Curation Digest changes

As I’m sure you are all aware, @buildawhale was created by @themarkymark to fulfill two important needs of the Steemit Community; to help minnows gain visibility through the upvote-bot usage and to highlight solid, original content through the daily Curation Digest.

@buildawhale has achieved these goals in many ways. Minnows are using the upvote bot and gaining visibility through both the higher earnings of their posts and from the added bonus of being featured in the Daily Digest.

Unfortunately, @buildawhale is also being used for the shitposters and spammers. It’s making life difficult for our Curating team.

Our curators, we currently have a team of 6 including Chief Curators @nicnas and I (@bethalea), go through hundreds of URLs every day, searching for at least five good, original pieces from our fellow Steemians.

I am sorry to tell you that it’s difficult. Not that you aren’t out there, beloved Authors. The problem is that there are so many more shitposters and spammers, and everyone ends up on the same list for us to go through.

I have an idea about how to help us, help you. Yes, I know that’s a cheesy line from that movie… it also happens to be true. I can’t tell you how frustrated I have become, going through posts that are copied, plagarised or otherwise total crap, in order to find the shiny gem of originality.

I often use my 1 SBD sent to @buildawhale on a post I’ve found that I think deserves a boost of visibility and extra kudos to the author, and I have heard from others in our community who do the same.

The Curation Team at @buildawhale will be giving priority to those posts who were sent to us from someone other than the author.

It is my hope that our team will be able to feast upon more high quality content this way, and that the Steemit community will be enhanced by you, faithful reader, sending these gems our way. I call you now to support your community and authors you deem worthy by using the @buildawhale service to promote someone other than yourself.

What do you think? Do you hate this idea? If so, why? Do you love it? Again, why? Let’s start a real discussion about using our upvoting bot this way, as a vehicle to enhance our communities.

@bethalea
_{Curator in Chief}