It looks like the VYB airdrop is history and the Verify Your Brain web site is live. I enjoying using the different front ends to HIVE.
I added the #CENT tag to this post because I want to speculate about the effects that a new token has on the base currency.
Before I launch into that discussion, I hope that #VYB takes steps to combat #tagspam . There are numerous authors who simply drop every money earning tag on every post regardless of whether the tags are relevant to the targeted community. It is easy to drop VYB into the tag template on LeoFinance.io.
The tag spam that results from modifying the template is brainless.
The people who engage in tagspam make substantially more than the suckers who respect the various tribal tags.
To make things worse, since the tag-spammers really don't care about the communities they abuse, the spammers are usually the first to dump the token. I strongly encourage all tribes to guard against tag spam.
Since VYB is splitting off of POB, it will be interesting to see what percentage of the authors on the forum include both tags on their posts. A person would be a fool not to include both tags.
I think it is worth watching the launch of new coins. I like to start by taking a look at the VYB richlist . I bought a trickling of VYB right after the airdrop and scored position 385. My guess is that the airdrop was to about 300-350 people.
Everyone Should Consider Joining VYB
As I understand, VYB dislikes the practice of self-voting. They discourage bots and the various vote-circle arrangements common in other tribes.
This means that people who were not in on the airdrop are likely to do well on the VYB forum.
In most HIVE Tribes, only the insiders earn the coin. Since VYB has a decent coin distribution and discourages self-votes, it is possible for outsiders to earn as much from a post as an insider.
Now for the body of this post.
The Effects of New Coins
Life on this earth is a mixed bag. There tends to be a combination of benefits and costs to each of our actions.
The issuance of a new coin (the ICO) seems to have both positive and negative effects on the base currency.
The positive effect of a new token is that the token creates a new use case for the base currency. When a token is used for more things, the value of the token should rise.
I suspect that the negative effect might best be described as "inflation." The addition of a new coin in the Hive-O-Sphere inflates the total number of coins in the sphere. People who dump their VYB are likely to dump the HIVE that they made from the VYB. So it is possible for an ICO to have a negative effect on the base currency.
Hive-Engine says that there are 2 million VYB in circulation with a maximum potential of 21 million. VYB was trading at 0.051 HIVE when I started this article. HIVE was trading at $1.54 implying that VYB was currently worth 7.9 US pennies.
The calculated value of the circulating supply was $157,000. The calculated value of the maximum number of coins was $1.6 million. Very few web sites are worth a million bucks.
Did the creation of a new use case cover the $157,000 in new coins? Will the VYB tribe bring more than a million dollars in value to the Hive-O-Sphere?
I do not fault people who sell their airdrop. The developers need to pay hosting, programming, legal and life expenses. People have real needs; so I do not find any fault with sellers.
Crypto isn't magic money. There is still balance in the universe. The question at hand is if the use case for VYB brings in enough value to the Hive-O-Sphere than the currency pulls out.
Since VYB is essentially splitting off the POB community, there is a second question of whether or not VYB will increase or devalue the base value of POB.
Since I have 5k HIVE and 1k POB, I hope the positive effects outweigh the negative effects.
My portfolio already has a half dozen coins which have turned into empty bags. All of the coins I bought on Steem-Engine are now empty bags.
Each failed coin tells stories of people who milked the tokens and those who lost HIVE supporting a failing cause.
Perhaps all HIVE tokens are destined to become empty bags. The game is simply one of trying to milk the coins before they devalue to zero.
I am not sure just yet where VYB will fit in my Hive-Engine strategy. I think the best way to approach Hive-Engine is to see it as a single unit. My portfolio has a reported value of about $400. I think I will build it until it has a reported value of $2,000. I tend to move the coins around depending on how well they perform.
Back in October, 75% of my portfolio was in POB. That was a mistake.
Investing in Hive-Engine is like knife juggling. It is a matter of catching the falling knives.If the knives aren't falling too quickly, I might be able to carve out a little nest egg as they fall.
Regardless of skill, knife jugglers are bound to end up with a few scars through the years. I am thinking that the best way to approach Hive-Engine is to gradually build investments in several coins at once.
Anyway, I have jabbered long enough. It is time to press publish. I wrote a post yesterday before the official launch and it didn't make it onto the forum.
The Pictures
Since this is a post about pluses and minuses, I took a picture of an inflatable Grinch, seen at the top, and an inflatable Santa seen below ... along with a line of pennies.
