@earthnation, you don't get the crypto economy yet.
If some entity grows in power and cripples the network for its selfish interest beyond repair then we just abandon steemit, create steemit2 and move there.
Imagine that you could create another Earth. When Hitler rose in power you just creating another planet and move there - there is no need to fight him. Just left him to build his own totalitarian hell on an empty planet.
In case of evil hedge fund, it just pump our coin 10 times and left behind in empty blockchain generating coins noone will buy on open market.
Finally, someone with eyes. Thank you.
He also imagines someone could buy all Steem just like that. It just isn't that easy. This whole strategy is built upon a situation that is very unlikely to happen. Go try and buy all bitcoin or all tulips, you'll see what happens to the price. You can't just magically buy them all at the current price. The increased volume will be noticed and you have to take into account that there's only 70 million Steem liquid while majority is locked up in SP. But yes, I welcome every fund to try and buy all steem, good luck.
E: also if they were to get somehow "all the Steem" or in this case 60 million or so, they would be one of the biggest holders meaning they'd probably see growing Steem to be used by everyone as far more lucrative path than just milking it dry almost right after getting majority stake.
It's hard for socialists to comprehend asset markets...or economics in general. Whoever these people are, they have no clue about anything market-related. The entire scenario that they painted, from the very start, is nothing but a BS attempt to gain power from the uneducated/uninformed, which is nothing new for people who have adopted this type of "progressive" politics/philosophy.
Even if we were to assume that a hedge fund would want to buy "all of the STEEM," they don't factor in how much STEEM is locked up in SP, as you mentioned, which is somewhere around 75% right now. So, best-case scenario, the hedge fund could only hold a maximum of 25% of all tokens.
If a hedge fund bought $100 million of STEEM at current prices (even if we assumed that the price wouldn't rise while they were buying, which would be stupid and incorrect), and the price then increased to $700 million, why would they then proceed to tank their $616 million profit rather than cash it out or reinvest it in the ecosystem or elsewhere? They would need to be "farming" accounts and posting for a very long time in order to see any returns that are comparable to that increase from prices rising. And the system would be dead long before they could take advantage of it...and they'd lose their massive profit.
My suggestion for them would be to actually learn about the blockchain, economics, and some basic math, perhaps.
The value of Bitcoin Cash is easy to see. But you need to look at its value from a FIAT currency perspective and not from a crypto currency perspective if you are going to see that value.
The word "cash" provides the biggest clue. It was no doubt chosen for the new currency because it invokes a sense of tangibility ( and normalcy ) in the minds of people. The target market for Bitcoin Cash is ordinary consumers...
@bronevik and @igster. There is truth to what you are both saying about being able to abandon steemit, and that any hedge-fund who did this would be obviously invested into the continued sucess of steem.... at least until they pulled out.
This ROI Steem-automation process would in fact happen over the course of many years.
Think about this; even if a hedge-fund does this so intelligently, that steem never crashes.... Would you still want that?
Would you want an group that doesn't add value to steem to benefit from 20-50% of the entire steem reward pool?
Regardless of whether the hedge-funds will crash steem, We believe it is so important we reduce the capacity of the extremeley wealthy to milk our economic system.
Do you agree that we should do our best to make Steem a fair place wherin no individual or group is allowed to reap massive amounts of steem without adding value to our community?
There is a reasonable trade-off between inequality and growth. Ideal asset equality is when everyone has nothing. Here and now we tolerate rather significant levels of inequality. But even whales here are pretty social. For now. In future it might become a problem then we have a few solutions in hand like sqrt-like vests curve or more complicated reward system.
I do believe that the properties of open and no-barriers crypto systems prevent extreme totlitarian scenarios by themselves. We just need to take care of rough edges as soon as they become bounds to growth and development.
And as someone is sucked into the power of their reasoning tone.
No there is never a reason to be party to inequality. NEVER. Remember WWII Hitler, the Nazi's, and the final solution. There is never a reason to be party to inequality!!!!!
For socialist utopia please proceed to another blockchain.
"Would you want an group that doesn't add value to steem to benefit from 20-50% of the entire steem reward pool?" As I said before, if they'd have this big of a share, it would be in their best interest to provide value. Pulling out takes time and if that would be to happen, people would eventually scoop up enough cheap Steem to make it rise again.
Or do you think they would blatantly use the system, making everyone else power down as well, hurting their profits immensely?
It's good to be thinking about these scenarios. I'll think about it, but if some major player would begin to try and get all liquid Steem, let's say 50 million out of 250 million total supply. This would drive up price insanely as in your scenario they would need to power it all up. As they drive the price up, those who have the 200 million can start selling as prices go lunatic (imagine minimal liquid Steem) and buy back lower.
These are just my initial thoughts.