Future of social media, or Why reinventing the wheel makes sense?

In 2022, traditional social networks are rushing into the Web3 space and creator economy ambassadorship: Instagram is close to integrating in-app NFT purchases, Facebook and Telegram are increasing their monetization efforts via Stars for Reels’ creators and posts with paid content, respectively. According to a new study from Adobe, about 48% of creators are earning from their digital content creative activities, and social media are thriving from that as well – collecting personal data and making a profit from it.

Rivalry for user attention is heating up. This is the gold, new oil, scarce commodity, and fuel for the capitalizing revenue of social media platforms. Attention economy takes over the creator one, business models and digital assets migrate to the blockchain, overabundance of information and marketing encourage clip thinking. 

In the upcoming era of overall decentralization, the image of iconic social media is disputable. However, let’s try to forecast and understand why both platforms and their audiences are eager for reinvention.

True decentralization and sense of ownership

While Web2 is still under heavy pressure of censorship: TikTok is blocked in numerous geo, Kanye West decided to buy conservative Parler as he was locked out from Instagram and Twitter for his antisemitic remarks, Elon Musk bought Twitter to bring freedom of speech to everyone  – the world turns eyes to decentralization both in communication and finance. 

Some steps are made by the social media giants: Twitter is preparing to roll out verification check marks, Telegram which is so native to crypto community already launched paid content posts but this feature was quickly blocked by Apple due to AppStore guidelines prohibiting to use paywall and payment system avoiding Apple’s in-app purchases.

Besides diving into the attention economy, marketers are tending to play with the devilish sense of exclusivity and ownership of social media communities – in Web2, this trick about holding digital assets exclusively is not very obvious and clear but blockchain brings new opportunities for transparent transfer and ownership of funds and assets. This is still a crazy powerful motivation for both teenagers and adults and a way to become a part of privileged thematic communities.

So, why is it worth reinventing the wheel of social media?

Obviously, social media and communications companies understand well the inevitability of integrating Web3 technologies into their products and blockchain mass adoption. It was a year ago when Facebook turned into Meta, but there is still not much to offer its audience from the Web3 point of view. And there is a number of blockchain-native companies that drive their digital content and social platforms for the mutual benefit of users and founders.