The problem Tike solves

Problems Addressed-
Lack of Ownership and Monetization:
• Issue: Traditional platforms don’t provide true content ownership or effective monetization for creators.
• Tike’s Solution: Users can mint their content as NFTs, ensuring real ownership and better monetization.
Discoverability of Web3 Applications:
• Issue: Discovering web3 dapps, top NFTs, and learning about web3 is fragmented and confusing.
• Tike’s Solution: The Explore hub offers a central place to access web3 dapps, view top NFTs, and learn about web3, all in one spot.
User-Friendly Integration:
• Issue: Existing Web3 apps often build entirely new experiences that are difficult for users to adapt to.
• Tike’s Solution: Tike blends familiar, addictive social media elements with Web3 features. By merging proven patterns from existing platforms with Web3 needs, Tike creates a more user-friendly, engaging, and rewarding experience.
Content Accessibility and Security:
• Issue: Premium content access is often restrictive and insecure.
• Tike’s Solution: Token-gated content ensures secure access to exclusive material.

Use Cases-
For Content Creators:
• Mint and monetize content as NFTs.
• Reach a wider audience through the Explore hub.
• Earn rewards for their activity on the platform.
For General Users:
• Discover and explore web3 dapps and top NFTs.
• Explore and learn about web3 at one place in an easy and engaging way.
• Access exclusive content securely with token-gated features.

Conclusion
Tike bridges the gap between traditional social media and the decentralized web3 world. It empowers users with real ownership, makes discovering web3 easier, incentivizes engagement, and ensures secure access to content. This makes everything easier, safer, and more rewarding for both creators and consumers.

Challenges we ran into

Complex API Integrations
We utilized Neynar for most of our data needs. However, the APIs provided by Neynar are not straightforward, requiring us to navigate through various complexities. For instance, since our platform is media-only, we had to retrieve a personalized "For You" feed through the API and then filter each cast to check its media type before rendering it on the UI. This added an extra layer of complexity to our data handling processes. For frames, there's no straightforward endpoint to retrieve "trending frames" and most of the frames are spam asking users for airdrops, etc. We are still figuring this out.

Handling Media as NFTs
Every post uploaded via our app is treated as an NFT. This required us to first upload the media to IPFS (InterPlanetary File System) and then cast it. We routed this process through the Pinata API to pin the media and then cast the resulting hash with the URL. This multi-step process was essential for ensuring the integrity and decentralization of the media content but added to the development complexity.

Real-Time User Interactions (likes, recasts, follows, uploads)
Implementing real-time user interactions through the Neynar API posed another challenge. Real-time features are crucial for a social media platform to keep users engaged, but achieving this with the existing API infrastructure required significant effort and optimization.