Hey all,
Thought we could discuss exactly what functionality will exist at launch provided through MaidSafe, and we can analyze exactly what functionality is most marketable to standard consumers.
I’ve mentioned this before, but from my understanding of the network, it’s ability to act a Dropbox competitor is massive and possibly it’s “killer” function.
Can other folks throw out there what they understand the system’s power(s) to be?
I agree that the killer app is a free anonymous dropbox.
The most marketable feature is SAFE’s privacy and security which we should repeat like parrots. In the Snowden era this is going to be viewed as the holy grail. Privacy is slowly becoming a luxury and we are giving it away.
Also the second killer app is private communication. We should really make sure to launch a WhatsApp a Skype a Hangouts and every other communications app that we can think off because this is going to spread like wildfire and we are going to be able to have a easy time marketing it…
I think the privacy and security, unfortunately, a nice addition, but its not enough to sell a product. Look at any major success online. Security and privacy are just expected. But no one leaves when they’re questioned. Facebook sells your information, Google does the same. We all know it, but no one cares, because they offer the best product.
The best privacy and the best security are assumed. They should go unnoticed, like good sound design in a film.
Too much focus on privacy, encryption, and security will get you a very specific type of person. And, this is a VERY unfortunate reality, but if I talk about privacy too much around people, the response becomes “Well, what are you hiding?” It’s horrible and its sad. But its the mindset of the majority.
SO, what we need to figure out is what about this product is better in terms of functionality? How will it save someone money immediately? Can it be faster than the current web? Could it bypass these new insane net neutrality problems? Things that have tangible, immediate benefits.
I concur with your reasoning. The actual market for privacy and security is much smaller than the market MaidSafe wants to tap into. The products and services within the MaidSafe environment need to be better than what is offered elsewhere, more benefits, more features.
I agree with this statement but I think you are missing your own question…
You asked what should we use to market SAFE when we launch the project. Well when we launch the project the places where we are going to be marketing them are places like Reddit, Hacker News, Bitcointalk etc.
people there are very much the type that are seeing privacy as killer feature…
But in the long run you are definitely right, if we are really going to attract users on a mass scale we are going to have to have something else. I personally believe that the Incentivization that Safecoin brings to the system will be of tremendous help to spread the network because when people realize that when they get their friends and family to use a free secure dropbox their Safecoin stash increases in value they will immediately start preaching some more…
I think it might expand beyond that almost immediately, and faster than we all think. MaidSafe will end up on those tech sites regardless. Every project in those circles right now tout the same buzzwords, emphasizing the same points, and all drowning in their cacophony of privacy/encryption/security.
So what’s unique to MaidSafe? Why separates it from those commonly-spouted buzzwords? I’d argue the almost limitless amounts of encrypted, private cloud storage for a fraction of the cost. That’s the strength. And if it can transfer data faster because of the distributed nature, that’s big too (Although I’m not 100% on whether that’s true, someone please let me know).
We shouldn’t bother saying “and it protects us from the government” or “NSA-proof!” Comments like that are redundant and alienating. If it can protect you from the toughest hacker, it can protect you from prying governments. Putting too fine a point on it makes it sound like a political movement, and once politics gets involved then every goofball will have something to say (see: many discussions in this forum already). Politics need to be hidden from this so people can project their own beliefs onto it.
Look at Dropbox. Look at their website. Do they have an agenda? Google? Facebook? They just exist. We all have things we believe about them, but they make no visible political or philosophical projections.
Keep in mind, I’m not saying we shouldn’t mention its powerful security features, but should be peripheral.
The largest focus, the centerpiece of the initial push, should emphasize for the masses its easiest to understand function. Dropbox Killer. It’s an easy correlation. Everyone understands that. People know they need more space, and want to pay less for it. Shine a spotlight on that.
Is there anything else about MaidSafe that falls into this camp?
Next is probably Safecoin, although this will bring up the “Why more cryptos?” discussion.
OK, so when it comes to the SAFE network itself we can easily point out why it’s better the Internet. When it comes to the apps themselves we are going to have to think a little bit harder…
So as you said we should focus on the products.Since we don’t have any we should deduce the most obvious ones. The first one is obviously dropbox but what about other apps? What are some of the apps that you are expecting?
For brainstorming reasons I’ll start a list of apps:
whatsapp (or better yet WeChat) - maybe we should concentrate on the fact that you can easily send large amounts of data over chat (business examples?), we should also point out that because of Safecoin integration you can easily conduct business. I put the WeChat example because the Chinese use it as e-mail, uber, paypal and ebay all in-one which to me seems like a really interesting idea.
Firechat is also extremely interesting in that it uses mesh networking to send data.
Twitter - our own content dissemination network is going to be a really important project. The marketability here lies in the fact that you can’t be banned (China, Russia, Turkey etc.) which will be a really important feature in the coming years…Also the fact that your data is in your control is really big
Facebook(Diaspora) - Any ideas? My first reaction is that if we manage to build a reputation system + Safecoin we can have buoyant economy on our own Safebook. Of course there is always the fact that you control your own data
A lot is going to depend on functionality, and having a basic toolbox of slick and useful applications early on is going to be beneficial, but I’m thinking that the big button to push is contained in the core concept of the network: Secure Access For EVERYONE. That’s the most available and native talking point.
Of course, file storage, browsing and communications should be focused on technically pre launch as much as possible.
Then I’m thinking several “central” sites that point to existing and new network resources, education, etc., will be important out of the box.
There are a lot of aspects of the network that are really amazing, for sure.
What I’d like to do is develop a list and sort it by mass appeal, and figure out what products will drive interest immediately, and don’t rely on any chicken-and-egg problems (social networks).
For example, more secure versions of chat engines, Twitter, and Facebook where the users own their information and have more privacy are nice, but they don’t have the strength to gain mass adoption. They have a few things against them. There’s already really functional versions that exist now with unmatched user bases (ultimately the only thing that matters in social networking).
Circumventing bans is an interesting point, though, especially in places like China. But I feel like its usually about getting a message out, and VPNs work fine for the moment (who knows down the line).
Are there any other functions that could exist from the beginning that don’t rely on a pre-existing social network, like the data storage functionality? Or things that are more business-oriented? That’s a big one to me. I’ll get accounts on newTwitter and newFacebook, but I’ll more than likely rarely use it myself because it ultimately serves no purpose to me, and that’s going to probably be true of most people for a while. But if there were, say, collaborative working applications (Google Drive + collaborative writing), or ways to share media for music or video production (obviously thinking about strictly my industry since that’s where my mind goes) I’d adopt those immediately because they don’t require that a massive amount of my friends and coworkers already have accounts. Just the few I’m planning to work with. For example, its very easy to convince a couple people to use BitTorrent Sync. It’s much harder to explain why they should adopt Diaspora.
Social networking would be a Phase Two thing once there’s adoption (like Google begets GMail begets Google+). What other Phase One things are there?
Okay, so we’ve got (In no particular order yet):
Plus:
Public-share blog/site which cannot be shut down by anyone but the owner.
The most robust permanent storage on the planet - no chance of bankruptcy, takeover, terrorist attack or tsumani wiping the servers and your data
P.S. Maybe Wiki the OP and summarise there: @David ?
Good one!
Also being called SAFE should also help.
We shouldn’t just look at what the marketable aspects of maidasafe will be, also the current infrastructure of the internet that needs to be improved. Tor, torrents, irc servers, etc. the best thing to do would be to have an universal chat app that would be the core of the social network and could add all existant communication protocols (with content import/export that retain posting times, transitions must replicate the history to be successful).
And please don’t steal names from already existant products (eg. Safebook), it looks terrible, it just comes across as a cheap knockoff…
Sure, we want things that aren’t just marketable but good. Not all important advancements are marketable because not all advancements are simple and can be explained easily.
That said, the goal in this thread is to pinpoint the parts of Maidsafe with mass market appeal, and coming up with the best ways to convey that simply and eloquently.
I’m generally with you. Obviously people will make whatever they want and name it however they wish, but I hope they’d use different names. I understand why its sometimes helpful to stick to a paradigm. Cultural symbols are the fastest way to a point and help product marketing tremendously. But when we get too close to something, we resist it. In storytelling, its similar to the idea of the Archetype and Stereotype. We need archetypes to draw a fast connection to things in our lives, but stereotypes make us mad for the most part. The loner cowboy is an archetype. The fastest gun slinger in the West chasing down a train filled with gold and a girl tied to the railroad tracks is stereotype.
Facebook was a brilliant name for a product back in 2003 because it was marketed towards college students and every college student knew what The Facebook was: that book with all the freshman’s high school photos in it. A directory of people. But we’ve transcended that concept. So for a Facebook knock-off, you want something that pinpoints the marketable aspects of the new version while drawing a parallel to something recognizable in culture.
What about say an information database? Education, medical, science and such. A place for collective open research to be done. A lot of people are turning to the net for their education these days. An in depth well crafted educational and research app makes sense. Open science and research in all fields.
Awesome. What about the SAFE Network contributes to making these sort of applications better and more powerful?
I could see maybe the whole buy-time-on-the-super-computer aspect (that’s a goal for the network, right? using the distributed power of the system for calculations and such?). Or for medical systems that need constant access, there’s potentially no downtime.
or simply renting out your processor power when your afk. Imagine a bunch of normal pc users rigging their pcs to the system for a price while they’re away. They get paid for the processor power and the customer gets speed. Which means your computer earns you money even when you aren’t using it. Theoretically that could even encourage people not to use their computers so much because they’d be being paid to be afk and maybe go out and do something.
We should integrate augmented reality technology so that it can plug into SAFE Network. This would be critical for a new generation of journalists.
Journalists could make money by offering shares in their content to Netizen Distributors. A tweet for example could be monetized in such a way so that the first 100 people who retweet receive shares and thus a percentage.
Another way of doing this is to go with releasing coins and then proceed to let people pre-order these coins. As these coins get redeemed they get burned raising the value for everyone who continues to hold.
But AR is going to be critical and here is an example of why in this video (tagging and auras): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frrZbq2LpwI