If the definition of "popular" means literally "populated" and "number of people" then of course the answer is "NO" since there are so many bots, sybil accounts and farmers.  I don't think you can replace that quantity with real users as-is right now.

If by "popular" you mean "well-liked" then I think the answer is "YES" because while there would be fewer accounts, the satisfaction average would likely be higher WITHOUT the spam/bots/farmers.

degen was good for some individuals but overall bad for the quality of content on the network

tipcoins have been a very interesting experiment but i think it's clear the impact is net negative

Full-stack digital product consultant @ BoundCorp.net - eng @daylight

Probably sitting on a stool | Shower thinker | Collaborative Worldbuilding | Community Games

/farcastles /brians-rescue

that showcasing argument is hella valid and a very good point

tbf it did a lot of good showcasing the programmability/extensibility of Farcaster and it's permissionless nature. the tipping meta was started independently by the early community of users. In terms of the behavior it incentivized, that was a net negative and I'm not sure we'll be able to escape it for a while. But it's also true about the entire crypto space. There's a ton of mercenary capital and farming going on. the only solution in my view is to build better experiences that are so good it dwarfs the unwanted behavior and makes it less appealing.

The ticker is $BERRY
/strawberry - https://www.base.org/name/oppai

i don't mean any personal shade by it, but i checked your timeline, it's like 90% tipcoin-related, seems to corroborate my point

im glad people are building stuff and making money, i just see it as a drastic step down from the quality of the content we had here pre-degen, many people are now only on here husslin for a buck while it used to be a goldmine of engaging conversations and gigabrain informational content

not all bad but not great imho, tipcoins don't really create value, they just extract it similar to how an adspot extracts value by taking up space on a news article ... some people see it as monetizing unused space, i see it as a distraction that waters down the legitimacy of the publication

mfer & founder at /farcards and /froggies

idk about necessary, id say it's inevitable and unavoidable but i remember a world where we didn't "need" it

agree it creates a lot of slop but tipping is necessary to public and own our own content as we build the new internet

The overall quantity of your average daily user's casts has absolutely plummeted because of both degen and Moxie. More casts is demonstrably not better

So strange. I like them better. Much better even with the nonsense

I still have no idea how degen works, people have tipped me but I have no idea where that lives or how to even use it

before DEGEN the content on here was mainly people talking about how great farcaster was and the same 10 accounts trending every day

the quality is night and day vs last year, and I say that as someone that has been posting basically every day since Q4 2022