REPUBLIKE Social Media: More than a platform, a new paradigm.
Introduction
In a world where social media dominates, the question of who controls these platforms and how they operate is vital. The giants of today’s social media run on a business model that relentlessly captures users’ attention to resell it, mostly to advertisers. This is known as the attention economy, and it’s what offers the “free” experience to users. These models not only compromise privacy but also, more subtly and broadly, the user experience and the quality of interactions, even spilling into the real world.
Attention Driven Business Models
While web3 seeks to provide a solution, it doesn’t genuinely address the root issues: the mechanics of the attention economy. A piece of content that massively evokes reaction, even if negative or sheepish, is still deemed “good” content, hence promoted by algorithms in web 2.0 or “Creators” in web3.
This is where REPUBLIKE introduces a radical initiative aiming to redefine our online interactions.
I. A Radically New Approach
A New Paradigm
REPUBLIKE is not just another social platform. It’s a new paradigm for social networks, removing the financial dependence on perpetual user attention and reactions, paving the way for more authentic, varied, and high-quality interactions and content.
From the Collective to the Individuals
Starting from the premise that what’s good for a community is good, directly or indirectly, for all its members, and the opposite isn’t necessarily true, REPUBLIKE places the shared human essence of users, what they naturally have in common, at the core of its model.
II. Redefining Social Interactions for Empowering Community
Current social media models focus on hyper-targeted user engagement, aiming for quick, often instinctual, and repetitive reactions. Essentially, chain reactions in the most elemental sense — almost chemical. This results in polarizing effects, inability to communicate across different worlds, bouts of extreme behavior, ensuing censorship, increasingly standardized content and reactions, and screen addiction.
While web3, with its emphasis on decentralization and creators’ potential for revenue, suggests improvements, by inherently remaining profit-centric, it doesn’t resolve problems tied to the attention economy. Simplistically, what sells or creates a buzz is good (yet, on a more subtle but not entirely unrelated note, we could think that generally, goodness doesn’t make noise…)
Republike rejects this paradigm, introducing two bold initiatives:
A. Engagement: Aligning individual rewards with the activation of community values
Opposed to engagement models focused on user attention, REPUBLIKE proposes an engagement model grounded in universally virtuous values (respect, altruism, quality — see below), integrated into the design and precisely measured in interactions.
Republike aims to redefine engagement by focusing on values that serve and enrich the community, aligning individual rewards (token/profit, voting rights, visibility) with the upholding and promotion of these values.
Users aren’t just content creators or consumers; they are accountable for the platform — which they also own (see below) — and its enrichment.
Values like altruism, respect, quality, and skill recognition form the core of the engagement model and the foundation of REPUBLIKE’s governance. These values carry two fundamental virtues for a social model:
- When properly embodied, they’re unassailable by anyone claiming to belong to a worthy community, i.e., a group realizing that 1+1=3 and thus sharing superseding interests and goals.
- Unlike traditional algorithmic models, they promote the most genuine individual expression, fostering fulfillment against the mass frustrations induced by major social networks, in a framework that not only respects but also rewards it.
Definition of Target Community Values (beta):
- Altruism: A mix of tips/rewards given to others, future donations to an internal fund aimed at charities, and users from less privileged countries.
- Respect: Moderation percentage in line with the majority, directly related to the values acknowledged upon joining the platform (The Constitution).
- Quality: Net positive vote difference/total content posted not rejected by moderation (hence aligning with REPUBLIKE values).
- Specific Skills (Hard skills): Score based on net positive vote difference/content posted by category or hashtags.
It’s the combination of measuring these values in a real-time dynamic formula that will determine user rewards in three forms: profit (our model is 100% profit-sharing), voting power in governance, and visibility.
This model promotes equity (Section EQUITY-BASED GOVERNANCE of the White Paper). In other words, it encourages everyone to be authentic and to break free from the gravitational pull of traditional egalitarian patterns that push everyone to do, think, and say the same thing, for fear of judgment or the allure of profit. REPUBLIKE stands against these egalitarian models which can’t lead to a harmonious society of fulfilled individuals.
Contrary to this utopian egalitarian vision and therefore, in reality, harmful, this model allows REPUBLIKE to make equity the core virtue. It offers a nuanced approach that recognizes the unique richness of each individual, moving away from the depressing “uniform originality” of traditional networks racing for likes based on tried-and-tested standards that encourage herd behavior, and invites everyone to embrace their authenticity. This philosophy recognizes the unique and essential value of each individual to cultivate a harmonious community (Section EQUITY-BASED GOVERNANCE of the White Paper).
B. A Revolutionary Business Model
By moving away from the attention economy that has dominated platforms for over 15 years, Republike’s pay-to-own model makes users the owners of the platform. This model encourages users to invest in the platform’s maintenance and development through an inclusive annual subscription, designed to be accessible to all (at the platform’s launch, it’s $12 per year for the early “founder” users, and we’ll ensure it remains as low as possible).
However, unlike any other app where users pay a fee for access to a service (Netflix, any SaaS, and even the new X/Twitter Blue), Republike’s model guarantees a fraction of the platform’s tokenized capital against these subscription fees. In accounting terms, it’s not an expense; it’s an investment!
III. What about the product? The two fundamental pillars, the redesign of economic and engagement models and the four core values, translated into the product’s design and features, promise to address all the issues related to the attention economy. The goal? To use social networks as a tool for construction and liberation.
“Featurization” of values:
Respect => Moderation is THE feature that embodies REPUBLIKE’s narrative and aims to achieve what no platform has: reconciling total freedom of speech without succumbing to lawlessness and chaos. Content is judged by its emotional context, not its nature. When content is flagged, it’s sent to 7 randomly chosen users who assess the emotional context (constructive or aggressive) of the post. AI will soon enhance this feature to improve sentiment analysis and mitigate human risk. Those in the majority (for example, 4 against 3) will be rewarded in tokens. The majority doesn’t guarantee the right decision, but this mechanism encourages objective assessments. Users whose posts are rejected can appeal.
Altruism => Users are encouraged to donate part of their tokens to reward content they appreciate, positively impacting their profile level. Later, more components will be added to this metric, like the option to contribute to the subscriptions of less privileged users.
Quality => With a philosophy grounded in respect and openness, arbitrary censorship based on content nature is mostly eliminated, allowing for a wider range of content and, paradoxically, healthier content since the context they’re introduced in is deemed positive. Moreover, and crucially, the number of votes on each content is hidden until one votes. This is key in eliminating social pressure and fostering authenticity. With these moderation and hidden vote features, the positive and negative voting system can again be considered a reliable quality measure.
Skills => Future updates will introduce a measure of each user’s specific skills, allowing everyone to positively impact their profile level based on their unique strengths and qualities. This is motivated by a societal vision that believes everyone has something valuable to offer. REPUBLIKE’s vision goes against the standardized models of contemporary societies, which might argue that everyone should attend prestigious schools and become engineers to secure esteemed societal positions, while not everyone is cut out for that: egalitarianism is unfair, equity is just.
A Digital Space for HEALTHY and TOTAL Freedom of Expression
REPUBLIKE’s first tangible offer is a space for complete freedom, where one can post and discuss any topic, from the simplest to the most polarizing, especially those unaddressed elsewhere, be it on social networks or even in real life. REPUBLIKE aims to address the frustrations of users who no longer dare to be themselves, crushed by crowd pressure and stuck between mainstream sheep and conspiracy theorist labels. Beyond the fact that every human has their unique story that colors their “truth”, it’s within the vast space between these extremes that we can come closest to the Truth and develop open, iterative thinking. REPUBLIKE’s innovative engagement model and moderation system support this vast ambition.
A Bridge between Web 2.0 and Web3
From a design standpoint, many Web3 solutions are inaccessible to Web 2.0 network users, who mainly suffer from the attention economy’s pitfalls. Our design blends the efficiency of Web 2.0 with Web3 innovations, offering an intuitive user experience from the first use. Unlike most solutions, our product was conceived before any tech constraints, ensuring the user vision was fully realized from the get-go.
Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO)
REPUBLIKE will be structured as a DAO, likely through a foundation. The best system for the community will be chosen, with the understanding that decisions are made collectively, with voting power varying based on user profile levels. For a Web 2.0 user, the experience will be completely seamless.
Co-creation
Finally, while the ownership and profit distribution model is user-centric, we also want users to partake in co-creation. Our philosophy is to involve users early in the roadmap compared to other platforms because it should be their network from the start. Only the economic and engagement models and core values are non-negotiable — REPUBLIKE’s DNA. Everything else is an organic, iterative process where everyone can find their place.
Conclusion
REPUBLIKE is more than a social media platform; it’s a project aiming to deeply revolutionize how we interact online and, perhaps, later in society, much like Facebook and its successors deeply shaped our “real world” interactions. Placing our shared humanity at the center and adopting a self-funding, network ownership economic model, REPUBLIKE envisions a digital nation where individuals share a common goal and a “common good” that, in an Aristotelian sense, materializes through individual development and flourishing, not the opposite. Join the revolution and be part of the REPUBLIKE adventure. It’s time to redefine what being social online, and simply social, means.
Beta app: https://www.republike.io/
