I came across a meme shared by @demotruk suggesting developing local Hive communities into HBD economies is more important than onboarding 10k users to Hive...
I know, I know, when there's a drama, we seem to love it here on Hive... Unfortunately for us!
That aside, my readers know I'm very much a supporter of the roots Hive grows in places like Venezuela, Ghana, the Philippines, Cuba and possibly other places, in real life, person to person (or teacher to groups), and I report on this kind of news practically weekly.
And having a place like Cumaná where there is a chance a small circular HBD economy will develop in the future is fantastic. And if other places would be able to do something similar (or in a different manner), it would be great for Hive.
This kind of expansion creates stronger ties to Hive among the local users, compared to others where Hive doesn't play an important role in their lifes and personal finances.
But stronger ties can be created by the sense of belonging to an online community (which sometimes meet in real life - Hife Fest is around the corner), provided this sentiment is instilled to new users over time. And in the social media world we live in, that becomes more of a norm than localized communities meeting online.
I understand the argument that it seems easier to grow a HBD economy when the community involved lives in a tight geographical area. And I agree with this argument.
But... there is a risk too. Localized communities are easy to track, control, and if decided, target than global, potentially anonymous users.
Let's keep in mind that in Venezuela, according to the western narrative, there is a dictator. He is benevolent now to the small HBD economy in Sucre (maybe he doesn't even know about it given its size), but what will happen if his oil sanctions would essentially be lifted? The Venezuelan economy might not need dollars then...
I'm not trying to cast a shadow on the great things happening in Sucre by imagining a potential nightmare scenario (I'm good at that), but that's why I believe our growth cannot focus only in one direction or on one type of growth.
I love to see an HBD economy grow in Sucre, but I also want to see a potential doubling of our active Hive creators from sources that target global audiences and also some local ones, from what I've seen in the Leofinance's proposal.
I'll be honest with you. I believe they set themselves a very high target. And they want active users, which will be even harder to accomplish. Hive would gain even from an unsuccessful campaign, but I'm not going to repeat the same arguments you've probably heard before.
Let's keep in mind Hive's active users (excluding votes, transactions and games) has been in the 10-15k range for as long as I remember (even on the other chain, if I'm not wrong). That's not an encouraging sign. I'd love to see that needle go to 20k for a change. Or maybe higher in the bull market.
Unfortunately, on Hive there are big egos that like to show how big they are (which is probably better than big egos hiding how big they are, lol). And often they are not just from one side, or we wouldn't have dramas all the time.