The revolutionary entity that is Bitcoin has made more than an impression on a whole lot of people. But just how profitable is its mining when compared to that of social mining? Well, we’ll know soon.

Bitcoin Mining

This is a process where transactions are authenticated and added to the public ledger. Bitcoin mining is also a way to create new bitcoins. During the mining process, the computers of the miners perform the “hashing” – thereby producing proof of work. This is done by taking a series of randomly generated input data strings and applying a particular cryptographic function to it (SHA-256 in this case for Bitcoin).

The process is actually designed to be difficult and resource-intensive so that the amount of blocks found every day by miners remains steady. Also, to be considered valid, individual blocks should always contain a proof of work. Other Bitcoin nodes verify this proof of work each time a block is received.

Miners are usually paid in transaction fees and in ‘subsidies’ of freshly generated coins. These transaction fees go to any miner that contributes in the verification and confirmation of Bitcoin transactions.

The tools for mining are actually on the high end of the economic spectrum – although their price varies according to their capacity. Mining tools can cost about five hundred to thousands of dollars. Either a graphics processing unit (GPU) or an application-specific integrated circuit processing unit (ASIC) can be used to mine bitcoin. ASICs are very specialized machines and using one to mine bitcoin is more effective than over 450 supercomputers combined.

Social Mining

In the emerging technology field, it’s not strange to see platforms attempting to combine various industries. Social media – which is now firmly a part of the lives of a lot of people – is an easy fit for blockchain technology. Furthermore, advertisers usually prefer the organic nature of social media interactions. With users growing more immune to advertising practices, the skill set of social media influencers will have to drastically improve. In the age of the Internet, attention is a very valuable commodity and anyone that can command it comes at a high premium. This is where the social mining phenomenon comes in.

New – and growing – cryptocurrency Mithril (MITH) harnesses this market by providing influencers with a means to ‘mine’ their influence. With Mithril, likes, content created, views, and time spent viewing videos will directly convert to MITH. The Mithril system allows influencers to forgo the need for advertisers. Their social clout alone will be very profitable and MITH can then be directly converted to ETH or used within a defined marketplace.

With the use of blockchain technology, Mithril will be able to guarantee the safety and security of transactions for all involved parties. In addition, the decentralized data storage technology that is synonymous with blockchain allows for immutable, efficient and reliable recording of transactions.

Mithril’s Integration Protocol

The blockchain based social media platform is not a new concept, but it requires the construction of a totally new network. In the face of non-blockchain competition, the process of creating a social media network from scratch is very long, hectic, and difficult. To get around this, Mithril’s Integration Protocol provides MITH mining on ANY included social media platform. This means that Mithril does not need to create or design its own platform. All they have to do is leverage existing sites for their own purposes.

In addition to this, social media influencers can use their existing follower network to mine Mithril. This makes the platform a hugely attractive prospect as it requires far less work than generating a following on an entirely new platform. This will also ensure that Mithril can immediately gain a large user base. The potential adoption will be larger if there is less friction in integration.

The team at Mithril feels that because of the potential influx of users and viewers, the Mithril ecosystem will possess the ability to create many opportunities for anyone engaged in social media. Be it finding new friends, interacting with your existing circle of followers, or even giving social mining a try, Mithril will offer something for everybody. With the network gaining popularity, this will encourage growth that will lead to continuous development.

The amount of MITH earned through social mining largely depends on the platform’s social mining algorithm. It will consider things like the number of stories that are posted, how many are actually viewed and how many likes they receive. Preset calculations will delineate a particular amount of MITH for each period of time – which is then divided among social miners on the basis of the algorithm.

The Lit App

Social media integration aside, Mithril has also released their own mobile content app known as “Lit”. This app is available on Android and iOS platforms and allows content creators to post and share their content in return for Mithril. It is also based on views and reach – which ensures that those that garner the largest audience will receive the largest rewards. This direct form of reward gaining will attract a lot of users that already see social media influencing as their main source of income.

The Lit app will also use advanced modern algorithms to ensure users can take brilliant photos and videos. Another feature of the app is its chatroom which will include the ability to share stories between friends, groups and communities.

The idea of a blockchain social media platform is not new but other platforms, such as Steemit, have fallen on some hard times. Distribution there is slow and they are rife with users that have learned to rig the system. With the integration of outside networks, Mithril hopes that this will mitigate some of the gaming issues that plagued Steemit and other previous platforms. The Lit app will also focus more on social media content such as pictures, videos, and stories, rather than texts and blog posts. This is much more geared to the current tastes of social media users and should put Lit and Mithril in a strong position going forward.