## Market Share of the Steem Blockchain by Application: December Analysis

There are now many different applications and platforms that can be used to post on the steem blockchain. These platforms are a key part of the value proposition of the blockchain and of the associated steem currency. The aim of this analysis is to provide an understanding of the growth and market share of these platforms, giving users some easily digested figures to assess their continuing development.

In the analysis I look at the market share of these applications over the month of December, focusing on the number of regular posters for each platform, the number of posts made, and the total amount of post payouts. I compare the figures to those from the month of November to see how the market share position is changing. Finally I consider where the trends seen may take us as we move into 2018.


![Market Share2.png](https://res.cloudinary.com/hpiynhbhq/image/upload/v1515111793/mqbpoeguuc1x43c9i8mo.png)

## H2 2017 

First though, a look at the overall picture of the blockchain over the last six months. This is to establish the general trend of change as we passed from November through December.

* *The light blue line is the number of articles per day and the dark blue line is number of distinct authors. These are plotted against the left hand axis.*
* *The silver columns are author rewards and the gold columns are curator rewards. These are plotted against the right hand axis.*

![Screen Shot 2018-01-08 at 10.35.33.png](https://res.cloudinary.com/hpiynhbhq/image/upload/v1515407780/gvvnrwnsblbk6wr1hqfd.png)

As can be seen, there was a huge increase in activity as measured under all metrics from the end of November to the end of December:

* The number of individual authors posting per day rose from around the 9,000 level up to 15,000. 
* The number of articles posted per day *(not including comments)* moved up from 22,000 to 32,000 *(although both of these numbers are unfortunately inflated by spam).*
* Overall post payouts *(author and curator combined, but excluding beneficiaries, and excluding comments)* increased hugely, from around 54,000 per day up towards 150,000 and even over 200,000 in the last days of the year. This is mainly a result of the rising value of the steem currency, since the overall payout in steem is broadly constant over time.

This overall picture should come as no surprise - increased rewards from the rising steem price are a strong incentive for new authors to join the network, for previous authors to return, and for existing authors to make the extra effort to post. 

---

## Breakdown By Market Share


##### Regular Posters

First let's look at regular poster numbers. I have defined regular posters here as users that have posted four or more articles over the month.

The following table shows the number of regular posters for each application over December. The "Change" column is a comparison to the month of November.  The rankings are shown for December, with the November ranking in parentheses.

|Application|Regular posters|Change|Ranking|
|:-:|:-:|:-:|:-:|
|steemit|26,546|+49%|1 (1)|
|esteem|3,995|+79%|2 (2)|
|busy|1,579|+111%|3 (3)|
|steepshot|890|+156%|4 (5)|
|dtube|694|+90%|5 (4)|
|utopian|624|+225%|6 (7)|
|dmania|327|+87%|7 (8)|
|steemkr|135|+93%|9 (11)|
|zappl|100|+12%|10 (9)|
|streemian|86|+6%|11 (10)|
|bescouted|68|+42%|12 (12)|
|chainbb|46|+18%|13 (13)|
|pysteem|33|-6%|14 (14)|
|dsound|32|+23%|15 (15)|
|steemjs|17|+13%|16 (16)|
|other|277|+4%|8 (6)|
|Total Result|35,449|+57%||

#####

There has been a significant increase in regular users across the whole blockchain (+57%). Regular user numbers rose particularly strongly for utopian.io, busy.org and steepshot.

With regards to the rankings the top three places were unchanged, whilst in the chasing pack steepshot, utopian.io, dmania, and steemkr all moved up places.

In terms of market share, steemit.com now contributes 75% of regular user numbers, whilst all other applications combined have now risen from 21% to 25%.

![Screen Shot 2018-01-09 at 12.17.47.png](https://res.cloudinary.com/hpiynhbhq/image/upload/v1515500294/d4cdqkf75excuag5q4ug.png)

---

##### Post numbers

We turn now to post numbers *(It should be noted that the number of posts does not include comments)*.

The following table shows the number of posts for each application over December. Again, the "Change" column is a comparison to the month of November.

The order in the table has been maintained from the "Regular Users" table to illustrate how different applications may have different market share rankings depending on which metric is applied *(and it should also be noted that the usefulness of the various metrics differs between one application and another).*

|Application|Posts|Change|Ranking|
|:-:|:-:|:-:|:-:|
|steemit|615,486|+31%|1 (1)|
|esteem|87,538|+71%|2 (2)|
|busy|29,790|+109%|5 (5)|
|steepshot|16,571|+190%|6 (9)|
|dtube|12,298|+98%|8 (6)|
|utopian|9,758|+256%|9 (11)|
|dmania|13,723|+130%|7 (7)|
|steemkr|2,162|+84%|12 (13)|
|zappl|1,875|+17%|13 (12)|
|streemian|5,028|-15%|11 (8)|
|bescouted|1,221|+33%|14 (14)|
|chainbb|684|-19%|15 (15)|
|pysteem|7,771|+51%|10 (10)|
|dsound|514|+54%|16 (16)|
|steemjs|34,580|-0%|4 (3)|
|other|47,697|+103%|3 (4)|
|Total Result|886,696|+41%||

#####

There has been a significant increase in post numbers (+41%) compared to the November. Post numbers increased by double or more for many platforms: busy.org, steepshot, Dtube, utopian.io and dmania.lol.

With regards to the rankings, steepshot was the strongest climber in post numbers, up from 9th to 6th.

![Screen Shot 2018-01-04 at 23.50.57.png](https://res.cloudinary.com/hpiynhbhq/image/upload/v1515111988/zmppobixkt0qgvixfdot.png)

---

##### Post Payouts

Finally, a consideration of post payout numbers.

The following table shows the amount of post payout for each application over December. Again, the "Change" column is a comparison to the month of November.
*(***edit*** - figures were re-extracted on January 8 and tables updated. This was due to the incredible surge in payouts for posts created in the last three days of the year, which in turn was caused by the steeply rising steem price in the first days of 2018)*.

|Application|Payouts Generated|Change|Ranking|
|:-:|:-:|:-:|:-:|
|steemit|3,206,183|+186%|1 (1)|
|esteem|145,963|+205%|4 (4)|
|busy|250,011|+317%|2 (3)|
|steepshot|46,287|+244%|7 (7)|
|dtube|81,553|+934%|5 (9)|
|utopian|221,268|+240%|3 (2)|
|dmania|10,980|+255%|11 (11)|
|steemkr|39,104|+189%|8 (6)|
|zappl|3,319|+36%|14 (12)|
|streemian|23,020|+325%|10 (10)|
|bescouted|3,549|+269%|13 (14)|
|chainbb|3,702|+55%|12 (13)|
|pysteem|28,930|+244%|9 (8)|
|dsound|837|+53%|16 (16)|
|steemjs|2,855|+233%|15 (15)|
|other|63,703|+300%|6 (5)|
|Total Result|4,131,266|+202%||

#####

There are some very large changes in the figures here, both overall (driven by the rise in Steem price) and for individual applications. The results for DTube is particularly strong, and those for busy.org, utopian.io, dmania.lol and steepshot also very impressive.

In terms of ranking, busy.org claimed the second spot, although the competition with utopian.io is particularly close. DTube was the strongest climber, up from ninth to fifth with a rise of over 900%.

![Screen Shot 2018-01-08 at 10.46.57.png](https://res.cloudinary.com/hpiynhbhq/image/upload/v1515408448/fdhglptbfp1jpn6hoe7k.png)

---

## Market Share Conclusions
Steemit.com is still the largest application for accessing the steem blockchain and its results increased strongly under all three metrics.

However the alternative platforms performed very strongly over December and reduced steemit.com's dominance by a few percentage points. 

With the steem price rising rapidly in the first week of January I would expect overall user and payout metrics to continue to rise strongly from December to January - generally good news for the steem blockchain.

The trend towards alternative platforms is also likely to continue as these platforms continue to improve their user experience and as new platforms emerge. 

For payouts, I would expect busy.org to consolidate its second position ranking by post payout, fending off strong competition from utopian.io, which may require further delegation to continue the trend of its significant growth to date.

---

## Questions
This concludes the market share analysis for December.

If you have any questions or spot any errors please do not hesitate to leave a comment.

---

##### Methodology and Tools for Analysis

## Tools

Raw data was obtained through sql queries of steemsql (thank you as always @arcange!) using Valentina Studio.

Data was analysed in LibreOffice and illustrated in Numbers (spreadsheet tools).

Data was obtained for various timescales, including a particular focus on December 2017 and November 2017.

## SQL query
I used the following SQL query:

~~~~
SELECT
    CONVERT(date, Comments.created) AS [CommentDate], 
    IIF(isjson(json_metadata) = 1, json_value(json_metadata, '$.app'), null) as [Application],
    Count(Comments.author) AS [Posts],
    Count(distinct Comments.author) AS [DistinctCommentAuthor],
    count(Comments.parent_author) AS [ParentAuthor],
    count(distinct Comments.parent_author) AS [DistinctParentAuthor],
    sum(CONVERT(REAL,Comments.pending_payout_value)) AS [PendingPayoutValue],
    sum(CONVERT(REAL,Comments.curator_payout_value)) AS [CuratorPayoutValue],
    sum(CONVERT(REAL,Comments.total_payout_value)) AS [TotalPayoutValue]
~~~~

~~~~
FROM
    Comments (NOLOCK)
~~~~

~~~~
WHERE
    YEAR(Comments.created) = 2017 AND
    depth = 0
~~~~

~~~~
GROUP BY
    CONVERT(date, Comments.created),
    IIF(isjson(json_metadata) = 1, json_value(json_metadata, '$.app'), null) 
~~~~

Thank you for reading.


<br /><hr/><em>Posted on <a href="https://utopian.io/utopian-io/@miniature-tiger/market-share-of-the-steem-blockchain-by-application-december-analysis">Utopian.io -  Rewarding Open Source Contributors</a></em><hr/>