ALiS: an overview of what has and is to come.

この記事は日本語が分からない人たちのために、ALISがここ最近どういう風に変わったか、何が発表されたか、をまとめた記事です。「いいね」や投げ銭を送らないでください。「じゃ、ALISで書かなかったらどう？」と思う方もいるかもしれませんが、ALISでの記事は実際どんな感じかを文字や画像で説明するより、直接見てくれた方が手っ取り早いのでこちらで書かせていただきます。

Hey all,

It has been a while since ALiS has released its closedβ version, and a lot has been added to the platform since. Next to added functionality, a partnership with Microsoft has been announced, of which I will explain the details as well. The overall aim of this article will be to show those out there who don't understand Japanese what has been going on the past few months, and what will happen in the month's to come.

The Platform

Some data:
・On September 9, 17k articles were created and 653k likes were given.
・I made a bot that tweets data about the platform and development. Based on the data from September 9, I've been tracking the amount of articles and some other data. This is todays tweet: (the New Articles are about 10 times what it is normally, but I had the bot switched off for the past 10 days):

・ Masahiro Yasu, the CEO, is speaking on conferences in Japan multiple times per week, meaning ALiS gets a LOT of exposure in Japan.

Functionality

In a quickly made video from last July, you can see ALiS's functionality as it was right after the release:

Below is a list of what has been added since:

New categories:
Whereas in July categories were limited to just 1: crypto and blockchain. At the moment there are 5 categories (crypto and blockchain, food, business, illustration/manga and goshuin.). This has made the platform more appealing to join for people who aren't perse interested in crypto. However, the main aim of adding these categories was not attracting a wider range of users to the platform. Nor were the categories picked at random. Nor were they added all at once.

The reason the categories were added was to see how different categories, of which the articles will naturally differ in style and content, would influence the platform and the token-economy. The first batch of new categories was to test a 'major' topic (food), which everyone can write about and could be divided up into a lot more sub-categories. On the other hand, a 'minor' topic (goshuin) was also added, in many ways the exact opposite of the food category. 

The second batch was to test a categorie that naturally results in longer and more in depth articles (business), as opposed to illustration/manga, which yields the exact opposite.
In other words, a lot of testing is being done in order to be able to assure the content wise performance of the openβ.

Tags and Search:
Whereas the search function didn't work yet in July, it does now. It functions based on the tags people can add to their articles, much like on Youtube for example. 

Coincidentally, yesterday, in the weekly community/employee live chat, where two from the ALiS team and people from the community share ideas, ask questions and have fun on Discord for an hour, it was briefly mentioned how they are now looking into using tags to make users able to 'filter' what is displayed on a category page. For example, you're reading through the 'food' category, but aren't interested in recepies, you can then filter out articles with the tag 'recipe'.

Comments:
It is now possible to comment on articles, which are neatly displayed below the article. 

Tipping 'Nagesen' 投げ銭:
This is the 'big one' I saved for last, since it also ties into the partnership with Microsoft. If you scroll down to the bottom of this article, you'll find a button that looks like a present. This is the 'Nagesen' 投げ銭, or tipping button. With this you can send any amount of the ALiS tokens in your wallet on the platform to the writer of the article, as a way of showing appreciation. 

While this doesn't sound as a big deal, if we take a little time to consider the applications, we quickly understand why it is such a big deal. This functionality means the backend is in place to do a number of very cool stuff with the platform. The two main ones I thought of are:
・1. Whereas on Youtube people rely on third party services like Patreon, on ALiS, the same could be done all in one place.
・2. It could be easily taken and made into a payment function.
In the future, the 'articles part' of ALiS will become a place where people with different specialities will share knowledge and where the same people curate articles shared by others. Meaning, its in essence one giant academic journal, and your articles are being peer-reviewed by others. If your articles are seen as worth reading on the platform, it means you know what you're talking about. For a second, consider how valuable this is. Say for example you're writing about marketing in the business section and you're articles are well received (i.e. other marketing experts think what you're writing is good), this is potentially way more valuable than a degree in the eyes of a future employer, or client. 

Now, what does this have to do with a payment function? Imagine a market place where you can offer your expertise, backed by your ALiS account, which is your portfolio. But also think about the possibilities for a market place where people can self-publish books, music, art and manga? I'm well aware the former sounds a little ambitious, but please note this is just one of the possibilities and only an idea. The latter however, is in theory already possible.

Additionally, the possibility to buy and sell stuff on the platform, means people will be less inclined to cash out. So instead of trying to 'force' people not to cash out, or incentivizing not cashing out, people are using the tokens on the platform. This is a much more healthy approach for obvious reason.   

Partnership with Microsoft

Together with Microsoft, ALiS is working on making it possible for other parties to implement the same tipping function that is already fucntioning here, making website able to receive donations in crypto (maybe even in stores?). These could be in ALIS, but also in other currencies.

At the Microsoft Tech Summit 2018, the development of the project was presented and it was announced they are going to start doing 'real-life' tests. For those real-life tests they opened registrations, of which a selection of 3 companies will be made.

More on the details about this partnership are explained here.

The final product will be presented at de:code 2019, a conference organized by Microsoft Japan. This years de:code was held in May.

Exchanges

Logically the most asked question by non-Japanese supporters of the product is: When will ALIS be listed on bigger exchanges? Before talking about this, I want to calrify that even though I am an 'ambassador' I don't know anything more about this then the rest of the community. 

Japanese and Foreign Exchanges
Although I am not sure how set in stone this decission is, in the English AMA a few weeks ago, the team mentioned they are aiming to be on Japanese exchanges first, since most (potential) investors are in Japan. Other reasons I can think of are:
・1. The team probably personally knows people from multiple Japanese exchanges. Making a deal with them will most likely be way easier than making a deal with an exchange like Binance. 
・2. With that being said, ALIS listing on one or multiple Japanese exchanges will probably result in a huge spike in volume, which will make it more interesting for non-Japanese exchanges to list ALIS as well. 

In other words, even though for non-Japanese investors this means they won't be able to easily trade ALIS on large non-Japanese exchanges as soon as they would like, this is probably the easiest and most effective way to make  that possible.

Ok, but when Japanese exchanges then?
This 100% speculation, but I think the team has been and is still holding of on listing because of the government regulations in Japan that followed after the Coincheck and Zaif hack, which are both Japanese exchanges. 

Not really knowing very clearly what the Japanese government would do to those exchanges, or to exchanges that might still get hacked, taking the risk to list on Japanese exchanges right now might only do more harm then good.

In addition, the team mentioned in one of the Japanese AMA's that going around listing on exchanges might actually not be very much appreciated by the government. We can’t forget that ALIS plays an exemplary role in Japan, being the first and only successful ICO in Japan. If they mess up or move in ways the government doesn't agree with, this could possibly result in stricter regulations or whatever else negative to the project and/or crypto and blockchain in Japan as a whole. 

Other Resources and Usefull Links

First of all, thanks for taking the time to read through this article. The team is small and they're having a hard enough time keeping Japan updated on what they doing, let alone the rest of the world. However, Jai, who is actually an employee, is very fluent in English and is answering questions on Discord. If she is not around I am also there to help out. 

I have written some other articles in English, which you can find on my ALiS page here. The official ALIS ALIS page (that looks weird), can be found here. Some English articles there, but some are Japanese only. Google Translate and the diagrams there will explain what those are about. If you then decide you want to know more about what is actually written, please reach out to me or Jai on Discord.

Furthermore, there is of course Twitter, Trello, Github and Google Analytics.

I hope to see more non-Japanese on the ALiS Discord and you can reach out to me there if you want me to elaborate more on something written in this article.

Cheers!