Platforms Need to Work with Their Users — Not Against Them

As online platforms have become dominant, many have leveraged their power by raising fees and changing rules. In the short run, this hurts the producers they work with — software developers, small retailers, game designers, content creators. In the long run, though, it also hurts the platforms themselves, because producers won’t continue to invest in platforms that don’t reflect their interests. But there is a way to solve this problem: Using the blockchain to grant governance tokens to producers. Such tokens would guarantee them the right to vote on key decisions and would give them the ownership and assurances they need to unleash their innovation — to the benefit of everybody involved.