In our whitepaper, we outline our goal to democratize digital transacting. We want to integrate cryptocurrencies into the traditional financial world and create an access point — a cryptocurrency epicenter — that is open, transparent, and rewards-based for all our users and content contributors.

So, how do we at investFeed see democratized digital transacting extending into the social media environment?

There has undoubtedly been an extremely rapid shift by marketers into digital channels and increasing ad-dollars are being spent on Facebook campaigns, Google Adwords, YouTube and other key channels. Products and brand messaging are being integrated via platforms like Instagram, Snapchat, and Pinterest. That, of course, makes sense. There is no point in advertising where your consumers are not. And we know that Millennial consumers are not watching TV.

In PwC’s Strategy& January 2017 report on “Content democratization: How the Internet is fueling the growth of creative economies”, they note the following key highlights:

We are witnessing the rise of a consumer-creator model that has broken down the barriers to the creation and distribution of content. Although demand for news in general has been on the rise, how people consume it is changing fast. Younger people typically don’t consume news in print or on TV, and are much more likely than people over 45 to get their news through mobile devices and social media. (Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2015: Tracking the Future of News, University of Oxford and Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, 2015) Sales of digital content show that consumers, as they spend more time online, are willing to pay for content, especially if it provides variety, is of high quality, is affordable, and has the convenience of anytime, anywhere, anyhow consumption. Perhaps the greatest beneficiaries of the content revolution brought about by the Internet are consumers themselves. And it isn’t just passive consumption — the Internet is enabling a whole new culture of remixing that allows consumers to co-create content and generate their own content.

It is clear from the report that “the internet” has allowed consumers to become creators of content, particularly as increasingly people consume that content online. In the new digital advertising ecosystem, corporates use their advertising and marketing budgets on digital channels. Facebook, Google, Twitter and the like benefit from that spend. But what about individuals who create amazing content?

Their “premium” content is contributing to the network value of the various digital channels, and the bigger and deeper the network, the more the likes of Facebook, Google and Twitter can charge corporates for ad placement. But, individual content creators, while creating value and revenue for the social media platform, do not receive many tangible, “pay-the-rent” rewards in return for their contribution.

Yes, if you are a small consulting business, writing great, insightful material will likely gain you leads and customers through the same mechanisms that the corporates use, but what if you are an academic, an educator, a believer in spreading knowledge to the community?

Essentially great content providers who empower the community have to be satisfied with altruism and awareness as a benefit, despite increasing the value for the social media platform in a way that pulls directly on their revenue lever.

At investFeed, we don’t consider this to be a democratic process. A democratized social media will allow the community to reward content creators who are adding value to the network as a whole. We intend to allow for those rewards to be enabled by our FEED tokens.

Our FEED tokens are an obvious natural extension of our core cryptocurrency focus — it made sense for us to embrace the power and capabilities of a native Ethereum-based cryptographic token to drive our marketplace capabilities and offering. In so doing, we are putting the community back in the driving seat.

Our community members will have the opportunity to create rich profiles, including crypto-trader performance, direct message other members, post and apply to blockchain-related careers and comment, share, like and follow community generated content.

We are also generating a limited supply of FEED tokens in the investFeed Token Sale — no additional tokens will be available post-sale. The limited supply of tokens coupled with our anticipated community growth will see demand-supply economics at work to drive the value of FEED for the community. Thus, great content will attract a deep and loyal community and the providers of that great content will be rewarded and incentivized by the community for their efforts.

This is social media democracy in action at investFeed.