Your words are stored forever on servers all over the world ensuring your speech is protected
Huge selling point.
The few people who know money is broken are already aware of crypto.
The many who know online speech is broken are looking for alternatives.
Not totally true, some people don't like the idea that they can't delete something they wrote before or their photos (probably why you won't see stars and celebrities coming here) ... if there was a mechanism to allow this for users that would be perfect.
The issue was already discussed here:
https://github.com/steemit/steem/issues/3350
Celebrities already know they can't delete photos from the internet.
If they post it themselves and delete the original from wherever its hosted (imgur, for example), then the chain will just show a broken link. Naturally there's an excellent chance somebody will have copied it in the meantime, though.
Still, immutability alone isn't attractive enough for some people.
I personally don't see a problem with allowing people to remove their account and data from the chain (not sure of its current doability), the users should have the ultimate control over the things they share, that's the selling point, immutability is good but only when it comes to protecting your data against censorship, if immutability means that your data will be taken in hostage by the blockchain forever, some people might not like the idea. The concept is not perfect, but it's something to think about.
the users should have the ultimate control over the things they share
True. Things they don't want publicly visible, worldwide, forever; shouldn't be shared on the chain. Post it literally anywhere else on the internet, and you can take it down, the site owner can take it down, the alphabet bois can take it down.
This is the one place nobody can do that; and its main selling point.
Think about it like this. Imagine I post something a powerful person doesn't want known.
If I can permanently, entirely delete my posts from the chain, he only needs to shake me down for my keys then use them to do so, and his problem goes away (as do I).
Since that's impossible, I can post all sorts of stuff about all sorts of people, and they can't do anything about it. Even more; if I suddenly go missing or turn up dead, there's going to be a lot of scrutiny on my posts, which can't be deleted, even by somebody in possession of my keys.
There's no problem to solve here. This is the solution.
1: The chain only records text, so unless its ASCII art of child porn, I don't see it being an issue.
2: A permanent record like the chain is the last place somebody is going to want to share criminal conduct like that.
3: The chain is a database; so each front end can choose to show/not show any content they like.
4: In an absolute dire case, the witnesses can permanently delete something, like nuclear launch codes, but at least 17 of them have to agree that it needs to go.
I'm not aware of any examples of this happening.
I would oppose, and I'm confident almost all witnesses would oppose, any change to the chain that would let individuals permanently delete data.
I think we can both agree that text can be used to redirect people to onion links (like a dark web wiki), I even think that text alone should be enough. All things apart, I found on the net that it is possible to store data (images) as text (binary) then recompile them again using specific tools.
It is actually safer to do it on an immutable chain than going for an onion option, immutability will allow fire-and-forget approach, which is far safer than using tor which will compromise your browser fingerprinting uniqueness.
Well, the problem here is that the front-end won't be necessary, people will just need to use a block explorer.
What do you think about letting the user choose? like giving people the choice before posting something to check a mark if they want the post to be immutable or not. This could be attractive to both those who want immutability and those who don't want nor need it or even cannot work by it due to regulations or commercial contracts.
This is all theorizing of course, but the steem blockchain needs to evolve, to adapt according to people's needs while keeping its core value at the same time. The immutability thing is overrated, we have already seen with HF9 what would happen if someone powerfull wants to play god.
You can read the post and comments here for more information:
https://steemit.com/stopthepowerdown/@lukestokes/is-steem-centrally-controlled
The user can already choose. If you want it permanent, post it on chain.
If you want it temporary, post it literally anywhere else on the internet.
I guess condensers could adopt a second (casual) layer, which doesn't post to the chain at all; similar to the dissenter browser extension.
I would support the adoption of a mechanism to remove images, binary, ASCII or otherwise, under specific circumstances; but only at the witness level, not by users.