I dont often do book reviews. And by often I actually mean "ever". But I have to say something about this book. I am going to say that I think everybody should read this one. Especially if you are interested in decentralized social media. I learned of this book in wee early morning hours today. I was drinking my coffee almost 12 hrs ago at the time of this writing. When the author commented on my post from yesterday. He was stating that he would like to be a guest on the new podcast and was all "by the way here's a book I wrote", lol. My first thought was cool. Now I for sure have a couple of people that want to come on the show.
But then I read the title of the book and to say that my interest was peeked wood be an understatement. But I had no time to spare at the moment. Had to get ready for the day job. But through out the day I found myself looking harder and harder at the description of the book the more enticed I was. So by the time the lunch hour rolled around I was genuinely intrigued. I plopped down the money to buy it and tore into it on the Kindle Cloud Reader. It's currently $13 on Kindle $27 for paperback. It's listed on a few other sites as well for similar amounts. I will link those all below.
But the book!
OH, the book, for me is a constant page turner. Only stretching to 252 pages spanning10 chapters plus all the references contained in it. It could be a really quick read for some of you super readers. But not for your old Unkle Bonehead.
I found myself reading a chapter and then reading that chapter again. Seemed like after going through it once I felt like I was missing something. And I think I am going have to read this a few times to fully grasp the full concept and scope of Cryptosocial: How Crytopcurrencies Are Changing Social Media by Allen Taylor.
The not a review review
As I said I have essentially read this book twice today. Each chapter twice. What I read is basicaly the culmination of what I have looked at the last two years but not anywhere to the extent to what Allen has covered in this book. I only knew of 4, maybe 5 or 6 of the social media platforms he talks about. I had no clue there was that many of them. I also had heard things about Minds and BitChute were supposedly on blockchains. I have accounts on both of them. I've never saw anywhere that they had blockchain aspects or crytpto currency related to them. All I knew about them was that Minds seemed to be more like a super tight club to get any traction on let alone try to build an audience with and Bitchute was where I could find all the tin foil hat wearers. Lol. Ya gotta admit there are some strange ones on there.I digress.
He mentions my beloved Hive in it a lot. Personally I wish there could've been a bit more about Hive in there. But thats probably my bias showing. You all know me I am not shy about my bias towards Hive. It's given me a lot of opportunity over the last 2 years and the people on it are very genuine and generous who dont mind laying out the facts and letting you form your own opinion on things. All while not hating you for it or trying to force your way of thinking.
He talks about how the blockchain has gotten into social media, working its way through gaming and NFT's and even where its going in the future. Allen presents this in a style thats very easy to understand. He doesnt ever try to sway anybodys opinion on one blockchain over another. Nor does he dive into any specs of the technology behind them. I gotta say hes my kind of guy. He just lays it all out to you in a neat, organized way so you can do with them what you want.
I don't ever recommend books to read but I think I'm going to start. And the first one you need to read is this one. This book has not only made me rethink my direction with the podcast and blog already. But I will say that if you want to know exactly what you are getting into with social media blockchains and decentralization this is a must read! The links below are NOT affiliate links. The links are taken directly from his site.
Where you can buy the book:
- Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
- Barnes & Noble (paperback and ePub)
- Chapters/Indigo (paperback and ePub)
- Kobo (ePub)
- Waterstones (paperback)
- WH Smith (paperback)
- Business Expert Press (paperback and e-book)
Go to his site here
Subscribe to his Cryptocracy substack here
Other places you can find me:
Podcast - https://defluenced.online
Twitter - https://twitter.com/3speakvidshare
Rumble - https://rumble.com/c/c-1773197
Site - https://unklebonehead.xyz
Ecency - https://ecency.com/@unklebonehead
3Speak - https://3speak.tv/user/unklebonehead
Locals - https://defluenced.locals.com
Truth - https://truthsocial.com/@unklebonehead
Parler - https://parler.com/unklebonehead
YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4RQU-YGBbDp4JFAHt3LnmQ
If crypto is your thing you can donate Hive-engine token to me
https://hivelive.me/donate/unklebonehead
Posted from my blog with Exxp : https://defluenced.online/cryptosocial-by-allen-taylor-you-must-read-this-book/
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Wow! Thank you for the book report! Sound very appealing - I'm going to get it! 👍
This is the kind of book I would love to read. Also, didn't know the author is on Hive too. Perhaps if you fancy to review a book, you could post over Hive book club https://peakd.com/c/hive-180164/created would love to read book reviews over there too!
I'll keep that in mind the next time I do a book review. If I do a boo review. I'm not really a good reviewer. I just really, really enjoyed this book. Lol.
It's a must do it or else situation.
In my opinion, yes. It lays out all the different cryptosocial media networks out there. Very nice assortment of a lot of ones I didnt know were there. Lol.
Sounds like you've got your work cut out for you with all the ones you didn't know were there. Lol.
Yeah I think the total of the ones he listed is close to 80!
I also dont think any are as good as Hive is. Hive seems to have set the bar pretty high for others to achieve.
What would be cool to have would be a way to link them together. Post on one and it gets posted to all the others.
So you're saying you're going to check out all 80 and post reviews here, so that we all get to know?
My stance on social media has always been that I loathe it, therefore I stay off of it.
Hive is and most likely will stay the only exception to this for several reasons. The whole structure is well set up and continues to evolve. Front end user experience is high quality with very good tech support.
In the community itself, so many are willing to help in any way they can. I do not see this kind of helpfulness present on other platforms. There's more a sense of community on Hive generally, especially once one takes the time to get to know people by engaging with them. Additionally, you own your keys. There's a lot of potential for growth with this platform, depending on how people choose to behave. Issues are everywhere in this world, so that is also to be expected on any platform. What is of primary importance, is how one chooses to conduct oneself, to set an example of authenticity and integrity with one's own behaviour.
Maybe you could work on that one.
I dont think anything could ever have as good of a community as Hive. But that could be my bias showing too. Lol.
I dont know if I could try all 80+ but I will try some. Thats going to be a part of the new podcast I'm cooking up. Trying to show people out there on the other places what it means and how to be decentralized in social media and other online things.
As for an app to connect these sites together. @spknetwork is showing a lot of promise that there is a way to do this using something called ceramic networks. I dont know much about it other than what I've read in white papers, but it states that it allows for connecting different chains together to cross post.
But there is a lot of barriers to knock out of the way to get the general public's interest and make it easy enough any bonehead can do it. Thats what I'm going to attempt to do. Lol.
Really interesting stuff. It's great you'll talk about that on your podcast. I hope you try out several and let us know what your thoughts are. You win the prize for #1 bonehead, so there's going to be a lot of competition to beat you out of number one spot. 😂
I've thought the same thing for a while. An Ecency app that is cross-chain and allows you to post the same content to different decentralized platforms. That would be incredible!
Also, I've discovered some others since I put that list together. There are now more than 100 active decentralized social media platforms. I'll be updating the list.
Wow! I'm honored. Thanks for the glowing review. I really appreciate your enthusiasm.
It was well earned!
Say @unclebonehead, I'm including a link to this review in today's issue of Cryptocracy.
Awesome. Thank you!
You're welcome. Lovely read.