As promised:
You’ve highlighted some important issues, particularly regarding consumer engagement potentially being insufficient to sustain long-term growth. The subscription model was primarily designed to cover server fees, which had been our biggest challenge in the past. However, expecting those who pay for the subscription to cover all VIMM's streamers isn’t entirely fair. It might be smarter to consider placing our streaming service behind a subscription model, while allowing free users to access other streaming platforms. An additional benefit of this approach would be discouraging DMCA violations since it wouldn't be worth it for someone to pay for a few minutes of streaming, like the Champions League final, before getting banned (which has been a problem in the past).
Coupling voting weight with the subscription model is indeed problematic and shouldn't have been included in the proposal. You can hold me accountable for that. In early feedback from others, like @shmoogleosukami, it was mentioned that this could be perceived as vote buying. You’ve also raised another valid concern—that it creates the wrong incentive for streaming. Voting should be tied to the quality of content, which, in the context of streaming, can be subjective. However, metrics like viewer numbers and chat activity could be a good starting point for evaluation.
When it comes to creating more tangible value for money, something like a season pass with a reward track would be far more suitable. We could experiment with parameters like beneficiary percentages and offer more (partner) rewards to unlock, among other things. Gamifying the "grind" encourages people to stream more and is better suited to returning value to the streamer, thanks to the secondary income we generate through things like beneficiary rewards and partner revenue.
(*) I have another gamification idea that I’m considering for https://dagamers.xyz, which could be fun. If it proves successful and the proposal goes through, it might eventually be implemented on VIMM (I’m keeping this as a teaser for now since I don’t want to make any false promises before assessing its feasibility).
We'll definitely discuss this in our next call and I see us going back to the drawing board.
Our perception of Twitch and other streaming platforms has completely shifted. Rather than viewing them as threats, we now see them as opportunities. The most effective way to onboard streamers from these platforms to VIMM and Hive is by allowing them to continue using their preferred platforms while gradually introducing them to the benefits of Hive.
I explored this idea in a theoretical article I wrote on DaGamers two weeks ago: https://peakd.com/hivedev/@foreveraverage/if-dagamers-went-full-hive-and-tried-to-onboard-new-gamers-and-streamers-into-hive. The article is somewhat simplified and should be taken with a grain of salt, as it was more of a "reflection of the moment"—especially the section on reaching out to new streamers, since VIMM will have more resources. However, it is a good starting point.
(*) When it comes to engaging viewers and those with smaller votes, it might be wise to look at other apps within the Hive ecosystem for inspiration. A common approach is to distribute custom tokens, which is certainly a possibility for us. However, we don’t want to create tokens just for the sake of it—there needs to be a clear utility or "sink" for them. Potential sinks could include jumping ahead in the reward track or applying discounts to the season pass. This approach could also incentivize viewers to watch streams, as they could earn tokens in the process. Additionally, it would give people a reason to use VIMM's front-end over other platforms.
(*) That said, we need to think this through very carefully. Another option that might be more beneficial for us is to keep this "currency" exclusive to our platform. By doing so, users would need to spend their tokens on VIMM-specific features, which would encourage them to stay within our ecosystem and focus on what the currency unlocks rather than what it's worth.
(*) Additionally, we could consider creating something like streaming teams, groups, clans, or guilds that viewers can join. This would foster a sense of community and introduce an element of competitiveness, further enhancing the user experience.
Everything marked with (*) is more theoretical and will most likely not make it into the proposal, as the proposal is set for one year—and a year passes quickly. However, these are concepts we're considering and would love to discuss further, even if their potential implementation is not set in stone.