Write To Earn: Publishing in web3

Mirror is a web3 publishing platform. It's part of the broader Write To Earn web3 publishing dapps. It sits on the Optimism blockchain, which is an Ethereum Layer 2 chain.

Mirror is not a full ecosystem in the same way as other web3 publishing platforms are. Some examples are: Hive social dapps, BULB, Solcial. These platforms have established economic systems which they hope are able to accurately have value reside, and be controlled by, the user.

The Mirror writer ownership model

Mirror's core thesis is to be a writing NFTs producer. That means you can mint your posts as NFTs to create collections, i.e., every post becomes it’s own collection (recently they've also released Subscribe to Mint which is an expansion of that functionality)

The marketplace dynamics of those NFT collections operate anywhere you can sell them. That leaves a lot of the tokenomics up to the creators. Much as the tokenomics is left up to someone minting a collection on Blur or Magic Eden.

It’s similar in many ways to web2 publishing platform (e.g., YouTube, Instagram etc..) who have set economic models you work within to create and capture value. The difference is the web3 model looks to have value reside with user via the blockchain.

In contrast Mirror gives you access to the blockchain as the way you can control your value of your work and leaves the rest up to you.

In many ways this is great. It gives you, the creator, the power to decide what works for you.

You can give away posts for free or charge and you can set the supply limits. Take it post by post to see what feels and works best for you, I certainly have so far. Each post is a technically a new collection after all.

We are in the explorer phase of web3 publishing so take this unique opportunity to dig in and experiment. Moments like these don’t come around that often.

Designing your personal tokenomics strategy

I have a particular interest in tokenomics. Primarily this field has been advanced by defi protocols and primarily by the DAOs within the different blockchain ecosystem. It’s a fast moving space with a lot of interesting ideas being thrown at the wall currently, all in various stages of “sticking”.

I personally don’t think web3 is going to be that different from web2 in that content will be king. The internet runs on content and the attention economy is the largest and most important economy in the world, it’s just not a very efficient market.

Or very fair.

Web3 is laser focused on fixing this. Blockchain’s killer app is verifiable and immutable digital ownership. That’s huge, but it also doesn’t mean anything else needs to fundamentally change.

Blog posts are still blog posts.

Books are still books.

Videos are still videos.

Games are still games.

It’s just now ALL participants can capture and own the value they create. It’s not just about money. Money is only part of ownership and often it’s the least important part.

My tokenomics strategy on Mirror....for now

I’ve come up with a tokenomics strategy for my posts moving forward. If it changes I’ll write an update:

• Low total collect number for each post. Set at 42

• Each post set to 0.0001 ETH / ~0.18 USD (this is the lowest amount you can currently set that isn’t zero)

• I collect one post for myself when I mint a new post

• I list my collected post for 0.42 ETH on OpenSea

Here’s the first post I did under this tokenomics model

Here’s my reasoning for why I choose this model:

• Why such a low cap on mints? I want collecting a post to feel a bit exclusive. Very few people read what I write now, and even though I’m just starting out I expect that not to change dramatically in the short to medium term. If a post ever become really popular in the future the early readers will be rewarded (and that’s how it should be).

• Why 42? Do you really need to ask? Google it.

• Why set the price so low? I want collecting to be broadly accessible but I don’t want it to be free. Free is a funny price for anything; it drives a lot of bad decisions in life. I want a lot of people to be able to afford to collect but also have to make the deliberate decision to spend something to do it. Can’t be mindless.

• Why collect your own posts? If my writing NFTs are ever successful I want to be able to share in that. It’s partly a selfish reason for why I am keeping the minting number and price really low. I can only collect one post per account, I may as well make it worth it. Plus I figure the vast majority of Mirror posts will have no collects so maybe it helps boost my writing in some way.

• Why 0.42 ETH? See point 2

• Why list at such a high price as compared to your mint price? There is a concept in pricing calling anchoring. It's well worth a quick study on; it'll help you make better decisions. My writing NFTs (and most likely yours) will have no pricing apart from the mint price. We've already established that my mint is both very lowly priced and very limited in terms of numbers. If that mint is exhausted the only other place to get a price is the secondary market, and I want to make sure that there is a nice large high price on there to act as an anchor to the value I think my NFTs have. It will help anyone trading my writing NFTs be able to list at a much lower price and be able to look "cheap" in comparison.

NOTE: You can adjust the royalties commission on your collect after the first mint thus adding more flexibility to your potential future returns. It's complicated (at time of writing) and not available through the UI. Hopefully Mirror improve this functionality with time.

Web3 gives the creators more control than ever. It's time to experiment.

It’s a brave new web3 world that is now here. We’re in control, more than ever, of own destinies. It’s both fantastic and terrible at the same time. But it’s definitely not boring and that’s the main thing.

“We act as though comfort and luxury were the chief requirements of life, when all that we need to make us really happy is something to be enthusiastic about.”

-Charles Kingsley (broad church priest of the Church of England, university professor, social reformer, historian and novelist)

If you liked this post, make sure to follow me at my other web3 homes, I’m @andrewsaul. If you’re not yet signed up below are some referral links

BULB

Solcial