I.3. Blockchain Properties

The VLOCITY blockchain was created based on the Avalon framework and this allows it to have a lot of customization possibilities and high performance. We chose the Avalon blockchain as a starting point to develop our own product because of its features and scalability. The blockchain can be used for other projects with different types of media but with similar social concepts. It uses a delegated Proof-of-Stake protocol that is included in other notable blockchains such as Cardano, Avalanche, Steem and Loopring.

The economic framework

This framework is based on an algorithm that creates and distributes cryptocurrency tokens to reward each participant for contributions such as posts, votes and tags. The VTV tokens have a utilitarian value by allocating voting power and bandwidth to its holder with time. The more VTV tokens held, the faster the user can collect these resources.

This algorithm protects VLOCITY from Sybil attacks that consist in creating multiple accounts to cheat the numbers of votes, which classic social medias are victims of. A malicious actor who creates multiple accounts to promote fake news or to mislead people for commercial gain will not have the same voting power as a regular user who has a real contribution.

The bandwidth is used to write transactions on the blockchain. The user needs a balance of bandwidth for transactions. The voting power influences how content is ranked and the rewards in number of tokens sent to the viewers who vote.

Voting on relevant and quality content will increase its exposure so that it will be shown to additional viewers. To vote on such content will give the user a reward.

The algorithm is thus more accurate than the classic paradigm of “1 person = 1 vote” because it recognizes that users are different and have individual contributions. The users who are more active and knowledgeable will have more influence to decide what content is promoted.

How it functions

The VLOKR platform is developed on top of the VLOCITY blockchain. It allows users to post, vote and tag videos. It has two tokens:

• VTV is a fully liquid and tradable cryptocurrency asset. It has monetary value and can be traded on exchanges and on a secondary market between viewers.

• VP is a voting token that allows users to curate content. The users spend this token to vote on the platform and influence how content is ranked, distributed and rated for viewers. This represents a moderation activity that is fair because it is done by individuals. The token circulates within the platform and has no value outside it.

The users go through a number of steps for voting as follows:

1) Collecting voting power.

The users who hold VTV are compensated with voting power tokens every hour. They gain one VP every hour per VTV held.

2) Spending voting power.

The users spend VP to vote, post or comment on videos.

3) The blockchain does calculations.

The blockchain settles on the amount and proportion of new VTV that are rewarded to viewers.

4) The users gain VLOKR coins (VTV).

The users are compensated with tokens if the vote on relevant and quality content.

Figure 4: The flow of voting power on the platform.

Community moderation

The algorithmic moderation of social platforms results in a lot of fake news and promotion of political and commercial objectives in a misleading way. The community ranking proved to be the most accurate and fair to rate and organize information on the Internet on subjects such as movies, real estate or restaurants in a specific region.

This trend is continued by the VLOCITY blockchain so that content is ranked exclusively by how users upvote, downvote and tag. A popular piece of content that received lots of upvotes goes up in its category to gain more exposure and recognition. Content that received a more negative score is hidden.

The community can also vote on the moderation guidelines to achieve consensus. This guarantees that the rules are created by the community and can be changed if there is a requirement to do so.

Community leaders

The VLOCITY system is designed as a decentralized organization, run by elected leaders who can decide on what propositions from the development team to implement for updating any aspect of the blockchain.

On VLOCITY, blockchain validators are called leaders and are elected by the community in real time. Any registered user can vote or downvote for up to 3 leaders at any time. The top 21 individuals who receive the most votes are automatically elected as leaders.

The role of a leader is to host, run the blockchain and validate the implementation of update proposals.

Covering the administrative cost

A commission can be set on the VLOCITY blockchain to cover the costs of teams working on the platform. Such costs can have a development, marketing, legal or corporate nature. The commission is on top of what is distributed to viewers for voting.

On this blockchain, 10% of the total VTV distributed to users are created and sent to the beneficiary account of VLOKR as reserves. This account is the first one created on the blockchain. The revenue shared to viewers surpasses by a significant margin what is the case on other social media platforms.

Figure 5: The blockchain reward system.

The difference when compared to classic social media platforms

The VLOKR platform has a number of advantages over other social medias that consist in the framework based on trust, user empowerment and moderation that is done by the community. It wants to create a fair system where participants are rewarded by their contribution.

Figure 6: The advantages and differences of VLOKR compared to other social media platforms.