This friend of yours is clearly trying to scam people. If this was posted on the bitcoin forums instead of here, most people would be screaming SCAM because we've seen this shit hundreds of times over the years.

In one years time, there's not going to be a Steem Island. At best, people are going to be getting there 1-3 steem back, and this guy is going to pocketing everything else. People are loaning this guy their steem for a year so he can use it to massively increase his voting power and massively increase his rewards.

If he wasn't trying to pull a scam, he would be offering to return the percentage that was contributed, so that those "investing" would get way more back than they paid in. That's not what's be offered though is it?