people are passionate (neurotic) about these.
It might be difficult to envision but Hive with 100K users would really see things expanding to some rather high levels. Here we can see how this is still nothing compared to Ethereum or some of the other blockchains out there. However, that is the value of this niche. Hive can be a tremendous success even targeting 100K users.
And then, from there, the goal could be to move towards 1 million.
This will send the token price skyrocketing.
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