At this very moment, and as you read this article social networks are being thrown under the bus for their blatant disregard for privacy and profiteering off their user network’s content and data. It’s a critical juncture where new, hungry startups are going to smell the blood in the water and come along with a solution that rights all the wrongs perpetuated by the likes of Facebook et al. Startups, like UHive, one of the UK’s freshest new social networks. In development for two years, and having already received £1.8 million initial investment, UHive is an innovative social network that is adding new features and experiences which existing social networks have lacked – think privacy, incentivized content creation, and a digital economy.
Compared to other social networks, UHive has been designed to truly feel like users are exploring a world. Navigating from space to space is a fun process in and of itself, and exploring these locations and pages spatially feels more natural and fluid than traditional navigation like scrolling and swiping.
According to its founders, UHive’s development was based on the study of human psychology, so on the one hand, UHive supports familiar social media functionality in its “Civilized World.” Here, users can find and join communities of similar interests, make and share posts, and in general do anything that fulfills the social drive to communicate.
On the other hand, and unique to UHive, is the “Grey World.” Within this world, users are free to anonymously, but safely, interact with one another, create profiles, and express themselves as whoever they want to be. Within this world, users can fulfill their fantasies and unconscious desires. There’s absolute freedom.
The Grey World would not be possible, however, without safety and privacy being paramount to its existence. UHive was developed from the ground up with this in mind, by creating patented technology that monitors and moderates all activity on the network via the community itself, users can feel equally safe no matter which world they choose to explore today.
Any successful new social network must also be based on economics, so UHive utilizes its own built-in digital economy. That’s right, you’re able to sell, purchase, and trade within the network. The foundation of the economy is a currency called UHive Tokens which are built on blockchain technology. Users automatically get UHive Tokens from advertising revenue: the more people that visit and follow their pages, the more UHive Tokens they receive. Users also receive tokens for engagement on the app, measured by the amount of time they spend logged in as well as how often they post and share images and videos.
The network is also built to incorporate VR technology. This makes perfect sense given the set-up of UHive, where it feels more like exploring a world rather than viewing content on the typically two-dimensional pages of existing social networks. It’s already future-proof with Oculus, Playstation VR, Android Daydream, Samsung Gear VR, and other major VR technology compatibility built in. Which means in the near-future you’ll be able to easily view videos and images, post, share, comment, and explore the UHive ecosystem to your eyes, heart and mind’s content.
UHive will be released in beta Q4 2019, and is available as an early-access app right now on Android and iOS here https://www.uhive.com/download/
