For anyone who doesn't already know, Justin Sun of TRON has purchased Steemit Inc. This was announced yesterday via a Twitter post and a Medium post, with very little information at all. This morning, Ned Scott & Justin did a live video, which I was watching. Here's my notes as it went, with a list of relevant posts at the bottom.
Here's my notes while watching the video
First off, it should tell you something that they decided to do this AMA on dlive, a Chinese company that started themselves on Steem in order to use our rewards system to get people to use their app, and then quickly left the Steem ecosystem for their own centralized platform, attempting to steal as many of the Steem users as they could.
It literally took Ned 10 minutes to ever once mention that Steem is a blockchain, and that it is a totally different thing than Steemit.
He talks about how "the company continued to integrate all these products"... What products? All the dApps on Steem were created by the community, not by Steemit (the company)... If you didn't already realize it, Ned doesn't actually understand that Steemit isn't Steem and doesn't own Steem.
Justin goes into explaining his interest in social media, and goes into some explanations of BitTorrent, which TRON purchased, and again sort of confusing the .torrent protocol and the company: BitTorrent Inc.
Next he goes into how TRON is working with dlive, then moves onto how they work with Poloniex, a crypto exchange that most everyone walked away from a LONG time ago because of their shady dealings.
Justin says that there will not be a token swap anytime soon. No further details yet.
He consistently refers to the "steem token," something that doesn't exist. It's unclear whether he is referring to STEEM or the Tron-Steem-Token that was referred to in their Medium post.
After 10 minutes of introductions and a solid 15 minute sales pitch, Justin finally opens it up for questions...
Q: For investors, what will the price merge [sic] look like for STEEM holders?
A: No immediate plan for token swap, STEEM & TRON will stay separate for now. Says that Steem doesn't have smart contracts... (Does that mean SMTs are definitely not a thing? Sounds like it.)
Q: We poured our hearts into the Steem blockchain, are you going to take it away from us?
A: No, I see a win-win solution. Since the announcement, the price of steem is up. (Duh) Blah blah, win-win, nothing really said.
Ned brings it back to talking about Justin for another 10+ minutes as the comments blow up with people wondering why this was referred to as an AMA. Apparently he worked at Ripple starting back in 2013(?)... Again, not a good sign that he was working with the Bankers' own crypto. Ned & Justin were both born in the year of the horse... Super relevant... Positive changes, blah blah blah.
Ned gives a message to the "Steemit Community" about how this is the "20th" time we've faced something like this... I didn't know Steemit Inc had a community, and reminding everyone how many times he's left everyone high & dry is maybe not a great idea.
Q: Justin will you be using your stake to vote on content or witnesses?
A: No plans to right now. Want to keep existing structure and team as it is.
Q: Will you be at SteemFest?
A: Sounds like a yes
Q: What's the giveaway for the TRX holders?
A: He believes "in the future" they will find a plan to connect TRON & Steem... More interaction, more users, more feedback... No real information.
Next they are sharing how Steem users can connect with TRON by using BitTorrent, or dlive (that project that took millions out of the STEEM ecosystem...)
Q: What about SMTs?
A: If team is ready for SMT, we will release it. We're looking forward to seeing if we can release it. It's been worked on for so long, we want to release it.
He goes onto talking about "features" to be released next week. It's going to be "awesome." Most likely referring to Communities.
So... 52 minutes total, and they answered 6 or 7 actual questions...
Now it's time for the top 20 witnesses to discuss what this all means, over on @Aggroed's MSP-Waves broadcast. I'm going to let those folks give you their opinions & ideas themselves.
Overall sense of the video
I feel better about this than I did yesterday, it doesn't sound like they're going to try anything too crazy right away, and the fact that Justin specifically said that they won't be using the SteemitInc stake to vote on content or pick their own witnesses is great.
Here's what the market had to say about the first news, and over the course of the video...
Image Source
It sounded like Justin most likely doesn't quite understand the difference between Steemit.com/SteemitInc, the Steem blockchain itself, the STEEM token, and the many dApps that have been built on the Steem blockchain. He said a few things about dApps specifically, that made it seem like he thought they were something that he owns now too.
Anyway, like I said I feel a bit better about this after the video, but not much. If they try to move Steem onto the TRON blockchain, attempt to centralize Steem, or otherwise go against what makes this place great, I will be removing 100% of my content from their platform, and will be supporting a community-driven Hard-Fork, as many witnesses have already discussed.
Learn More
Post-Video
- Most Recent: Steem - The Confusion Continues... Justin Sun deletes latest Tweet by @jrcornel
- Justin says Steemit is migrating to Tron: Time to Panic or Things will be OK for Now? by @aggroed
- Justin Sun & Ned Scott AMA Recording including chat and Steem chart by @acidyo
- Justin Sun - Ned AMA + STEEM Price by @firepower
- It Is A Great Time To Be Involved With Steem: Post AMA Video by @taskmaster4450
- How are all my Chicken Littles doing? by @edicted
- My Thoughts About TRON - Steemit Partnership by @dragosroua
- Thoughts On The Future of STEEM by @theycallmedan
- Witness Update from @c0ff33a Steem Blockchain and Steemit Inc with Tron by @c0ff33a
- Steem + Tron Thoughts: The Best We Could Have Hoped For by @midlet
- Predicting the Future of STEEM and TRON by @buggedout
- Toward a smile or a frown by @tarazkp
Pre-Video
- STEEM is still not Steemit, even if Tron buys Steemit. by @LukeStokes
- Justin Sun bought STEEMIT and is trying to convince everyone that he bought STEEM by @lordbutterfly
- Steem Classic, anyone? by @liberosist
- Steemit / Tron Announcement by @Splinterlands
- Regarding Steem and Tron by @vimm
- Did Justin Sun Jump The Gun A Bit? by @taskmaster4450
- I guess I have to talk about the Tron thing? by @edicted
- My opinions on the Tron news by @themarkymark
- Steem? Tron? Ston? Treem?- confusions and questions by @tarazkp
- Updates From Steemit Inc Team And Justin Sun's Involvement by @taskmaster4450
- Steem-tronic? by @Steevc
- How to Prevent Hostile Takeovers for a Naive Steem Community by @starkerz
- Thoughts on what's on everyone's mind by @acidyo
- A Witness Prayer for Steem and Tron by @thecryptodrive
- No, TRON didn’t buy Steem blockchain by gokulnk on Medium
Keep Calm & STEEM On!
And be ready to hard-fork away if they screw this up
