Tweak messaging in headline paragraph?
Created by: robby-dermody
I generally lurk on the reddits and slack, and I've noticed a bit of a shift with how many are thinking about Monero. Whereas before, its privacy and fungibility aspects were highly emphasized as standalone -- almost abstract -- properties, many seem to be coming around to the more holistic realization that these are required attributes of good digital money first and foremost. I think this is a great development, as an analogous relationship to the better properties of paper cash (specifically, it's accessibility, privacy, bearer instrument nature and fungibility) massively helps people initially grok the value of Monero. In doing so, it may also help deflect the "bad boy" narrative that the press loves to drape all over Monero: that it's a coin used by hackers, drug dealers, and people who are generally up to no good, and that by extension, you, not being one of these kinds of people, don't need it.
So with all that said, I wanted to get peoples' opinions towards tweaking the first paragraph on the website. You can see the current content by going to getmonero.org (it's the next to the right of the embedded video, at the top). I'd like to change it to something like this:
Monero (tagline:) True Money (from the comment here with the highest likes...or, have no tagline)
Monero is cash for a connected world. It’s fast, private and secure. With Monero, you are your own bank. You can spend safely, knowing that others cannot see your balances or track your activity.
Justifications:
- The updated text is shorter and more to the point. It immediately likens Monero to something that virtually everyone intrinsically understands and values: cash.
- With the advent of 0-conf spending with the Kasisto POS, mobile wallets, and monero's shorter blocktimes, I think we have enough justification to say it is "fast". People understand and -- as we've seen with all the interest for things like IOTA, XRB, etc -- value fast.
- I carried over the "private" and "secure" for obvious reasons.
- I kept the bit on "you are your own bank" because it's important, is understandable and is what cash is all about (being a bearer instrument).
- I added "You can spend safely, knowing that others cannot see your balances or track your activity" as a replacement to some of the copy I removed (which I detail below). Beyond being more succinct, this sentence just "feels" better to me -- it's more positive and conveys a feeling of relief, without making me feel like I'm using monero to do something bad or because I'm a paranoid nutter. Being able to spend safely where random others cannot see your balances is something that everyone both values highly, as well as being something that other cryptos simply do not have. (I.e. new crypto users slowly realize that all their transaction activity is viewable by anyone...it's not like their checking account or cash wallet!)
- I removed "Only you control and are responsible for your funds" because it was redundant with "you are your own bank", and the "responsible for your own funds" is heavy and scary, and doesn't really mean anything when you consider that Monero is just like any other cryptocurrency in that the user is responsible for the security of their private keys.
- I removed "It is open-source and accessible to all." because I think it doesn't need to be in this first paragraph: most public-chain cryptos are open source and thus accessible to all, and most general users do not strictly care about this up front. It's like advertising a car by saying "it has air conditioning".
- I removed "Your accounts and transactions are kept private from prying eyes." because it's redundant and no longer needed with the new content, and a bit paranoid/negative.
With these changes, privacy is still given the attention it deserves, but in a way that makes it sound less like we're all walking around in black hoodies trading drugs with one another. Thoughts?
EDIT: Changed "Monero is cash for the internet" to "Monero is cash for a connected world", at the suggestion of @cryptoizzy