On Monday, Oct. 22, a new Bitcoin Cash-powered social media application called Hivr launched in beta form. The platform, available for Android devices, features a wallet, native tipping, posting to a social news feed, instant messaging and more.
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Hivr: A Bitcoin Cash Social Media Wallet
Over the past few months, numerous developers have been building forums and social media platforms on top of the Bitcoin Cash (BCH) blockchain. Now a new project is attempting to test the social media waters with a splash of BCH on the side. Hivr is a social media application for Android devices that allows users to post, tip and chat with one another using a native instant messaging system.
The Hivr creators explained during the launch announcement that they understand there’s already a variety of platforms that allow media uploads on top of the BCH chain. However, most of them, like Memo.cash and Blockpress, support only a few features simultaneously like posting and tipping, and don’t offer services such as instant messaging. Additionally, most of the other media platforms also require a small fraction of BCH to create a post, but the Hivr model allows free posting.
“Basically, we created Hivr because we wanted to combine all these amazing ideas within the Bitcoin Cash community into one well integrated, easy to use application,” explain the Hivr creators. “With Hivr, you can post any content you want for free, tip the posts you like, create group chats, and send each other tips right within the chat, all within one application.”
Creating a Profile and Testing a Few Posts
News.Bitcoin.com decided to test the beta platform after reading about Hivr on the blogging platform Yours.org. Hivr can be found on the Google Play store for Android devices and the developers have detailed an iOS version will be built when the Android release comes out of beta. So far, according to statistics, around 50 people have downloaded the Hivr application, which is 53MB in size.
When you open the Hivr platform, you’re greeted with a login screen where you can use existing login credentials or register a new name and password. Following the registration, the application asks you to pick a few tags of subjects that you’re interested in like bitcoin cash, news, and other topics. After that, the account is given a BCH wallet with a twelve-word mnemonic phrase so the user can backup the native Hivr wallet.
The application is pretty easy to navigate and I quickly created a profile called ‘Posternut’ which took roughly two minutes. Much like the other BCH-based social media apps, Hivr does not have a ton of people posting yet but some people are definitely testing the application’s features. At the bottom of the screen, there is a small pencil icon that allows users to post content to their profiles and to the public feed similarly to Facebook.
After pressing the pencil, the user can post text, URLs, GIFs, videos, music or photos on the Hivr public feed. While testing out a text and URL-style post, it took a few minutes as the linked post started making the application glitchy, enough to force quit the application. The second URL post attempt was successful and, just like Twitter and Facebook, the article’s title and the cover photo is shown with the link.
An All-in-One Social Media App – but Like All New Platforms Hivr Needs Users
Similar to other social media applications that offer instant messaging, the Hivr app has a messenger feature that allows you to connect with other Hivr users and also to create a group chat. Under each user’s post, there’s a small gift box that allows people to tip content and it also gives quick BCH tipping options in increments of $0.25, $0.50, $1.00, and $5.00. Hivr users can also ‘like’ posts, repost (similar to retweet), and comment each thread posted.
The application definitely could use some more participants because compared to Memo.cash and Blockpress, which has lesser action, Hivr is a ghost town. However, people should take into consideration that the platform is still in beta and it’s only been out for a day. The two aforementioned BCH apps also had issues with gathering participants earlier on. As far as traditional social media platform features, Hivr has managed to pack types of services into one application and not having to spend BCH for every post may entice people who are new to the cryptocurrency ecosystem.
What do you think about the Hivr social media wallet available for Android devices? Let us know what you think about this project in the comments section below.
Images via Hivr, and Jamie Redman.
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