What Are You Paying For? (Stifling Boost) #MindsGaming
Do you know what a boost is? Do you know what a view is? Do you know what you’re really paying for? Lets investigate.
To investigate boost we must first know how to boost, and this requires tokens, Minds has this to say about there tokens in there white-paper for Minds:
“For the past three years, Points successfully fueled the Minds network and established the foundation for a rewards-based ecosystem where top contributors earn the most revenue and reach. Minds is building upon this foundation by leveraging blockchain technology to replace Points with Minds tokens. The Minds token is a social networking utility built upon the Ethereum ERC-20 standard. Minds chose to issue its tokens on the Ethereum network because it is the leading open source, general purpose blockchain optimized for smart contracts. It includes sophisticated web tools to develop a user-friendly experience and has established broad credibility through market experience with mobile payments,distributed exchanges, cryptocurrencies and enterprise blockchain solutions.”
You can accomplish three main objectives with Minds tokens. Wire, where you send tokens to another channel on Minds. Enroll in Plus, you can use the tokens to enroll in Minds “Plus” program, and of course you can use the tokens for Minds most valuable network asset to date, boosting. But what is boosting do we really know?
Well according to Minds white-paper “Minds Beta introduced Point which are earned by interacting with the site (checking-in, referring new users, receiving votes, comments, shares, posting, etc.) or purchased in exchange for views, shares and other rewards across the network. The reward system quickly gained traction and has since become integral to the platform as the most popular feature. To date, users have earned over 1 billion Points through the Minds reward system and over 100 million Points have been purchased directly .Points provide users with value in two ways:
1.Users may exchange Points to Boost their content and receive guaranteed views from the network (1 point = 1 view)
2.Users may Wire, points directly to other channels as a tip or to pay for a premium subscription to exclusive content and unlock rewards.
The Boost system has grown significantly, (1271.79%) since its introduction. We assert that our grow this essentially validation that the surrender of personal privacy to digital surveillance is not required for successful content exposure in the attention economy. Boost has already served users with over 500 million views and is currently serving over 40 million views per month and over 1 million views per day. The system has gained popularity quickly because users are able to extend their reach beyond their existing subscribers. Minds makes it easier for influencers, publishers, and the like to increase exposure on their content and grow a following, even when compared to top mainstream networks”
Of course we now call these points tokens but still this doesn’t answer a lot of our questions for example it states (1 point = 1 view) as a key piece of information but what is a view?
Well according to Minds “A view is defined by a post passing through the center of someone's screen.” Okay but for how long a millisecond? Well indeed it seems so as Minds has no set value for its boosting protocol and can set the value of a view to any time spectrum they wish with out informing the user base that invests into these “views”. So much for a transparent social media, not even it’s main commodity is transparent.
My view? Well as The Guardian so well put it, “The days of email scams have been replaced with a new wave of web fraud. One that's harder to spot but arguably easier to pull off and with far larger implications. Namely fake traffic.
Advertisers are battling with the reality that, according to digital analytics provider com Score, 36% of online traffic is suspicious or non-human. There's a reason why – it's remarkably easy for fraudsters to set up shop and generate fake traffic to websites that earn money from advertising."