Reddit has announced the expansion of its innovative Community Points system, a blockchain-based reputation score that rewards users based on their contributions to specific communities. These digital tokens are earned through various forms of engagement, such as posting content, leaving comments, and receiving upvotes from other users. The accumulated points grant access to exclusive rewards within communities, membership features, and increased voting power in community decisions.
Blockchain Reputation System to Reshape Social Media Engagement
Beyond a simple score on a scoreboard, Community Points are recorded on the Ethereum blockchain, allowing users to buy, sell, and exchange them independently of Reddit. The top users on Reddit’s cryptocurrency subreddit earned over 9,000 Cryptocurrency Community Points (MOONS) each in a 28-day period, emphasizing the growing significance of these tokens.
The Evolution of Moons: From Testing to Live Implementation
Introduced in June 2020, Moons are unique digital tokens specific to Reddit’s r/Cryptocurrency community. The platform aimed to reward content creation and stimulate user engagement through Moons, which have evolved over the years, transitioning from testing to live deployment on the blockchain. The community has implemented various rules to determine how users can earn Moons, with specific types of contributions being recognized and rewarded based on these rules.
The Role of Blockchain and Smart Contracts
Moons are ERC-20 tokens managed by smart contracts on the Ethereum blockchain, ensuring their independence from Reddit. Users have complete control and ownership of their Moons, allowing them to send, share, or trade the tokens both within and outside the community.
Expanding Community Points Beyond Subreddits
After successful testing in the Cryptocurrency and Fortnite communities, Reddit is poised for a wider rollout of the Community Points system. Blockchain-based reputation systems offer communities and users greater control over the type of content and behavior rewarded, penalized, or blocked within their communities.
Tradability and Interoperability
Listing Community Points on cryptocurrency exchanges enhances their tradability, providing users with a direct path to exchange them for cash. Additionally, being issued as ERC-20 blockchain tokens makes Community Points potentially portable to other communities, social media platforms, or applications connected to web3 wallets. This interoperability allows users to carry their reputation and earned points across different networks, extending the impact beyond specific subreddits and even Reddit itself.
Addressing Meritocracy Concerns
The tradability of Community Points raises concerns about the potential for users to “buy” reputation, affecting the system’s meritocracy. However, blockchain’s transparency enables a clear distinction between “earned” and “purchased” points, providing greater clarity in reputation assessment.
A Game-Changing Innovation in Social Media
Reddit’s Community Points represent a groundbreaking shift in the social media landscape. Unlike closed systems of competitors, these points have the potential to transcend the boundaries of Reddit and revolutionize the broader social media ecosystem. The integration of blockchain wallets and reputation systems opens up new possibilities for other social media platforms to introduce similar scoring systems based on publicly available blockchain data.
