Traditional social networks like TikTok are starting to feel a bit outdated even in 2022 for ignoring all the potential that blockchain can offer to its mechanics. New startups like Chingari or Cheelee are ready to take over the niche. But how sustainable are their models, and who will win by crossing the chasm? More importantly, what can users get out of all this? Let’s start from the beginning.

The video sharing boom of the 2020s

Chinese video-sharing app Douyin, TikTok in the rest of the world, took the social media market by storm in 2018. In 2022, TikTok and Douyin ranked no. 4 with over 1.6 billion monthly active users leaving Instagram behind, it was too late. with the reels.

Innovations like an AI-based recommendation algorithm made TikTok an absolute leader in being the “time waster.” Even in the US market, an average user spends more than 45 minutes on TikTok every day, leaving all other social media platforms including YouTube and Facebook behind.

But what really changed for the user? Until now, the mainstream social media industry massively ignored the emergence of blockchain and the NFT industry by concentrating on its primary metric: revenue per user. It seems they haven’t even heard of the democratization trend. Little was done to protect personal data even after the Facebook breaches that affected more than 500 million people worldwide.

Users remain a commodity for advertising companies that sell their attention to corporations, while some bloggers manage to make a fortune off of it. Of course, users began to search for alternatives en masse.

From fighting the hegemony of intermediaries to rewarding users

The first inspiration came from the decentralization and democratization movement that started with various blockchain-it-all projects. After the invention of Bitcoin, it became clear to many that in the trust economy there is no need for intermediaries, be it the bank or Facebook.

The rise of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) made it possible to create unique tokens for any type of content and reward creators directly, freeing the creator economy from the hegemony of the middleman who took most of the profits in traditional services. like Spotify. .

In the social media sector, experiments of direct rewards for content creators were carried out by Steemit as early as 2016, but they still didn’t work. What was needed was a deeper shift in the social media paradigm. 2022 became the year it finally got hot and noticeable.

The shift towards an “attention economy” became a missing piece of the puzzle. Nobel laureate Herbert A. Simon, who coined this term, shared the idea that attention, or time spent on social media in our case, is a rare commodity with its own value and can be sold for money. In the 1970s there was no Web3, the success of the GameFi sector with its Play-to-Earn model but in 2022 it began to bear fruit.

Democratizing the Creator Economy

Who will be the next unicorn? Only time will tell. In the Indian market, there are at least two interesting cases showing that TikTok has been seriously challenged.

The first is Bangalore-based startup Chingaru, which is already number one in India by challenging TikTok. At first glance, everything is there: users are rewarded with tokens for uploading and watching videos, commenting and sharing videos as part of the GARI mining program. In addition, it optimizes the purchase process of the advertised goods. And as a bonus, users can bid and vote for suggestions to influence the future development of the project.

Chingari co-founder and CEO Sumit Ghosh even heralds the new monetization plan as “another step toward democratizing the creator economy.” Yes, it might help “micro and nano-influencers” in smaller cities earn their share, but will it change the way we consume social media and what is the economics behind it all?

First of all, the paradigm here still has a heavy focus on the creator economy. Chingari’s reward distribution depends on the virality metrics of the video. In other words, the reward for creators grows with the number of views of the video. To earn more, a creator must get more views. In the end, everything revolves around the creator.

Second, there is a question of sustainability. In the press release on November 21, the company shared the launch of a new “content monetization plan.” By purchasing a subscription for Rs 20 per day, Rs 30 per week or Rs 100 per month, users will be able to double their earnings from the GARI mining program and “withdraw money directly to their bank accounts, making the whole process easy and without friction”. ”, reads the website.

What will happen when market penetration reaches your adoption curve? Also, those familiar with the blockchain market know that fiat-based subscription models do not work well with Web3 models. Why is it necessary for users to pay? The underlying problem is the lack of an NFT or token economy component. If the design can be improved in months with more competitors, the underlying economics and mechanics are the core component for future growth. That is why the reward for Chingari is still quite limited.

Marry NFT and ad-based earnings for the benefit of a regular user

The first project that really went one step further in both directions: blockchain-based democratization and the attention economy is Cheelee. The team of more than 150 developers who have already created the NUTSon app with a base of more than 1.5 million users launched their alternative this winter. Both creators and users will find ways to make money, but Cheelee created an ecosystem based on the attention economy.

Unlike Chingari, there is no need to open pop-up subscription plans with any fiat or any currency. It does not require any investment at all. Just like TikTok, Start NFT glasses are totally free. And the reward will also be much greater. How is it that a project offers more based on the same structure of social networks?

The biggest difference is that Cheelee adopted the Web3 component at its core. It has built an underlying technology with NFTs and internal stability funds. On that basis alone, Cheelee offered a balance between NFT-based earnings and ad-based earnings.

The central idea is not to divide the existing pie and have creators fight over the video that is most viral, but to grow the pie and improve the terms for all stakeholders to participate and make the token economy flourish. Needless to say, you don’t need to subscribe and pay even Rs 1 to get the best.

As with any new idea, it will take some time to gain momentum. To help users tell the difference between being a product and getting paid for the time they spend in the app, Cheelee is giving $50,000 to lucky early risers. Follow the project news to learn more about the paradigm shift and how it works in real life.

In 2021, one would laugh at the idea that users should be paid to watch TikToks. In 2022, after an influx of GameFi projects that always promoted the Play-to-Earn model over Pay-to-Play, the social media sector started to notice new companies working in this area. Some projects like Chingari are helping with the democratization of an existing model, while others like Cheelee already work on Web3 paradigms from the ground up and put the user at the center of the ecosystem.