steem

Steem is a blockchain protocol co-founded by Daniel Larimer and Ned Scott. Launched in 2016, it uses delegated proof of stake and is distinguished by an on-chain cryptocurrency reward model for creating and curating social content, first implemented in Steemit.^[1][2][3][8]

Overview

The idea behind Steem grew from a social-network concept that Daniel (Dan) Larimer called a “Mutual Aid Society” in 2015. Larimer and Ned Scott developed the project together after meeting in 2016; Larimer had previously founded BitShares, while Scott had worked in business operations and finance. They launched Steemit as an application on the Steem blockchain, with the service going live on July 4, 2016.^[3]​^[2]​

Steemit was the first application built on Steem and introduced its central proposition: users could earn cryptocurrency for publishing posts, commenting, voting, and curating content. Contemporary descriptions compared its social features to Reddit, while emphasizing that users could receive rewards for popular contributions instead of relying solely on advertising or conventional intermediaries.^[4]​^[3]​

Steem’s design was presented as a way to return some of a platform’s value to the people who contributed to it. The project’s stated rationale compared contributor rewards to the equity shares that a startup may allocate to participants in a funding round. Its intended uses included social publishing, selected news and commentary, answers to users’ questions, and opportunities for community members to earn and use financial services.^[2]​

Technology and Architecture

Steem uses delegated proof of stake (DPoS). STEEM holders vote for witnesses, accounts responsible for validating transactions and producing blocks. CryptoSlate’s April 10, 2018 account described a 21-witness configuration with 19 elected witnesses and additional miner and backup roles. Steem Developer documentation describes the production rotation as 21 witnesses: the 20 highest-voted witnesses plus one randomly selected standby witness. These accounts describe different configurations or system descriptions, not simultaneous counts.^[3]​^[9]​

Witnesses are scheduled to produce blocks at three-second intervals. Steem does not create new coins through proof-of-work mining; instead, witnesses produce blocks under the delegated system. The protocol’s design emphasizes rapid transactions and the throughput needed for frequent social interactions and small rewards.^[2]​^[5]​

Steem’s website describes the network as processing transactions every three seconds and using bandwidth allocation to support feeless transactions. It presents that design as suitable for social applications, where users may frequently post, comment, vote, or transfer assets.^[6]​^[5]​

Assets and Rewards

Steem’s ecosystem has three principal assets: STEEM, Steem Power (SP), and Steem Dollars (SBD), also called Steem Dollars or SD in some accounts. STEEM is the network’s primary cryptocurrency and unit of account. SP represents a staked form of STEEM associated with greater influence over reward allocation, while SBD was designed as a stable-value asset intended to track the U.S. dollar.^[5]​^[3]​

The network distributes newly created STEEM through rewards and block production rather than proof-of-work mining. Gemini’s February 23, 2022 account described an allocation of newly created STEEM with 75% going to a content-reward pool, 15% to SP holders, and 10% to witnesses. Gemini says the content pool is divided evenly between creators and moderators or curators; another description summarizes the pool as rewarding authors and curators.^[5]​^[2]​

​CryptoSlate’s April 10, 2018 account described a different allocation of newly created tokens: 85% went to users who created content, upvoted, or commented, and 15% went to SP holders. It reported an inflation rate of 9.5% and characterized the model as encouraging participation rather than passive holding.^[3]​

SP holders have greater influence over the weight of their votes and therefore over the distribution of content rewards. Users can obtain SP by staking STEEM, a process known as “powering up,” or by receiving it as a reward. Gemini describes “powering down,” or converting SP back into STEEM, as occurring in installments. The documented current power-down schedule is 13 weekly installments; before Hard Fork 16, it was 104 weeks (two years).^[5]​^[3]​^[9]​

SBD was intended to provide a dollar-linked unit for rewards and holding. CryptoSlate’s account said users could hold SD for interest or convert it to STEEM or SP, while Gemini described SBD as convertible into STEEM at a rate determined by market forces.^[3]​^[5]​

On Steem-powered social applications, users can earn rewards by creating content and by curating it through voting. Rewards depend on community voting and the SP behind votes. Gemini describes upvote rewards as generally split between SBD and SP, with creators able to select rewards entirely in SP. It also says that voting weight is adjusted for frequency: SP holders who vote less have more weight per vote, while frequent voters have their weight divided proportionally.^[5]​^[3]​

Transactions and Bandwidth

Steem transactions are designed to be feeless, including transfers and social actions. To limit spam without transaction fees, the network uses bandwidth limits: users have a finite weekly allowance for actions such as commenting, reacting, and transferring coins, while viewing content does not consume bandwidth. Users with more SP receive greater bandwidth.^[5]​

The design was intended to make small interactions and rewards practical without requiring users to pay a fee for each action. Gemini’s account notes that the project’s founders favored this approach over micropayments, tips, or paywalls, arguing that rewarding creation, voting, and commenting could help decentralized social platforms compete with free services.^[5]​

Applications and Ecosystem

Steemit was the first decentralized application on Steem and is a social platform. It allows users to publish and curate content for cryptocurrency rewards, and Steemit content is published in multiple languages, including Korean.^[5]​^[2]​

Steem also supported applications beyond blogging. D.tube began as a video platform built on Steem and the InterPlanetary File System (IPFS), rewarding participation in STEEM before later moving to its own Avalon blockchain. Dlive originated in the ecosystem as a livestreaming service, then moved first to the Lino blockchain and later to TRON. TravelFeed, a travel-blogging service, and 3Speak, a video platform built on Steem and IPFS, later migrated to Hive. Dlike offered social-post sharing with topic filters and sections for new and trending content.^[5]​

The Steem website describes the network as supporting social applications as well as gaming and other services. It lists Steemit, SteemPro, and the HARI RAID tap-to-earn game among Steem-based applications, and also identifies Steem Retrogames and SteemAtlas. On October 16, 2026, the website reported more than one million users across more than 324 Steem-based applications.^[6]​

Steemit’s community activity has included writing selections, games, and themed challenges.

Steem’s feeless transfers and throughput also attracted developers working outside social media, including in decentralized finance and blockchain gaming. Some applications later moved to other networks, while Steem continued to support its own community and applications.^[5]​^[6]​

Governance and the Hive Fork

Steem’s governance combines witness selection with voting on content rewards. STEEM holders vote for witnesses, while users with SP have more influence over reward allocation through their votes. A 2016 account described voting on value allocation as weighted by ownership rather than using one-person-one-vote.^[1]​^[4]​

Steem hard forks are coordinated updates to consensus rules. In the documented procedure, witnesses vote on a hard-fork version and activation time through the software they run; a supermajority of witnesses determines activation. Steem’s developer documentation specifies 17 witnesses by default, while the Hardfork 20 announcement describes the supermajority as the top 20 witnesses.^[10]​^[9]​

A major dispute followed the acquisition of Steemit Inc. by Justin Sun, founder of TRON, in 2020. Accounts of the event describe Sun’s position as giving him control through a majority stake in network tokens; Gemini characterizes the episode as a hostile takeover and says Sun blocked a user-led attempt to fork the network. The resulting conflict led many developers and stakeholders to leave Steem and establish Hive, which attracted several applications that had previously operated on Steem.^[2]​^[5]​^[1]​

The split changed the composition of Steem’s ecosystem. One later description characterizes Steem as continuing with a more niche community and as integrated into the TRON ecosystem, while noting that projects and users also moved to other blockchains.^[1]​^[5]​

Community and Partnerships

Steem’s early development included community-organized events. SteemFest 2016 was held in Amsterdam as a global conference for the community.^[3]

In January 2018, Steemit announced a collaboration with Datawallet, a data-monetization platform. The proposed application was intended to let Steemit users monetize data associated with their online creations. Scott framed the collaboration as part of a broader effort to address data ownership and distribution, alongside changing how platform users were rewarded.^[3]