Hive is flexible, it can be used as a middle ground between Reddit, Substack, Facebook, and YouTube.

It's in the way that you use it. There are appealing dApps, communities, and tokens. Plus, there's plenty of development going on. I'd say the appeal is in the individual communities and creations themselves, not in the concept of a "Hive community." Further decentralization is where the growth is for Hive as a whole.

Getting further adoption of the Hive currency and even the acceptance of the side-chain tokens in what would deemed to be mainstream commerce would be a massive victory (and we are not necessarily talking about Amazon, Overstock, etc.).

One of the threats that is looming is the ongoing effort to centralize in a decentralized, multi-community (more communities are coming!), multi-application environment. Those looking to centralize are doing more harm than good because there's reputational risk, corruption, entry barriers, and a stifling of the individual communities (due to a lack of understanding) created by these so-called authorities.

In the end, Hive is a tool. We all can use it differently and in the way we see fit to further our goals. The communities, dApps, and the monetization involved should be the selling points.