Posts

HIVE inflation reduction: thoughts on the next hard fork

avatar of @aggroed
25
@aggroed
·
0 views
·
3 min read

For a long time I've been a proponent of high inflation on the chain and directing a lot of it through post rewards. I think that was a good solution to the ninja Mine and made sense with Steem north of a dollar and a large dev fund sitting under steemit. I think it's a bad plan with Hive at 11 cents.

We essentially have one shot in the next four years of helping Hive turn into something bigger than it is. I think in order to do it we have to drastically reduce the print rate so that HIVE is an attractive place to build a business. It's currently a weak place to build a business because the base currency is dirt cheap and there's not a ton of capital to access here. So, the chain, tech, and community are pretty strong, but the underlying financial structure is shitty.

One of the reasons why HIVE is so cheap is because we keep printing massive amounts of inflation. I think we should drastically reduce inflation. I think we should bring it to 1% per year and hold it there. .33% for witnesses, .33% for DAO, and .33% for post rewards.

This would have the impact of cutting the inflation down to about 1/8th of what it is now. So, folks might ask, "Hey fucktard, you think cutting inflation is gonna help us? You're supposed to be for minnows you turn coat asshole. I'll get so many fewer coins to sell on the market. Go fuck yourself."

And it's precisely the thought that everyone, not just you, will have fewer to sell. Most of the top 20 witnesses sell everything they get, most of the bloggers sell, there's a handful of investors who are trying to accumulate, but most folks seem happy to dump. The sell pressure is unrelenting and a big part of that is because Hive doesn't feel like a great place to invest money or try to store it. It's inflating away and if you're looking for something to hodl you're better off selling for BTC.

I think instead of helping you pile up coins that are losing value, I think we should let people earn a smaller stack of coins that are growing in value. I think it's waaaay more likely the top 20 witnesses hold onto their stake, bloggers fights for larger influence, and the DAO gets pickier with their funding under these circumstances.

I would rather we all have fewer tokens of something going up, than more tokens of something going down.

A big point I have cared about for years is distribution. Well, we've actually distributed deeper down at the lows than we have at the highs, and with Hive at 11 cents I really feel like minnow status, 5k HIVE, is reachable for many.

Lastly, my experience with tribes has shown me that high percentage distribution through a tribe is bad, but having just enough to give people a taste is great. I disagree that we should cut hive inflation and post rewards to zero. I just think we need to cut the whole thing drastically. If you thought the halving is good for business just wait and see what the eigthening can do for you.

Anyway, I'm out of consensus these days... so not sure anyone cares what I think, that said I do manage a couple influential projects on the chain: splinterlands, hive-engine, palnet, and run a few nodes for the infrastructure. I think we need to do this, and we need to do it quickly before the bull is let out of the cage and we're left behind.

TL;DR Next HF plan

ASAP: delegation pools, inflation down to 1% annually, and otherwise keep it clean.