Comprehensive Crypto & Blockchain Social Media Platforms Review VI
This is my sixth comprehensive review of blockchain social media platforms meant to give you the most thorough resource and reference for finding the next best platforms to use! In this review, I cover about 223 social media platforms that either are integrated with a blockchain to some degree, have crypto-monetized rewards, or at the very least promote free speech and are distributed or decentralized in some way.
https://odysee.com/@ScottCBusiness:4/Blockchain-Review-6:3
This review below will mainly attempt to focus on cryptocurrency-monetized and blockchain-integrated social media platforms.
Due to the length of this being about 17,000 words spanning 35 pages in a word document most blogs cannot support all of it. The only thing I had to remove was previously reviewed and not recommended platforms that I still do not recommend. You aren't missing out on much, however, if you really want to see the full 35-page review even just for reference to the links for every website you can download or view the PDF listed below online.
Content Hosting Links:
You can find the other copies of this article on these platforms below.
Hive: https://peakd.com/hive-181335/@scottcbusiness/xkvfnvkq
Minds: https://www.minds.com/scottcbusiness/blog/social-review-6-1427142449670656015
You can get the full PDF given that some platforms cannot host this much text.
PDF Download: https://pdfhost.io/v/zZLY.Qr~u_Blockchain_social_Platform_Review_Version_6
Video Timestamps:
00:00 Introduction
04:00 Decentralization Matrix
07:15 Disclaimers & Prefacing My Review
11:27 Previously Not Recommended Categories
14:03 Avoid These Platforms!
19:41 Platforms Not Recommended Anymore
25:05 New Platforms Not Recommended
40:05 Platforms That Need Improvement
50:58 Tertiary Platform Recommendations
1:00:56 Secondary Platform Recommendations
1:10:19 Primary Recommendation – Hive
1:14:21 Conclusion & Summary
1:21:50 Outro
Dapp Directories:
Check these out. There are many chains I did not dive into and many apps not worth reviewing. Keep in mind most apps on Steem or Hive for example, are just interfaces and not different platforms so it is not necessary to explore every single one.
App.co - https://app.co/
DappsRadar – https://dappradar.com
DappReview - https://dapp.review/
Dapp.com - https://www.dapp.com/
StateOfDapps – https://www.stateofthedapps.com
The Review:
This will be covering some new platforms not covered in the previous but re-reviewing any applications or websites that were not to par but were not awful from the last review. I will very briefly double-check the awful ones and either add them here if they have improved or not include them given, they were in the last one and you do not need to see the same thing twice.
In the video itself, I go through some of the main recommendations I give and the platforms that I am currently using. I only go through some brief examples of ones not recommended for sake of time and to give some insight as to how I came to my decisions.
One last thing before starting is that I would like to state my bias. I will look unfavorably at websites that require too much verification like requiring you to verify your phone to even browse the platform (several platforms failed to verify mine), requiring you to spend crypto on every interaction, requiring Facebook or Google to sign up, websites that are overly centralized, websites that claim to use blockchain but don’t, and most EOS platforms given the challenge it is to use them and all the extra extensions and programs needed that make it almost unusable for mobile. Note that I have included several EOS platforms in the not recommended ones as I still did go and try them.
My final disclaimer is that I am here to share my recommendations and recommendations against them. I will not be explaining how every platform works or giving solutions to their problems.
Noteworthy Not Recommended (26):
Avoid These Sketchy Projects (10):
Not all of these are outright frauds, but they all have the potential to be so I will share why I watch out for these ones. Fraud is any fraudulent or deceptive act or operation. Used as a verb, it is defrauding someone or obtaining something such as money via fraud. So, while some sites may outright explain what they do, a lot of it is hidden or unobvious and will trick many people.
SoMee.Social – SoMee had tons of issues on the platform and then shut it down for about 8-10 months. It finally became a community on Hive and launched a Hive token as a solution to its tokenomics issues. I would consider officially closed as its own platform since it is now just another Hive interface. You can still use it, but the onsite wallet still does not work, and everyone lost 90%+ of their funds. You can now normally use it as a Hive community since they have integrated. I still recommend staying away from it and just using something like LeoFinance as your Hive community and posting to PeakD. They do not deserve any of your attention, effort, or money. - http://somee.social
Bearshares - A replica of Steem, but they have had many issues with their platform staying online lately and it seems not worth it to me. To add to that their platform went down and came back with everyone’s posts and cryptocurrency vanished. Biggest fraud I have used yet. Now they allow you to sign up after sending them Bitcoin through a Google form sheet which is the lowest effort, I have ever seen to take your money. https://bearshares.com/
Weku – A Steem alternative that has some potential as a new budding community however their coin has still not reached exchanges, as far as I know, they have one witness, and they have had issues without people illegitimately obtaining Weku via making many fake accounts for the sign in bonus so it has its issues and investing a lot into it would be a mistake. I am trying to get out and no one wants to buy my Weku. I am sure it is a fraud like Bearshares or was grossly mismanaged - https://deals.weku.io/
Whaleshares – Another Steem alternative that is a safer and better setup than Weku although they do not use a reputation system like other Steem platforms which is remarkably interesting. They are also tied to BTS, and there have been some issues with witnesses running frauds with their own witness coins used on Whaleshares so again be wary. You cannot really trade it anywhere though you can put orders on Hive Engine, there is no one buying it. - https://whaleshares.io/
Theta.TV – This is remarkably like DLive except that their token Theta is listed on exchanges. While you can buy it though, you originally could not withdraw after you have deposited, and you can only “withdraw” it by buying their merch and items in their store. This is borderline fraud. You can put money in, but you cannot take money out, you can only buy items. To me, that makes this a fake cryptocurrency. You are only buying it from Theta and others who are trying to benefit off other people’s stupidity, so in a way, they are controlling its value just like DLive. It is disappointing that Samsung has partnered with them since giving them more legitimacy to trick more people. Three platforms that use their token are Theta.TV (previously Sliver.TV), G Fuel, and Esports on Samsung VR. Also, people who say it is eventually going to allow withdrawals are running nodes and hope you put money in because it has been over a year, and they have made no claims that this is on the roadmap.
This page has a lot of the explanations you need so while they are straightforward, I don’t know how obvious it is to everyone what they actually imply: https://community.theta.tv/tfuel-on-theta-faq/.
At first, it seems awesome. The more internet bandwidth they take from you while you consume content, the more you earn so you can get tons of crypto while you enjoy yourself. Until you read enough to realize that you can only spend it within the platform on specific items and depositing anything to the platform is non-refundable. So, what is really happening is they are using everyone’s internet bandwidth for free and giving you back a tiny fraction of what you give them which you can only use according to their rules. To make it more confusing they all have different names on each platform and different values, but it is always only spendable on the platform and non-refundable. If you had not caught on yet, you are not going to make money. You may be able to get a new PS4, which I have not seen anyone verify, but that’s not real monetization. If you invest time and earn something, you should have full control over its use and what you do with it. On any of the Theta platforms, you do not.
So, overall, it is just as sketchy as DLive in its own way. It is good that there is a competitor in the space, but it is still awful. I covered this more in-depth in multiple videos previously. They are also planning to launch another platform. - https://www.theta.tv/
Update – They finally enabled withdrawals but only from Theta.tv onto their ThetaAidrop NFT platform. You can still only withdraw about ~$60 worth of TFUEL a month which is currently 400 and you have to KYC to withdraw. So, it is terrible.
Hideout.Tv – Complete sham. They reward you with points you can redeem. They do not allow ad blockers and even when I disabled them, they still would not let me watch a video. They denied me joining as a creator without a reason, so I really doubt it is incredibly open either. https://hideout.tv
Viewo – Looks like a fraud website that had its presale last year and is still set to launch. Has not had any activity on social media since presale in November. Now it is not accessible. Stay away. - https://www.viewo.com/
View.ly – Previously this did not work at all, and I could not get any help, but it has been improved upon and is working now. Out of all the platforms not recommended, I was the most disappointed with this given they had enormous potential so now that I can post I will give a tertiary recommendation because yes while the publishing is great, the UI is and the platform looks better than Bitchute and BitTube, it does not have their community. The last nine posts go from 5 minutes ago (mine) to 2 weeks ago, so the community is not continually active. It is likely because you must spend ETH or VIEW tokens every time you post, and you need to buy and hold 100 VIEW tokens to even vote on other posts. The issue here is that you cannot do anything at all without money being invested and the thing is very few platforms succeed with this given the skepticism of the space. You must be able to earn your share free and then have the option to invest. Therefore, it is not being used a lot, but I see how it could beat spammers etc., still, I do not see it getting adopted either way. Al the top posts are like a year old now and their social media is all but abandoned. After uploading a few videos and spending a bunch of ETH to do so, I stopped bothering. You will just waste your money. - https://view.ly
Howdoo – They have rebranded to Hyprr which I review separately. Regarding Howdoo, I have spoken with several users that were technically scammed when Howdoo switched their currency and abandoned the old one. Coming back to revisit it I found out it was the second time they did a token swap and abandoned a previous one with two pump and dumps and then had a huge expensive giveaway that they canceled before it was to finish. They also have many other claims that are false. Their CMO recently said they do not have time to monitor their telegram group and closed that too. Anyone who invested before token swaps lost 95% or more of their money with the value falling drastically. A lot of information was shared by a previous employee. - https://howdoo.io
DLive - I have already shared countless videos and blogs on why this is a fraud and not to be trusted so I will simply reshare the information I have shared previously and link a few videos I have done. They have continued to make it harder for streamers and users to use the platform, access, manage, and control their funds, not to mention adding more restrictions for withdrawals and creators to earn.
DLive was acquired by TRON and is now fully running with BTT but has done nothing to integrate with the BTT video network they originally talked about. They also lost Pewdiepie who was by far the biggest reason for anyone to join. It has been getting more centralized, not less. There is no hope for DLive. They also took away your ability to upload a video without live streaming unless you are a partner on the platform. Recently they also heavily weighted their BTT staking towards their small set of partners, taking away a massive chunk of rewards from the users who are doing most of the staking and locking up their crypto.
Platforms That Closed Down (21):
Empow – Though it is an interesting concept, I do not think people will want to use a platform that only works with a browser extension. Especially considering the extension requires permission to modify data you copy and paste amongst other security flaws. There were very few people on the platform, so I did not bother with it. It is down - https://empow.io/
TouchSocial.xyz – This has little to no users at all and looks a little boring (it is all gray). Nothing super unique about it, just an amateur version of what already exists. Also, their token is worth $0 so them giving out $1000 TST as a sign-up earndrop is a joke. https://touchsocial.xyz
Coil – Coil seems interesting and has a medium feel. There is barely anyone using it though currently and its payout system and partners are not the best. I wanted the second partner so I could get payouts in BTC, so I go to sign up and it does not work forcing me to use the first payout option in XRP. That is not a big deal, but it is not impressive. The reason it is not recommended is that the top trending articles only have a few likes. It could eventually gain more traction though. I have used it for months and gotten zero interaction. Not recommended. After leaving it for a month and coming back I found that I could not access my account to log in. They closed and moved to write.as. All your content was lost in the transition. - https://coil.com
BitLink – Bitlink went down for maintenance “shortly” several months ago and never came back online. - https://www.bitlink.tv/
Karma – EOSIO dapp – It is a good concept but too niche as a platform that is supposed to be “Users are incentivized to do good, share positive & original content” it gives the idea that it's niche and not just a normal social platform. Their value has dropped ten times since inception and looks like it is going the same route as Trybe. It is only usable on mobile which is also less ideal. When I tried registering it said, “problem trying to create account.” Tried again and it did not work at all. Months later I tried signing up and it gave me a premade account for some reason with the username Dirma1249 then when I tried switching my username it said it was taken. After trying twenty usernames I realized that no matter what, it says the username is taken and thus I cannot change my username and update my account. The lack of functionality makes me question why anyone ever “stood up” for Karma as one EOS dapp that works (even though it is not on their public chain) Website is down and the application still not working for me. - https://www.karmaapp.io
Editionial – Closed down - https://editional.com/
Honest Cash – A bad version of Read.cash that eventually closed. - https://honest.cash/
SocialChains – So I had an entire interview with the CEO, and I was going to post after I found out the site had no users when they claimed 50-100 joined daily. There were no posts at all, it was a 12-hour wait to update your profile picture, and there were no personal profiles or at least no way to get to them. Also, you had to give a license and many verification pieces which seemed unnecessary. Given it seems like the real platform did not live up to the claims being made. Their vision is interesting in that they will solve all the problems on social media by removing anonymity, but I felt that MANY blockchain users go to these places for anonymity, though the concept is fading, especially for people trying to build a following. Try it if you like, but I mean even when I did the phone verification it did not work so it said I was not allowed to use the platform, and had to get even the CEO to help me with getting the staff to fix it. I gave up after trying to speed up the process to change my profile picture with support and they wanted another image of my ID, so I gave up. https://go.socialchains.io
Honest.Cash – Very similar to Read.Cash, but a little more clumsy and awkward to use. Only uses markdown, so if you are familiar with Steem, this should be easy. The publishing toolbar does not work as it should. However, it does not matter as it was recently shut down. - https://honest.cash/
Uptrennd – Uptrennd was having many issues and not long after a lot of information came out about the team dumping 1UP years ago, they ended up shutting down and merging what’s left with Trodl - https://www.uptrennd.com/
Voice – The Voice platform was somewhat of a flop and since then it has been discontinued and turned into an NFT creator platform. - https://www.voice.com/
Narrative – Narrative looks like it could have potential, but it is geared to reward early adopters. For example, to start a new “tag” or niche as they call it, you must bid on it, and it could be anywhere from $50-$500. I do not think it is realistic that people would pay that, but they have. I have only scratched the surface so maybe there is more to the story than is Narrative. You need a NEO wallet to earn NRVE. When digging further into the platform niche owners are upset because they must renew their ownership and they have earned next to nothing as the owner but spent between $50-500 so for quite some time I expect this to only generate losses. Users will have an enjoyable time here, but I do not think it is quite ready yet. I will try to use it more to test it. You also need to pay $15 via Paypal to certify. They recently closed even though they raised over five million dollars, sold over 1,000 niches, and sold certifications while only ever dishing out about $1,500 in rewards to users - https://www.narrative.org
SOLA – I really liked this platform and did well on it for a while, but it has shut down as of April 10th. - https://sola.ai/
Pepo – This was like Tik Tok, Instagram, and Snapchat but using the OST blockchain and Pepo tokens. It was a failed project. I cannot find their coin anywhere to check volume or to even buy or sell it. I am sure you can only do so on their app, so my Pepo was effectively taken. They also stopped keeping up with their social accounts a few months ago. Plus using Gmail or Twitter, I cannot even login and those are the only ways to log in. This means I am locked out of my account even though I have the correct login access so I cannot even check if the platform is still going. But based on all of this, it is safe to say. Plus, it was mobile only. You can learn more about it at https://ost.com/ or download it on your phone from the app store.
Hyperspace – It has approval for posts, so it is like Trybe in that negative sense. You must connect and verify your phone number to receive free $AMPS every 24 hours which you can then use to upvote others and “amplify” their content. It is designed like how SOLA was in its Instagram card-like appearance but operates more like Medium or Trybe in terms of the way posting works. The design is clean, but the network is still very beta. You previously could not follow other users, but that was updated, profiles are basic, and topics are very few, but the community is fairly engaged. This could easily be a top performer if it progressed and fixed its current issues. I was disappointed though that Canadians cannot verify their phone and get free Amps. After using it for another month or two, I have decided it is not viable. I had posts not get approved for over 11 days. With all its faults, people urge me to give it another chance so I will be posting on it for a while, but I doubt my review will change. I was historically correct this would not last. It just recently shut down. https://hyperspace.app/
Publyto - https://publyto.io – Abandoned
TokenTuber – Tokentuber is not decentralized or on the blockchain, but what it is, is a collection of as many cryptos and blockchain-related videos as possible from YouTube all in one place where the creator of the original video can come on and claim their crypto rewards in the form of TUBER tokens. It has been down for quite some time, and I considered it closed. https://www.tokentuber.com/
Rebuzz – Rebuzz seems to have closed. Their last mobile update was in 2020 and their website cannot be reached. It was a good concept, but I find that mobile-only platforms struggle in the blockchain space. - https://rebuzz.io/
Vibravid – Vibravid is a Tron-based video platform. It is one of the only working social media dapps on Tron. While they have fixed their previous issues, they have extremely limited media restrictions with maximum video durations of 15 minutes. While they have come a long way, they are still not recommended. After recently following up they were shut down. - https://vibravid.io/users/scottcbusiness
Trodl – After Uptrennd was shut down, Trodl took over and merged with the users very sloppily and with little to no support. You can earn TRO from tips and as a welcome bonus, but it is worth nothing. You also cannot withdraw your BTC that is worth something, making that worthless too. 100% avoid this platform. Then not long after it shut down. - https://trodl.com/
Mix Acuity – Mix offered a remarkably interesting ability for creators and influencers to launch their own token on the network and will work to gamify it with leaderboards and incentives like a Patreon tiered paywall subscription but using minimum token hold amounts. The project has ended its support. https://mix-acuity.com/
Platforms Newly Reviewed & Not Recommended (45):
These were not on the last review, but I do not recommend them now. If you take the time to go through these, you will wonder why I even bothered. These will be lumped into the categories above in the next review, but the easiest tell that it will not be recommended is whether you can withdraw your funds. If you cannot withdraw your funds, they are not yours.
SocialStack – Requires social sign-in like Gmail to sign up - https://community.socialstack.co/login
Taki – Requires a phone number to sign up. Remarkably like Bitclout with creator tokens and I would expect similar issues however they did not commit identity fraud. - https://taki.app/signup/
Main.Community – Requires you to log in via a centralized login like Gmail. Need coins to post to the extremely limited communities. Lacks a user base. https://main.community/register
Playground – Another NFT marketplace. - https://playgroundapp.com/
Rally – Rally is just an NFT marketplace and that is all. - https://rally.io/
Raiinmaker – Uses your normal social media and gets their cryptocurrency as a reward for participating in ad campaigns. Feels more like an influencer gig marketplace than a social platform. There also are no available campaigns when I checked. - https://raiinmaker.com/
Only1 – It is decent as a status posting platform, but I do not trust the concept of staking tokens on creators for crazy APYs like 38.41%. It reminds me of Bitclout/Deso in this regard. Only1 uses Solana which has gone down more than most blockchains of its size and rank based on market cap making it even harder to rely on. Staking is only for select people and many features are still coming soon. In fact, most of the top creators have not even ever posted so the site feels like a ghost town that is trying to capitalize on being an NFT marketplace while touting itself as a social platform when it is not really used as one. - https://only1.app/
Lit – A good application, but it is mobile-only, prompts you to log in through centralized services, and requires KYC to withdraw and cash out. If they could expand their usability and decentralize more, it would be recommended. - https://lit.it/
Authenticity - Terrible platform tried to copy Voice and have every post as an NFT, except it charges you. To post “Hey everyone” would have cost me $33 on Ethereum. This is a hard no. - https://authencity.io/
Niche – New social platform with niche communities. It is still invited only so it is not very ideal or open yet. - https://www.niche.club/
Flux – Requires download to use - https://www.fluxsocial.io/
Expertly – Expertly is still too basic. They want to be Linkedin, but there is no way to post or interact with people aside from direct messaging. The articles that are hosted are also restricted and do not even allow comments. https://experty.io/
Iris – I was one out of two posts on the entire platform unless there was an issue with the platform - https://iris.to/
Trovo – Very reliant on legacy platforms. Was not obvious that there was a way to withdraw funds. - https://trovo.live/
Friendica – A platform on the Fediverse. Not a fan because it is not easy to use and does not utilize crypto anyway. - https://friendi.ca/#try
PulseBitfinex – Has many restrictions such as if they are non-compliant with regulations, you cannot post on the social platform. My province was banned. - https://pulse.bitfinex.com/
Grape – NFT platform on Solana. I will not be getting a Solana wallet to test it as it’s one of the most centralized failed ETH alternatives I’ve ever seen. - https://verify.grapes.network/
YouNow – Extremely centralized live-streaming platform. Cannot sign-up without legacy platforms meaning it is KYCed and extremely centralized. Requires you to pay through Google/Apple through the mobile application. - https://www.younow.com/explore
GFam – One of the worst user interfaces I have seen for a social platform. Uses Coil which is awful and extremely centralized plus their obscure cryptocurrency called XUMM. Posting is also temporarily disabled. - https://gfam.live/
BBS – Many aspects do not work correctly and more importantly, when you try to withdraw your tokens, you get this message “Your account also has to be reviewed and whitelisted by the BBS admin before selling tokens is enabled.” - https://bbs.market/
HighVibes – Invite-only platforms do not get recommended as I cannot test them. - https://www.highvibe.network/
Blockster – There is a waitlist, and it encourages you to legacy sign-in options like google sign-in. I was able to get started but then it would not let me upload a profile picture on multiple browsers and thus could not create my profile and start using the platform. - https://blockster.com/
Aether – Great application that feels like Discord, but it requires a download, is only for Windows, and it is not necessarily a social network. - https://getaether.net/
Mirror – Interesting concept but having everything as NFTs does not really make sense. This is how Voice failed. Al posts must be created as an NFT according to their marketing. The issue is this is not practical, and you must sign everything with your ETH wallet. - https://mirror.xyz/
LoveChain – Invite-only and not worth testing out. - https://www.thelovechain.io/
Zion – Charges you $12 per month to use. There is no way the use of a simple blogging platform should cost more than a service like Spotify. I cannot imagine they are even profitable. - https://www.getzion.com/
ShareVision – Video hosting platform that has “visions” which are just points that are converted to cash and you have to KYC to withdraw to a bank account via Stripe. It has no cryptocurrency attached at all and only works in the UK anyway. - https://sharevision.com/
Write.as – The latest version of Coil but they charge you to host a blog, so it is not worth bothering with. It is Medium starting at $6 a month. - https://write.as/
Dfinity / Internet Computer Protocol Dapps – While they boast 50k-70k users, the sites are not user friendly, the URLs are often random characters that no one could remember, and interestingly enough, a lot of the posts were bug reports and support or the dapps were not actually ready yet like Nuance. ICP has only gone down, but that is just the cherry on top. It is very technical and confusing especially to the average user and it requires excessive verification authenticating everything through my Windows authenticator app. Typing in my PIN every 30 seconds is not a realistic expectation for social media users. And of course, to get verified you must pay them $100. So, the blue checks are just people who paid up. See a few examples below from - https://dfinity.org/showcase/?tag=social
DSCVR (Dfinity Dapp) – Barely anything to the platform, cannot make changes to my profile either. Trying to be a Reddit like forum. Reading the URL link to my profile is enough to know no one will use it - https://h5aet-waaaa-aaaab-qaamq-cai.raw.ic0.app/
Distrikt (Dfinity Dapp) – It is supposed to be their professional network like Linkedin, but it is just your average Facebook/Twitter. Not much real activity. A lot of bot posts like “Where am I?” or “Wonderful life.” - https://az5sd-cqaaa-aaaae-aaarq-cai.ic0.app/
DSocial (Dfinity Dapp) – Lastly, we will look at their YouTube alternative. It works, but it is just spamming unfiltered videos into the feed. A lot of content is noticeably short thirty-second clips, but I was still able to upload my video. It has almost no features, including no wallet or even settings. - https://dwqte-viaaa-aaaai-qaufq-cai.ic0.app/upload
Relevant – Relevant is an interesting site with a new focus. You can earn coins that can be claimed and transferred as REL cryptocurrency. Because it is an ERC20 token, there are gas fee issues currently, but hopefully, in the future, that will be improved. Relevant is too niche as every time I tried to make a post, I was downvoted and told it was the wrong type of post and only strictly “news” was allowed. You cannot really create a social platform that is so niche and so restrictive on what you can say especially as a crypto-monetized platform. There are only eight categories and I read the guidelines which I did not violate. This really is a voting circle more than anything. - https://relevant.community/
Socios – Requires a phone number KYC and requires you use the mobile application even after offering that you can use the website application. More of a sports token marketplace than a social platform. - https://app.socios.com/
Main – Requires legacy social platforms to sign up and use the platform. - https://main.community/
Wumbo – Feels like a rip-off of Bitclout mixed with Yup. I do not like the idea of minting creator tokens within a website ecosystem and not really on the blockchain after Bitclout soured it, especially minting for other people’s identities. - https://wum.bo/
SubsTV – It was a great attempt, but I think requiring a download and being mobile-only is way too restrictive, especially if you want content creators to upload videos - https://www.subs.tv/
Pantograph – It is mobile first with a plugin and app extension for internet browsers like Chrome. I dislike applications without a web application, but the main issue was that the application did not work right. I could not view my wallet properly and there was nothing on the main feed. - https://pantograph.io/
PolkaSocial – Barely any users on the platform. Bots that message your porn from the first moment you join. Saves most of the good features for paying members starting from $100-500 per year or $1000 for life which is excessive. Terribly slow and low-quality performance. Many posts in the main feed are spam or people calling the site a fraud. I retried connecting to it recently and it said “Failed to connect to MySQL: Connection refused” on multiple browsers. - https://polkasocial.org/
The Capital – It is a copy of Medium. The earning aspect and many of the features on the platform are greyed out and I have not seen any developments since its inception. The top posters only have a handful of followers and top posts have little to no engagement, so it is safe to assume barely anyone is using this platform. - https://thecapital.io/
Floyx – You can only earn cryptocurrency via daily tasks which is not ideal, but it is not terrible either. The issue is that there are only two tasks per day maxing out at 10 cents meaning the max you can make every month is around $3 if you put in the effort every day. On top of that, there are not a lot of users. I would say this is a mediocre version of Torum. I am still testing this, but I do not recommend it. - https://www.floyx.com/
Subsocial – You need to download a polkdadot wallet to start using it which is okay, but then even just to update my portfolio or do anything I need to buy tokens and you start with zero. I am not going to spend money on this not even knowing if it is good or not. They had a faucet but closed it. - https://app.subsocial.network/
Carbon – This platform had potential and I will still be using it as a social platform but they pivoted it so you can only earn through their low tier quality video games that are amazingly simple 8-bit web-based widget games. This makes this site and more importantly the CRBN token pointless. On certain browsers it also does not connect for me anymore and I must give up on it. - https://crbn.social/
GazeTV – While it was small and mostly non-English focused, I was willing to test it out and use it for a while. The reality is that to get any earnings out which are also ERC20, you would need to fully KYC and provide proof of residence which is very excessive for a video hosting platform. They do lack some basic features like uploading your own thumbnail, etc. If they remove KYC, they will get a tertiary recommendation from me. - https://www.gazetv.com/
Bitclout/Diamond – CLOUT/DESO is at $14 down from $180. While price is not highly relevant, I wanted to preface my negative review of this by showing that to simply say even the investors have lost faith in it. It was a fad based on the hype of NFTs with the idea of creator tokens. The issue is that it is all donation/investment based so you need to aggressively market your coins and convince people to invest in yours versus earning rewards. Then you end up with the issue of selling your tokens and hurting your supporters by doing so. The tokens are not real tokens because they only exist on the platform and cannot be withdrawn. So not only are you taking a risk by buying them, but you also take on the massive risk that you may lose access to them, or they could have no liquidity for you to sell them. The whole model is poorly designed as it always sets up for rug pulls/dumping on your supporters if you want to make any money. I have covered the many issues around the pre-mine etc. but the only redemption they made is allowing withdrawals. They are getting some more traction lately by offering a USDC integration, but the platform is still a flop. Elon Musk’s fake token was worth more than Bitcoin at one point and now it is just $3K. Anyone who invested in these creator tokens lost money. Beyond that, they have attempted to rename everything calling CLOUT DESO instead and throwing an almost identical interface over Bitclout called Diamond App to rebrand to distance themselves away from their sketchy beginning. - https://bitclout.com/ & https://diamondapp.com/
Blogchain – Requires an invite to get signed up or to use a social sign-up through Google or Facebook which would KYC yourself. - https://blogchain.app/home
If Improvements Are Made, These Platforms Would Be Recommended (6):
These are decent platforms but still need some updates and improvements to make it to the recommended section.
TipMeACoffee – New platform trying to do something like DTube’s tokenomics and Noise.Cash’s user interface, but as a status post platform. It is very new and does not have many users, but I like where it is going with its simple layout. Needs performance and feature improvements and it could go somewhere. - https://tipmeacoffee.com/
Den.Social – While Den is a newer platform and has a lot of interesting features and a different take on social crypto platforms using Dragonchain, its main cryptocurrency is on Ethereum and the ERC20 gas fees make it impossible to make a profit using the platform. It is very niche and needs to have the base features improved. Even after a year, the platform still does not have correct follower counts, and a lot of the voting is based on voting rings versus a real community. There’s potential here especially when ETH 2.0 scales fees down a lot. However, considering they still have the same issues with little to no development in years, I am unenthusiastic that they will drastically improve any time soon. - https://den.social/
Steem – I still passively post on here, but it was centralized by Justin Sun, and three exchanges stealing and using users’ funds, so I do not take it very seriously and do not recommend it. While it still operates the same, all the promises that blockchain offers are negated now. You are better off using Hive or hive clones instead. The only real reason I post here is that DTube offers the ability to cross-post. If that could be fixed, I would recommend it, however I do not believe that will happen. He also ruined DLive. - https://steemit.com/
Minds – I used to really like Minds, but like LBRY the bigger they became, the more centralized their system was and less profitable too. To withdraw your tokens, you will be charged a massive fee way beyond the gas fee. My attempted transaction had a $2 gas fee and then an extra $25 charge to take out Minds tokens. If I wanted to then use them, it would cost gas fees to spend them as well. The point is it is not feasible to use. Beyond all that, transfers need to be approved and can take up to 72 hours. If they do not approve the transaction, they will also keep the $25 you would have spent. As a platform, it is still decent to use, but it is not really that decentralized, and its monetization is so tied up with red tape and limited. If they got back to their roots and were more decentralized and had fewer intermediaries approving what they can do, it would be much better. They used to require you to pay for Minds+ with a credit card for a monthly subscription or thousands of dollars for a lifetime membership to withdraw, so their removing that requirement is a step in the right direction. - https://www.minds.com/register?referrer=scottcbusiness
Yup – Yup is an overlay application that works on other platforms letting you upvote or downvote any webpage or piece of content on the internet. It started off decently and the idea was interesting, but after they had so many issues with the EOS blockchain, they moved to Polygon which tanked the value of YUP. I have since tried it again but did not really earn anything. Since most people also are not browsing on a PC with extensions to rate content, it does not really feel relevant either. I wish them the best and will continue to check in, but I do not see it going extremely far. It needs to be a more integrated experience and offer content publishing within its network. - https://app.yup.io/
Torum – Torum has completed everything it needed to do to be recommended. The only drawback is that you can only earn XTM through missions and not through platform rewards or curation. Also, because it is an ERC20 token, there are some complications around withdrawals and fees you will need to pay to do so. These are the reasons it is in tertiary and not primary, but it is still a great platform. - https://www.torum.com/signup?referral_code=scottcbusiness
Non-Crypto Platforms Worth Mentioning (10)
Below are some platforms that are distributed or decentralized in some way but lack any blockchain or crypto integration.
Fediverse – It is the underlying technology to provide peer-to-peer social networking instances that other platforms utilize like Diaspora, PeerTube, Mastodon, ActivityPub, etc. - https://fediverse.party/
Diaspora – Great protocol, but Diaspora social does not even let you sign up. You must go through a convoluted process to register in another pod first and they make it more confusing than needed. I would recommend just using something like Mastodon. - https://diaspora.social/
PeerTube – Look I would love to recommend this, but the average user would be confused, and though I understand that true decentralization requires many networks but separating and keeping users in that network with an extremely limited upload space capacity would lead me to not even bother using the platform. Had I joined an instance, there would be fifty-nine others in it only and I would have the ability to upload 1 or 2 videos before capping out. No crypto or blockchain use and not recommended. https://joinpeertube.org/
Mastodon – Part of the Fediverse. A great platform for libertarianism and freedom. People can individually censor on instances, but you are free to roam wherever. - https://mastodon.social/
Flote – Flote is a great status platform and while they have been wanting to add monetization, it has been lacking on the development side. Usage has seemed to slow down, but I am hopeful they will add crypto rewards and introduce more decentralization to the platform. Currently, it is not much different from a Twitter alternative or something like Gab. - https://flote.app/
Below are a few more platforms that are pro-free speech and support good moderation policies but are still centralized and could act the same way as legacy platforms.
Tertiary Recommendations (4):
If you have extra time to post somewhere, you might as well sign up on these platforms and explore them a bit.
JoshWhoTv – This platform has made many improvements and while it is the best for crypto, it is particularly good for censorship resistance and content distribution. I do not get many views on here, but it is worth considering. - https://www.joshwhotv.com
LBRY/Odysee – this is a great project and while I have a ton of criticisms for them, it is still better than most platforms in terms of decentralization. They do a lot wrong.
They do have to approve you to earn LBC rewards and you do have to pay LBC to post content. So, for beginners, you need to pay to get started and monetization is on the way out. This also shows that they have full control over monetization and governance of the blockchain making it fairly centralized in that regard. They are decentralized in terms of content moderation and content hosting, however, there are issues there too. If the content is banned from Odysee, 99% of people will not see it. Even multiple alternative platforms still require you to seed or pay for content to be hosted. While people could still seed content or you could spin up own server, that is not realistic for people to do and thus the result is that 99% of the users using this platform are going through a very centralized experience.
People will argue that Odysee and the LBRY dapp are quite different but from a user experience perspective, they are the same. LBRY is the protocol and is different from all of this, but regardless, the platform experience is getting worse.
You can use my invite link to join - https://lbry.tv/$/invite/@ScottCBusiness:4
Bastyon – Bastyon is a great platform that was originally called Pocketnet. They use the PKOIN cryptocurrency to give out rewards and offer boosting. You can also use their decentralized application to access it too. While the rewards are low, it is good for moderation and decentralization. While it could be improved, it is an up-and-coming platform that could grow a lot in the future with some more momentum. - https://bastyon.com/
Publish0x – I have really enjoyed using Publish0x. It is a great blogging platform that is like the likes of Medium or Read.cash. One of the main draws is that it is crypto-agnostic, so you have opportunities to earn various cryptocurrencies without being concerned about the platform’s value or longevity being tied to a certain coin. The biggest issue they have is how centralized it is where they must approve authors and now, I am earning less and less on there. They are also limited by using Ethereum tokens for payouts, but it is still worth using if you like writing and want something like a crypto-monetized Medium. - https://www.publish0x.com/?a=gl9avjgaG1
Secondary Recommendations (6)
These are platforms that are solid but lack a few things to be able to get a full primary recommendation. I still highly recommend using all of these if you have the time and capacity to do so.
Serey – I almost never recommend platforms that require a download, but this only requires you to download their wallet. You can still use the platform without controlling or claiming your cryptocurrency rewards. It is a Hive clone and while the user interface is not the best, it is worth trying out. - https://serey.io/
COS.TV – COS.tv is a cool video platform that has been paying me increasingly lately. Unfortunately, it is not being traded on as many markets, so it is harder to cash out. Some issues with the platform are the centralization around content approvals, requiring you to use a phone and massive amounts of spam comments. They also use Theta for their videos which I have criticized for centralization many times. It is still a good platform worth using, they just need to focus more on decentralization and values commonly associated with blockchain. - https://cos.tv/account/register?invite_code=GJLPA
Blurt Blog – Blurt is another Hive clone like Serey or the previous Weku and Whaleshares. The major difference is the removal of downvotes, but also opens the door for more spam. To deal with this they do have centralized moderation which I’m not a huge fan of, but that is the route they went with. You can’t get a free account on the main site but you can claim one by going to https://joinblurt.com/ or https://blurtcreator.intinte.org/. Also, there are fees for everything which is meant to disincentivize spam and the fees are burnt. It has exceptionally low liquidity which poses a risk if the one or two ways to sell were dropped and you are stuck holding the bag. One last gripe I have is if you have a big article and want to update it, they charge you a lot of Blurt to do so. To update this article cost me 13 Blurt and then 19 Blurt. It's a great platform and worth a try. - https://blurt.blog/
Brave Browser (Rewards & Creator Program) – I include this as more of a tool to use, originally writing “earn crypto for allowing ads to display on your more secure and faster browser” - https://brave.com/sco556 but they have evolved well beyond that with their various projects, marketplace, and creator program that allows for creators to sign up to earn money via tips, grants, or through ads that might have otherwise been blocked. While it is not a social platform per se, it is integrated into the social experience and extremely easy to use. I have been earning a good amount from BAT rewards and creator rewards and I am happy with the experience. - https://brave.com/
Read.Cash & Noise Cash – Read.cash has been a blast to use. It is like Publish0x or Medium but much more open and with few limitations. They reward you with Bitcoin Cash that you can withdraw without restrictions and even connect you to Sideshift if you want to be paid in something else. It is not actually integrated with the blockchain, but you can boost your content, earn from sponsorships, and enjoy the platform in a decentralized way regarding moderation, etc. Since it is not actually integrated into the blockchain though, it is not decentralized like how Hive is. You also must consider that the rewards given out were funded by donations from Marc De Mesel and while they used to be public and transparent, we do not know how much is left and when rewards may end. The team is also not public facing nor using the platform anymore so there is no development or communications from them. The main issue now is that they could shut down at a moment’s notice. - https://read.cash/r/scottcbusiness
This also counts as two recommendations because you can use Noise.cash as the place to share short status posts rather than on Read.Cash. You can still post status posts on both though. This is a beta that was put out by their team to test this out and it is worth checking out even though it is bare bones. You can just link it to your read.cash account and automatically earn your rewards in that wallet. - https://noise.cash/u/scottcbusiness
DTube – DTube has its own chain and allows you to post to Hive, Steem, and Blurt all at the same time which is very ideal since most blockchain platforms do not have to crosspost. I would recommend it as a primary recommendation, but the trading and liquidity are so low that you could have trouble with getting or selling DTC as well as the price volatility that comes with that. There are also regular issues with the upload process, but they do offer you many methods, so you can always revert to importing videos from a legacy platform if you need to. Lastly, there are too few leaders (witnesses) who run the nodes. There’s 20/20 meaning that there is no way to vote for someone new because there is no one new to vote for. If they can get more people trading DTC, fix their upload issues, and decentralize more, it would be a top recommendation. - https://d.tube/
Primary Recommendation (1):
Hive is the best platform based on profitability, monetization, decentralization, and blockchain integration. While many platforms are great, Hive does the most to respect and build upon the values associated with the blockchain ethos.
Hive – This is my alternative to Medium / Reddit / Facebook. Hive is the hard-forked version of Steem and hosts a massive number of decentralized applications (dapps) that I use regularly. It is complex, but if you understand Steem, then it is the same thing. It is extremely decentralized, everything for your account is owned by you and uncensorable. Moderation is done by the community, but you are never actually “banned” or “censored,” instead your content won’t appear on the feed after enough negative votes on your content to deal with spam, etc. I stopped using Leofinance as my go-to community due to extremely low earnings and now mainly just post to the Threespeak community. Communities are like subreddits within the platform where you can earn tokens from that community and get more visibility for your content within certain communities.
This counts as multiple recommendations as I am recommending the network Hive, PeakD as my main interface, and 3Speak for video. - https://peakd.com/@scottcbusiness/posts
3Speak – This is my go-to video hosting platform for Hive. While you can post any video content on PeakD or whatever blogging interface you choose to use, uploading your videos on 3Speak are a wonderful way to fully integrate with the blockchain and utilize IPFS. - https://3speak.co/
Conclusion:
A lot has changed in the world of blockchain social since my last review 2 years ago. I have been posting a lot less and unfortunately earning a lot less as well. While I made about $25,000, there has been a steep decline in recent months. I have been posting less too, but there is a clear decline in rewards offered and naturally the value of those rewards due to market conditions. While Hive is not perfect, it is by far the best blockchain to host dapps.
While I understand Hive itself is not a social dapp and all the dapps on it are separate, it is much easier to recommend Hive as a whole. It checks off more things I am looking for than any other platform. I have moved everything else to secondary recommendations. DTube is great, but it has technical issues the most often, Read.cash is anonymous and funded by donations so it could shut down at any time.
I have decided to recommend Blurt & Serey because most Hive clones are good places to earn and have a similar decentralized ecosystem. While Cos.TV is the most centralized and must approve videos, it is still a good place to earn crypto. Odysee/LBRY has completely fallen off in terms of rewards and the platform in general, but they could improve given they have total control over governance. Bastyon is a great platform, but you do not earn very much there. Publish0x requires approval for new authors which I never really supported, and the earnings are falling off due to low value.
There is still a lot of hope for crypto social and what is possible in the future. Just lately I started using Actifit more on Hive where I can track and get rewarded for my exercise. Blockchain social and crypto-monetized platforms have taught us that everything we do has value and can be monetized in some way. While my earnings are down, I have proven that you can do this as a side hustle or supplementarily to the content you already create or have created.
A consistent theme I have noticed with platforms is more are opting into centralized services like Gmail logins, KYC verification, phone verification, requiring you to use a credit card, etc. I have also not been a fan of applications that only work on mobile as they are at the mercy of app stores like Apple and Google. There is also a growing trend where platforms are rebranding into mostly NFT marketplaces and trying to cash in on NFTs rather than growing and working on their platforms.
For my tertiary, secondary, and primary recommendations, I have written and recorded guides and tutorials for several of these platforms as well as doing interviews with their founders or executive team members. I have also done many breakdowns on frauds and the platform I recommend you avoid. To keep the word count down and make this not any larger a file than it needs to be, I will not include those links, but do consider looking through my content to find all of that.
It is worth reviewing my decentralization matrix episode to get more insight into where these platforms fall in terms of how decentralized or centralized, they are. This is a handful of platforms ranked on how decentralized they are based on many questions. This is the latest update: https://youtu.be/BnJPj5VfXOg
These are the questions I refer to when reviewing content:
Can anyone monetize?
Is there a KYC process?
Are the tokenomics of the system sustainable?
Do they have a terms and conditions?
Do they have something like a “we always still retain the right to ban you” clause?
Do they sell premium features
Are they payable without KYC?
Are there “back-doors” or super administrative users that could log into or manipulate a user’s account in some way?
What is the initial token distribution/was there a pre-mine or ninja-mine?
What is the ratio of tokens staked vs liquid tokens? How many people are staking?
Number of core developers?
Can you self-host content and or utilize peer to peer technology?
Number of decentralized application (dapp) developers?
Can anyone post content and participate? (Is it invite-only)
Can anyone develop third party applications/tools/services for the platform?
How challenging/easy is it to fork or clone?
How is privacy handled?
Is it open source?
How concentrated is the wealth of the ecosystem?
Is their cryptocurrency an actual cryptocurrency?
Does it support and uphold free speech?
How are moderation and censorship cases handled?
Do they go after copyrighted material?
Is the governance decentralized?
Is it a DAO?
Is there a company and or CEO behind the project?
Is voting transparent while also protecting privacy?
Is there anything protecting the governance model from an attack?
Does the project use and integrate with a blockchain?
How many nodes are there?
How distributed are the nodes?
What is the barrier of entry to start a node?
Are they incentivized fairly without over concentrating wealth to the top nodes?
Does it use Amazon Web Services, Google, Cloudflare, or another service that could create a single point of failure?
How many of these factors are trustless versus policies/promises?
There is no perfect platform and they each offer their own unique benefits. Follow along with my monthly reports to see how much I am earning on each platform and gain some insight into how I have performed on each in terms of engagements, followers, impressions, views, and comments.
I use many platforms and if you are curious to see what I am currently using the most, check out my monthly reports on crypto earnings and social metrics to keep up with what I use and how well these platforms have been progressing, the earnings you can get, and how I’ve performed on them.
If you feel I made a mistake, poorly reviewed something, or missed a key platform to review, please comment below and I will take your feedback in and edit this to include it or edit my post accordingly. I really hope this benefits you as much as I hope it does. This took me an exceptionally long time. Please share this with others if you believe they will find use in it too! For some, I explained my reasoning more than others. If you are interested, you can inquire about anything, and I will get more in-depth on it even making a video if needed. Let me know what you think about all this in the comments below.
This was the last review: https://youtu.be/k3FJPnsDh_U
Read.Cash: https://read.cash/@scottcbusiness/comprehensive-blockchain-social-media-platforms-review-v-633ef26d
What review or guide would you like me to do next? What is your favorite platform? Where are you spending most of your time? Where are you earning the most? Let me know what you think about this in the comments below and do not forget to subscribe!
*Disclaimer: This is not financial advice and is purely for entertainment purposes. What you see, hear, or read is my opinion, and any statements made are based on my views and should not be misconstrued as fact. My crypto portfolio may or may not be simulated*
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👉 http://www.scottcbusiness.com - Scott Cunningham
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This was very helpful... Thank you very much because I learnt alote here too.