Virtually all of the people on Farcaster with large audiences:

1. Don't have large audiences elsewhere (Farcaster is their first time with a large audience)

2. Didn't know me or Varun and didn't know each other. The "Farcaster OG scene" is net new creation of Farcaster.

3. Were early and stuck around when everyone made fun of Farcaster (and people still do)

4. Continued to cast interesting stuff, casted in channels when we suggested people cast in channels

5. Warpcast onboarding asks all users for their interests

6. Based on the interests, we pair the account with an initial set of follows

7. There are 200+ accounts on the list, weighted toward accounts that get the most engagement / drive retention, but a large group of people benefit

8. On our list to improve, but the reality is outside of "I should be on the list!" haven't seen any concrete proposals to improve

I quit a large audience on Twitter and joined Farcaster a year ago as a direct replacement. I didn't know Varun or Dan, and indeed, anyone else active on Farcaster at the time. While "the list" made sense early on, it should be opt-in recommendations now - the engagement inequality is very real. 

This is made worse by the hyperfinancialization, where a handful of those people are incentivized to be very active, while a vast majority of the rest are bots. (IMO, as a casual observer nowadays) Farcaster right now should be aggressively focused on social values over financial values (and yes, this is a very direct contradiction and trade-off) - in design, engineering, and most importantly marketing. Unless the terminal addressable market target is degens, which is fair enough.

A very fair reflection. In traditional social networks, I think the incentive is similar though more indirect; influencers also monetize content creation but with more difficulty due to intermediaries, which is why the phenomenon may not be as widespread. In my opinion, the challenge lies in creating the right incentives so that this activity generates value for everyone, while also enabling the social aspect. I believe the opportunity lies in precisely changing that advertising model that underlies the content in general.

A very fair reflection. In traditional social networks, I think the incentive is similar though more indirect; influencers also monetize content creation but with more difficulty due to intermediaries, which is why the phenomenon may not be as widespread. In my opinion, the challenge lies in creating the right incentives so that this activity generates value for everyone, while also enabling the social aspect. I believe the opportunity lies in precisely changing that advertising model that underlies the content in general. https://mirror.xyz/0x3e0cf03f718520F30300266dcF4DB50bA12d3331/lHvm-sB91ZlGbcdVY1L07PO9EP_3LpwhKjN8Cj-Mvlw