RE: Steem, Utility Token or Rewards?
I will be the first to admit that I don't understand all that is happening on the Steem blockchain, but I see a potentially positive future with Steem being the utility token that enables all of the tribes/communities and pulling away from being a reward token.
This is the key question for me - Will Resource Credits be considered a valuable resource to the point that someone will rent my used resource credits?
If the answer is yes, then I believe that my current SP investment is not at risk. I will stop thinking like an end-user and more like an investor. I would not be getting paid for my time and allow my current investment (the resource of Steem Power) to work for me.
If Steem never becomes anything more than a reward token, what happens as the reward pool keeps decreasing. The supply decreases which hopefully increases the demand, but at some point, people will stop creating content as there is not enough incentive to do so.
Just some thoughts.
Yeah, that's another great question. At this time it is too easy to have a huge amount of RC credits. So, if it is going to create investment it seems that would have to be adjusted in my non-technical opinion.
I would argue that the opposite should be true. Let the early adopters (that is us) benefit from the time and money we invested into Steem.
For example, say company A wants to start a tribe. They buy SP which correlates to RC so they can onboard their tribe members.
Company B also wants to start a tribe, but they do not want the upfront cost of SP. So they decide to rent from current holders of the RC - maybe from a site similar to what DLease does now.
As more companies join, more RC will be needed to onboard their users/members. Eventually, those members will not even know what Steem is, they will just know the process of their tribe and their tribe ensures that there are enough RC for its members.
My max mana is 12,486,580,072,262. Let's say I keep 1,000,000,000 for personal use (way to much). If I wanted to start my own tribe and provide RC to my members I would need more, but then I can rent out the rest to another tribe.
One thing to consider is that the cost of transactions in RC may increase as there are more users and therefore more activity on the blockchain.
Good point about the cost of RCs going up. I forget to include that aspect in my thinking