See my reasons

denmarkguy (76) · 7 years ago

Well said. And agreed.

I'l add two more points, both of these from a more distant perspective.

(7.) Every rewards-for-content site over the past 20 years (almost ALL of which have failed) have had the central flaw that the founders/creators grossly underestimated the level of greed and selfishness inherent within human nature... as soon as there is money/rewards on the table.

(8.) For all those who whine about rewards and get into rhetorical battles over the issue that they are "depending" on Steemit for money... a REMINDER that you are not an employee of Steemit, Steemit never hired you to do anything with any promise of payment whatsoever, and the rewards you do (or do not) earn here represent nothing more than a potential opportunity to be rewarded. If you even make 50 cents here, you're better off than you would be, posting on Facebook.

"But what about investors?"

"Investing" typically means you buy and hold an asset on the assumption it will increase in value. That means, you buy Steem at $0.92 with the hope that it will become worth $10.00. Getting "paid to post" is not investing, it is a possible fringe benefit.

Which brings us full circle back to your post. To increase the value of your INVESTMENT-- whether you hold 1000SP or 1,000,000SP you're counting on the infrastructure that holds your investment to be attractive to other investors... which will drive the price up.

Now, for reality and economics 101: A thriving social community people love to interact on, and want to be part of, is probably going to look more attractive to the next 7th, 118th or Nth next investor than a cesspool of automation, bots, spam and system abuse. Which do YOU want to be part of, if you weren't already a member.

What's the challenge here? Ultimately (just my opinion) this boils down to short term thinking vs. long term thinking. If your entire focus boils down to being worried about making money for tomorrow's pizza... then you're not going to act from a perspective of securing the site's long term stability. And that's what all those purchased votes are about... wanting a shortcut to "make money now" rather than putting in the work and slowly building a social following.

Most will not BE successful. Period. Please go back and read (8.), above. This is a social site, not your freakin' job!

Anyway, great post-- couldn't have said it much better!

$4.33

em3 (60) · 7 years ago

@denmarkguy you are right.....but...
A small fact is that Steem Inc and two of the biggest Steemit YouTube videos Do Promote the platform as a cash cow.

Steemit inc's "come for the rewards" and "get paid to blog"
dollar vigilante's 'wow I found steemit and made $10,000 on my first post'
jerry bainfield's 'wow I made $600 on this post and $300 on that one, wow, comeone and earn some crypto'

Are the First introductions into Steemit. It is no wonder people comes with $$$ in their eyes. That's what sold most of them.

We werent told how much we can expect to make....but I was looking at a couple of $150 posts and thinking..."I can do that or better" when I first got started after seeing the YouTube hype videos.

So...it is just an adjustment for people that it isnt a cash cow and don't expect much in terms of financial payout.

So I try not to be too hard on newbies who come here with the wrong info/marketing.

$0.42

5 votes

dhouse (57) · 7 years ago

making money is literally the only thing that distinguishes steemit.com from any other social media site

$0.26

denmarkguy (76) · 7 years ago

Absolutely valid points.

I somewhat "reluctantly" signed up here in January because I was looking for a new place to park my web content and wanted to get back to social blogging... and the rewards idea sounded appealing.

If you analyze that sentence carefully... my motivation was "content creation," and rewards were merely a potential consequence.

The reason I said "reluctantly" was that I started looking around to see what others were saying about Steemit... and came across various versions of Jeff Berwick's "$40,000 post" promotions... which immediately made me think... "This place is SO doomed!"

It's simple marketing 101: If you pitch a place like this on the "free money" you attract a swarm of people looking for free money, if you pitch it as a "content platform" you get content creators.

They basically "blew it" because they were afraid people wouldn't show up unless they were promised "free money." It's a basic beginner's mistake: Thinking you have to give away the store for free. It "works" (in terms of drawing people) but it's the wrong crowd.

What can we do now? Reward those who authentically try-- ignore/flag those who game the system.

$0.04

cryptogee (75) · 7 years ago

It's simple marketing 101: If you pitch a place like this on the "free money" you attract a swarm of people looking for free money, if you pitch it as a "content platform" you get content creators.

You may be right; however making money on posts and for voting is a unique selling point, so why would you try and hide that fact?

If you marketed Steemit as just another content creation platform, first of all you'd be doing it a huge disservice by not mentioning what makes it different from the plethora of content creation platforms out there.

Secondly I feel the response would have been'meh'.

I do get what you're saying though, expectations should perhaps be balanced, but at the same time nobody ever got excited over $0.10 :-)

$0.15

denmarkguy (76) · 7 years ago (edited)

I wouldn't advocate hiding the rewards... it's more of a case of "what's your lead argument" when you market?

If your argument is "Make money on Steemit!" and you publicize Jeff Berwick's famous $40,000 you'll get a whole different set of people than if you say "Steemit is a censorship resistant social content platform, and we reward quality content!"

When I joined I was excited about the idea of a social content site with rewards... but to be honest, when I started reading external content about Steemit, it sounded a bit scammy. And I experienced the same feedback when I aired the idea to fellow bloggers and content creators. BUT... I am a "content creator" (who happens to like being rewarded for content) not an "investor" or "income opportunity seeker."

I do get what you're saying though, expectations should perhaps be balanced

Agreed. And I would really expect no more. The challenge of the moment seems to be a lack of balance as the "clicking buttons for pennies" brigade is starting to drown out real human interaction and engagement... which is a concern (in the longer term), because communities are built by PEOPLE, not by code, bots and automation.

One of the factors @penguinpablo tracks in his daily stats is "comments per post" and that number has been declining for months. And if we keep in mind that upvote services auto-post thousands of time, that means the "human interaction" aspect is really tanking... and I see that as problematic, maybe not "now," but definitely in the longer term.

$0.00

rawdawg (61) · 7 years ago

You are spot on!

$0.00

em3 (60) · 7 years ago (edited)

"What can we do now? Reward those who authentically try-- ignore/flag those who game the system."

And at the moment we arent doing a great job at either. In part because so much SP is tied up in 'votes for hire' systems.

I do hope the big players will reassess their positions with a better strategy in mind.

$0.00

afsanamitul1 (49) · 7 years ago

$0.00

tusharvasave (52) · 7 years ago

Wow that is great. Superb work. I read some jerrybanfield post. His work ia also good. I think ypu joined steemit from 2-3 years ago. Well done

$0.00

afsanamitul1 (49) · 7 years ago

$0.00

tusharvasave (52) · 7 years ago

Wow. Nice comment. You have great knoledge which is seen from your comment.

$0.00

afsanamitul1 (49) · 7 years ago

$0.00

dber (66) · 7 years ago (edited)

I use voting services from time to time, primarily minnowbooster. From my perspective, it serves three purposes:

It can, theoretically, increase the overall visibility of a post - although I am dubious;
It provides me with a purely psychological boost which keeps me posting new types of content.
It can achieve the first two benefits while usually breaking even, or even slightly increasing, the eventual amount of SP banked.

So, for instance, I post mycology posts twice a week. I work really hard on those, and many people, early on acidyo, and especially the steemstem community, today further supported by curie, have been super supportive. (For which I am immensely grateful).

My plan now is to take one of those once in awhile, go 50/50 on it, and then use the SBD payout to buy large upvotes for OC fiction content I want to get more consistent about writing, and regarding which I currently have zero street cred. I work hard on these posts as well, but nonetheless, my writing is simply not that great. Still, this use of a vote buy, on a purely selfish level, results in a near risk-free, delayed SBD transfer that keeps me posting when all I really want to do is play 7 hours of League of Legends.

For me, being able to visibly boost my content on demand is, and always has been, a major psychological assistance in continuing to post, especially before my posts got as consistently large support as they have been getting.

Steemit has kept me from playing a video game for 158 days. That is the most effective "sobriety" mechanism I have ever encountered. But even now, when things have been going very smoothly, having the ability to simply tack on some post value, even artificially, helps to keep me motivated and simply gives me a dopamine boost.

Now, I haven't cashed out any steem, and have no plans to, because this experiment has nothing to do with profit for me. It is gamifying my mycological exploration and creative writing. To the extent the visual booster shot of a bought vote keeps me - and other people - here, so long as we make a good faith effort to create quality content and engage in the community, I guess I support those services.

Having said that, I'm sure these services are used, much of the time, somewhat unscrupulously - in a broad sense of the word. Indeed, I imagine some would criticize me for using them as well. If a macro-analysis shows that it is a net drain on the reward pool, or on the overall well-being and health of the steemit community, then I would also support the elimination of those vote buy services, assuming there is no way to regulate there use in a net-positive way, especially when communities come into play.

$3.52

8 votes

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

I understand, and there will always be a demand for wanting votes. However, I don't think vote buying services should extort money from the vulnerable. (Yes, dramatic effect) Instead, they should do what the system was designed to - curation.

$0.10

vimukthi (72) · 7 years ago

Personally I love what @treeplanter is doing. They banned self-voting and lost 80% of the donations they were getting. (https://steemit.com/nature/@treeplanter/i-lost-more-than-80-of-donations-because-i-banned-self-voting-i-will-give-you-200-upvote-of-your-donation-till-my-vp-get-80)

The bot is there to help fund the planting of trees in a Forrest in Cameron.(http://kedjom-keku.com/en/) I think it's a great social initiative and a perfect example of what upvote bots really should be. No self-voting means you are doing it for somebody. A @treeplanter vote is better than a straight donation to the content creator as the vote is worth more than the SBD invested. Additionally, half of the money spent goes to plant trees. $1 is 1 tree planted on our planet to create a greener and better future.

$0.00

bashadow (65) · 7 years ago

O-kay, this is kind of what I was mentioning in my response to @techslut only in reverse. @dber, I like to read, and I will take a look at your story. This is the sort of thing I have tried to point out to new people, (yes I am still new myself) is if you want visibility you need to put yourself out there and promote yourself. If you go to a dance and spend all your time in the janitor's closest, you are never going to get asked by the pretty girl/guy to dance, because they don't have a clue you are even around.

$0.04

dber (66) · 7 years ago

Oh absolutely - the success i've had here is the result of socializing, promoting and sheer persistance combined with luck.

But despite all that, I still use the boost as an on command "point increase" - and it helps me when I feel like walking away - which, because of the diminishing returns inherent in any addictive behavior, still happens - even though there's no rational reason for me to feel that way!

So much of this process is just posting and watching to see what it stirs up - and when it doesn't stir much, it can really help to force that number up and just look at it.

$0.23

11 votes

cryptogee (75) · 7 years ago (edited)

@dber's post has been the best answer I've read here, it's great that it has come from a vote buyer, as it is important to see things from that perspective. It's all very well and good saying that these services are bad for Steemit etc. But the fact remains you can get rewarded for your posts and you see others getting rewarded, why not try and join the club?

At the end of the day everyone deserves a crack of the whip, and what you would hope is that people get a bit of exposure and then the quality of their content keeps them up there and growing.

I'm glad Steemit has been your methadone, keeping you from those heroin-video games :-)

$0.03

afsanamitul1 (49) · 7 years ago

$0.00

reddragonfly (64) · 7 years ago

You are really going about "getting seen" on Steemit the WRONG way... I would suggest reading people's content and actually engaging them in dialogue... and then let them decide for themselves that you might be interesting enough to have a look at.

$0.03

lukestokes (75) · 7 years ago

Well said. I've never personally paid for a vote bot, but I've also been here over a year and a half which gives me a significant advantage over new users. I like how clearly you explained how markets function. Much of that was covered in the white paper originally as well. It's like a lottery but many want a meritocracy. The closer we can get to a meritocracy, the better, but we may end up finding ourselves battling against aspects of human psychology, such as it is today.

$1.63

5 votes

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

I've also been here over a year and a half

And in a year and a half new users would have been here for a year and a half :)

$0.00

geekgirl (72) · 7 years ago (edited)

From a financial point of view, I find vote buying unprofitable. First of all, bought upvote amount doesn't stay same until payout time. My understanding redistribution/recalculation happens while rewards are pending and the value of the bought vote or any vote goes down significantly by the payout time. Second, the author gets to keep ~75% of that amount, as 25% or so goes back to the seller as curation reward. Lastly, remaining amount gets split in half: 50% illiquid, 50% liquid. In the end, it becomes a loss in my opinion. I think people should be educated about this too, that might discourage them from buying as well.

$1.62

afsanamitul1 (49) · 7 years ago

$0.00

heymattsokol (68) · 7 years ago

Great analysis of vote buying. Most creators will do fine if they can put out consistent and good content for 3+ months, and participate in the community. This is one of the simplest places on the internet to build an income for people who are willing to do the work.

Hopefully these bots will keep losing influence for a little while, they've been too powerful historically on steem.

$1.51

afsanamitul1 (49) · 7 years ago

$0.00

markangeltrueman (67) · 7 years ago

Completely agree. I've recently come to the conclusion that using upvoters and boosters is just counterproductive. No-one with any power behind them is going to upvote your post if their curation reward is going to be diminished by the hundreds of boosted/purchased upvotes a post before they notice it. I admit, i used minnowbooster and randowhale in the past, but have been phasing these out as im finding i get more rewards for my content when not using them.

My feeling is that if we remove them, a lot of pointless spam will also disappear.

I'm going to investigate something that I have seen mentioned in the Curie chat and try and develop myself a curation algorithm so that I can find good content. I already have some manual techniques but finding more stuff would be beneficial for all.

$1.13

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

Any technology that will benefit curators is highly appreciated!

$0.00

captainobviou3 (63) · 7 years ago

PS: I'll support anyone that downvotes posts and votes by vote buying services, as that effectively redistributes the reward pool to the people that create and discover content on merit. The people that add lasting value to Steem, making it a quality social publishing platform.

I am glad you said that. How do you feel about using the voting service to give someone a boost that deserves it?

For example, I have a few paragliding friends that came in seeing my post getting 20, 30 and 40 bux. They have not had the luck that I have. They posted a few here and there and for the most part didn't see much.

I remember when you messaged when I was brand new and talked about how you felt about Vote-buying. I dabbled around with the booster a couple times, but I always felt unclean when I did it. You said it well when you said:

This is a free market. Like any free market, only a few creators will ever be popular.

This needs to be a long haul thing. Not a blow and go website that had potential.

$1.08

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

How do you feel about using the voting service to give someone a boost that deserves it?

That would be curation :) That was the whole idea of this post, to push vote buying services to get into curation.

Currently, there's still a lot of gaps in curation.

$0.07

surfermarly (74) · 7 years ago (edited)

Great article which I found thanks to @kevinwong.
Thanks to both of you :-)

I have personally asked many good authors to stop vote buying, so that I could submit their posts to Curie, or vote for them myself instead. They did.

That's a brilliant approach, and I will copy that :-)
@curie is doing an amazing job ever since btw. I really love how they select content. If I want to read an outstanding piece of content I simply need to follow their upvotes.

Let's make quality a priority again on this amazing platform!!!

Resteemed this

$1.07

steevc (73) · 7 years ago

I've been thinking much the same. The vote sellers have a lucrative business and people are willing to buy them, even if they don't make much. I support minnows with my votes and with delegation. I don't worry about what I make from curation. The whales should be boosting the community as steemit grows. The big profit will come later

$1.00

happyme (68) · 7 years ago

Thank-you, thank-you, thank-you! It is so nice to see that what I have been going on about for so long is finally catching on. I believe this has now turned into a movement and more and more people are 'getting it'. As more influential people begin to write about this issue, the faster this movement will sweep through the community and soon a new mindset will dominate the landscape. I truly am excited to see more and more of the higher-ranking Steemians writing articles like this one.

There were days when I felt like joining the crowd and give in to the pressure of vote-buying because I could see how those who bought votes shot past me in earnings. However, I feel proud that I didn't cave in and have never paid for a vote. Instead, I have been offering all my SBD earnings for the week as incentives to others to read my weekly contest posts and to write some meaningful replies in order to encourage engagement.

I'm just a small fry with very little influence, so would appreciate any participation I can get from this audience.

Thanks again for supporting me in my mission to look at the long-term health of this platform by having REAL social interactions.

$0.99

ewuoso (63) · 7 years ago

i never knew it was not ok to pay for votes. yhur post just made me think. if i am here with the hope that i will get a reward for my original works why then do i have to pay?

$0.98

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

Exactly :)

$0.00

afsanamitul1 (49) · 7 years ago

$0.00

donkeypong (75) · 7 years ago

First rate analysis and I agree 100%.

$0.98

rakison1 (57) · 7 years ago

it is important what you mention, it is very complicated for new users as in my person, to have votes even creating quality content

$0.00

tarazkp (80) · 7 years ago

I am so glad that this is finally snowballing into a death spiral for vote buying, There are enough issues with low quality content without adding to it.

$0.98

bashadow (65) · 7 years ago

Views=156, comments=39, and votes=105. That is an indication of being a good post. Number 1 people looked at it. Number 2 is a good amount of those that viewed the post interacted with the post, and Number 3 the votes are in-line with the views.

I wish that if a post is going to go on the trending page, or hot page, then it should have absolutely nothing to do with votes, but should be based on the number of views it received. After all a 868 votes does not equate to 868 people actually taking the time to read, comment and vote on that blog post, just an indication that they may have bought a lot of votes.

$0.88

shadowspub (70) · 7 years ago

you have a good point, the trending page being driven by post returns rather than post engagement is definitely a negative for the site. Surely Steemit can create some algos that will churn posts to the top which are attracting community engagement through a combination of views and comments.

$0.69

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

Agreed. The argument for the current system I've seen, though, is that the big numbers at the top will attract people to sign up. But I'd argue great content would be more of a draw.

$0.00

#steemit #curation #promo-steem #abuse #support

michaelcj (64) · 7 years ago

Hi @liberosist,

@curie has been a motivation for steemians, especially newbies. But my question is this, why is it just curie obviously supporting newbies, So many people register on steemit and 80% of them declines. if we want steem value to increase, then the demand should be high. for the demand to be high, we need more people on steemit which we will definetly need more curation team. because @curie cannot see them all(but kudos to curie). trust me

@dan said, blogging on steemit is just the tip of an iceberg.

I really understand how you feel about buying of vote. but i believe it has an advantage.

See my reasons

i have a proposal for steemt growth and i am scared of the post not recognized by many people. i am afraid that it wont trend. its safer for me to have a backup plan. boosting a post will automatically take it to the trending page.

i am a community leader and we make sure we abide to curie curation standard, other curatin team like @ocd are also available if curie do not upvote.

See this Post here. it took me the whole day to meet up my freiend who is a comendian, record two videos, edit, upload and publish on steemit. two videos in one post. dont you think its okay for me to boost it,not to even get reward. but for steemians to see how hard i put in to promote steem and entertain the community but some others will give 100% upvote to themselves, cater-porting the post to trending page. Well that's not my business

Conclusion

Buying of vote should not be abused by steemians. i will not buy vote if my post does not worth it. but if my post merit curation reward but to no avail, the second option is to boost it.

its your blockchain entertainer
@michaelcj

$0.78

len.george (63) · 7 years ago

Thanks for the plain english version that an oldie can understand. Like a mighty oak, it takes time to grow a canopy of readers and voters, until then, keep posting, and slowly you will grow.

$0.76

thatgermandude (59) · 7 years ago

meh, well said. I thought you are one of them.

It is funny how vote buying is often described as a "service with a high demand". I mean assassination could be in high demand and it still wouldn't be a valuable service, at least for the community in the long run.

$0.62

shadowspub (70) · 7 years ago

I agree with you to a point. While I don't advocate routinely using the voting bots, I do at times use them. Usually on a post I want to give a shot in the arm to because of whatever reason I want to give it a shot in the arm. I always wait for a few hours to see if the post will get some traction on its own.

For those under a reputation of 52, Curie does an excellent job of finding and promoting posts of promising content creators.

Then there are those over that level, it's a constant struggle to try to gain some notice.

I spend countless hours on the site finding and sharing quality posts in the Steemit Ramble. That has evolved into a discord where people can nominate posts to be reviewed for possible inclusion in the Ramble.

A few weeks ago I started Pimp Your Post Thursday where I host a chat, morning and evening, where people can present their posts and network with those in attendance. The sessions are getting a growing response. I publish within a day or so a report of the posts shared.

It's an effort to try to help people get noticed. Sometimes it feels like a soapbox on an obscure little corner and I can only give minimal help. I keep plugging and slowly growing and hopefully some day, I can find a busier corner to help give some hard working Steemians some notice from.

In the meantime, those hard working people will likely feel the need to try to upvote their posts by purchasing from a voting bot which in some ways is not a lot different than boosting a post on FB by paying for more exposure. Well, yeah there is a difference, here they do get a small return if they choose the service wisely.

$0.61

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

I'd recommend you and other curators approach whales for delegations. I know, not everyone is a marketing person. I sure am not, I wouldn't know where to begin about asking for a delegation. In which case, team up with someone who is savvy at negotiations and communication. You can do the curation, they can keep the whales happy. It can be a whole group of people too.

There can be dozens of groups like Curie.

$0.00

mrashid (40) · 7 years ago

I comprehend, and there will dependably be an interest for needing votes. Be that as it may, I don't think vote purchasing administrations ought to coerce cash from the helpless. (Truly, sensational impact) Instead, they ought to do what the framework was intended to - curation.

$0.00

rebeccabe (63) · 7 years ago

@shadowpub thanks for creating Pimp your Post Thursday.. what a fun show...I was able to make it to one but plan to attend others... a great place to connect.

$0.00

pathtosuccess (51) · 7 years ago

thank you @rebeccabe ... I appreciate the feedback

$0.00

acidyo (80) · 7 years ago

Very well put, thank you for this post.

$0.47

5 votes

mammasitta (70) · 7 years ago

can't agree more!

$0.00

minnaloushe (49) · 7 years ago

This article is so well written. I am relatively new on this platform, and there is so much that I do not understand yet. I mainly just follow my children's advice. Now this article I could actually understand. Well done, and much appreciated.

$0.43

whatsup (75) · 7 years ago

Vote selling and buying are a result of the poor distribution of Steem.
I actually agree with many of your points. One thing I would like to point out is Vote Buying is a bit of an equalizer in getting something noticed which goes against popular opinion.
Twitter and Facebook both offer paid promotion services
I enjoyed reading your thoughts, I personally think it will all play out.
Discussing it is part of letting it play out. :)

$0.42

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

Vote selling and buying are a result of the poor distribution of Steem.

For which there's a clear solution that I mention - delegated curation to curators.

$0.24

whatsup (75) · 7 years ago (edited)

It could work, but up until now, it has been a circle jerk of giving too few people too much money and people within the circle they already support.

There are many ways it could play out and it is a hot topic this week. Next week... ?

My opinion is the current atmoshere is a function of the actions of those who control the steem. When they behave differently, the money will go to different places.

Why is vote buying on shit posts more offensive than the trending list? No reason that I can think of. :)

$0.00

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

That's the whole point of this post. To appeal to stakeholders to invest in good curators and not vote buying services and other circlejerk.

$0.57

8 votes

themanualbot (70) · 7 years ago

WithCommunities incoming, content discoverability will be greatly improved.

Yeah, I've said this before 'community will save steemit'. Looking forward for growing communities!

$0.42

erodedthoughts (66) · 7 years ago (edited)

Finally worded in laymen terms for some of us that were still slightly confused on the issue. I am sure 99% of the people buying their own votes had no idea it would cause them to be skipped by some of the curation services. This fact alone may make some stop instantly.

$0.40

booster916 (60) · 7 years ago

In my opinion, Steemit would be better if you didn't buy voices. Also SteemIt would be better if some whales were more selfless and would simply upvote any content they like or are of high quality.

I know some small minnows who wrote really good posts and ended up empty. Meanwhile, there are plenty of users who simply follow people with a high reputation and just upvote every post in the hope of earning a few STEEM and SBD whether the post is good or not. I've seen enough posts from big whales that were really bad but with $100 going out in no time.

I am also only a small Minnow with 200SP and I can understand the users who pay bots to get their posts pushed to trending or hot, so that the actually high quality posts get the attention they deserve.
I'm also frustrated when good posts or ideas come out with a few cents while a "good morning"-post from a whale still earns $50.

$0.39

shadowspub (70) · 7 years ago

if you are buying upvotes with the desire to get your post pushed to trending, you will be sorely disappointed. The best you are going to get is a bit more of a payout on the post. If you're not careful, you will in effect get less payout because the return from the bot will be less than what you paid to get it.

$0.00

booster916 (60) · 7 years ago

I buy bots for topics where people hardly look in the new section or I get their attention just if reaching trending. Sometimes you make money with the bot, sometimes you lose money, but if I get new followers who become aware of my content, then I make money in the long run; independent of the additional upvotes for this post. Therefore, I can understand when small Minnows use bots to get the attention for their high quality posts.

$0.00

mgibson (66) · 7 years ago

@liberosist recently I got some offers by users who created fake id in the name of such users who have huge steem power and asked me to pay some sbd to get upvotes in my private steemit chat. I have studied and found that they are not the actual users. They are scammers who create account in steemit chat and ask for sbd or steem in exchange of votes and say to send the amount in their polonix address. I want to say that vote buying process is increasing the numbers of scammers.

$0.39

lennstar (66) · 7 years ago

Steem already has far superior discoverability thanks to financial incentivisation of curation efforts.

Unfortunately that may even be counterproductive (regarding vote buying) because most people "curate" where they think there will be a lot of upvotes. So if you know user X will always buy a $10 vote, thats a sure place to place your vote.

$0.39

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

I have found that it's much more profitable to vote on undiscovered posts, as there's no competition. A user that will always buy votes (or more important, is very popular, so guaranteed high payouts) - bots and humans alike will latch on to those. It'll start a bidding war where you'll often have to vote at 15 minutes or earlier. It's stressful and when I tried that it was never as profitable as just voting on exceptional but undiscovered posts.

$0.00

lennstar (66) · 7 years ago

If you want to get curation worth 10$ on undicovered posts, you need to put in at least one hour.

Voting on those guarantees only takes 10 seconds.

$0.00

geekpowered (69) · 7 years ago

I agree with your final notes.
I don't think the site is anywhere near perfect as far as curation though. That is contributing to the frustration of many users.
The promoted tab needs to be improved. A number of users have made suggestions as to make it more beneficial to promote a post, such as incorporating promoted posts into the trending tab, and having promoted posts listed in the sidebar, as well as various means to ensure the promoted tab posts are shuffled a bit. Fixing promoted posts will go a long way in reducing the problems of vote buying.
You can also pretty much just set a bot to automatically upvote posts by users that are statistically more likely to have a high reward, and sit back and collect the curation rewards. This causes a lot of posts by well known bloggers to be artificially inflated. You can see this on any of their posts by the number of votes they get literally seconds after posting a blog post that is over a page long. Unless these voters have a neural interface, they're botting it. In my opinion, there need to be lower curation rewards for users that are more successful, which will mitigate this, and cause people to look a bit harder for quality posts by unknown authors.
Communities will likely help to find quality content, but I don't think they solve the issues.
The problems with bots have occurred because of seemingly small issues with the platform. The only way to get rid of them is to work together to figure out ways to mitigate them.

$0.38

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

Of course the curation is flawed, and that's why I made this post. To drive some attention towards developing curation instead of vote buying.

$0.00

booster916 (60) · 7 years ago

If you upvote a Post from whales without owning much SP, your curation will still be 0,001SP when this post hits 100$ or what. So it is not effective to just upvote posts from whales.

But I agree with you: I am sometimes fascinated by how quickly people can upload a post with 2000+ words ^^

$0.00

shonyishere (56) · 7 years ago

I am new here at Steemit, i do feel that quality content goes unnoticed here, before joining i thought steem was some platform similar to reddit, where you will get the appreciation if you could give quality content.

But, i was wrong, until and unless you buy a lot of steem power or if you get to have hundreds of followers your content won't get rewarded, all that time you spend writing content and putting your ideas into words can be waste of your time. I am hoping to learn more and to find success in the long run.

$0.13

acidyo (80) · 7 years ago (edited)

similar to reddit, where you will get the appreciation if you could give quality content.

As a really active Redditor with ~20k link karma and ~100k comment karma I can tell you the odds of gaining exposure here are a lot bigger than on Reddit, even without communities yet which will be like "subreddits" where users can follow their favorite tags.

On Reddit it's a lot more about being lucky that voters with no incentive to do so happen to find your post and vote it up into trending.

$2.12

7 votes

rawdawg (61) · 7 years ago (edited)

Can we pop some acid together some time @acidyo ?! 😀✌️Haha! Your replys to people are good because they always utilize common sense which seems to be lacking in some corners around here. Peace out homie!

$0.00

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

Allow me to be forthright - you have been here only a week and written two posts. You're in no position to come to a conclusion to the tune of "quality content goes unnoticed here". One curation initiative alone (Curie) has discovered about 25,000 authors, thousands of whom are active. All those top authors on the Trending page? Yeah, they all started from scratch. They are up there because they make quality content, with persistence, engage with the community, and have done so for over a year.

The very same applies for Reddit. If you feel entitled that putting your ideas into words will guarantee rewards, you're mistaken. Nowhere does that happen.

So, keep at it, if your content is good, you'll be discovered. Much more likely than Reddit.

$1.04

12 votes

mers (66) · 7 years ago

I agree with you @liberosist .
I have been here since June of this year and I must say that I have been curated once by curie.. I really post good contents but being noticed is the hardest part. I write a blog for so many hours and big whales do not notice me at all. I have joined a community and that at least helped me earn a reward.

I did buy votes from a bot only to get noticed although I knew it´s a lost investment..let´s say if you invest 1 liquid SBD to a bot, and you would get an upvote for $1.40.... the margin of $0.40 is minimal which will still change within the 7 day period before pay out. You´ll have to share 25% of that $1.40 to your curators which is $0.35. What is left is $1.05 , so why should one give a liquid $1 SBD to a bot if the ROI is only $.05. and the authors 1.05 would have to be split 50/50 Steem and SP. It is a bad investment and besides, I am not even sure whether I get noticed at all. The really best thing to do is write good content and join communities. I don´t use bot anymore. The question is where are the big whales when the noobs needed their curation and upvotes? There were big issues and discussions raised recently about the big whales being given huge amounts of SP and they, big whales upvoted each other using SP delegated to them. Isn´t that Abuse of power?

$0.00

apsu (65) · 7 years ago

Three things

Everything requires time, as you haven't been on Steemit that long. Of course fast success would be perfect for any of us :)

Secondly, sometimes you'll need some extra work to be noticed. I found some of my best followers by reaching out to others.

Third, you can't really directly tell what is quality and what is not. Quality is what fits the "customers" need, in this case, whatever the reader is happy about. Be it witty memes about Steemit or in-depth analysis about vaccination.

$0.87

8 votes

em3 (60) · 7 years ago

Steem power only makes a diference if you are upvoting yourself.

Community is still key here. It will help you greatly to meet established members(in the comment sections, or outside chat boards) and find your niche. You have to start by finding people. It will only be by a stroke of luck that they will find a week old newbie.

Followers less than 1000 or 5000 mean nothing because as many as 90% are follow for follow trolls. They will never look at your posts again. I have 500+ followers, but only 20-40 that regularly visit my Posts.

Like was already said.... Less than a month here??? Count your time here as your Steemit Class 101 or internship. Except intead of having to pay, you can still get paid while you train. Even if pennies...its not out of pocket.

And finally.....for nearly every newbie, your posts are probably only subpar for the first 5 or 10 or 50. Again, look at it as on the job training.

So, we are glad you are here. Glad you are commenting! We hope the best for you!

$0.05

carrieallen (66) · 7 years ago

Indeed:

Followers less than 1000 or 5000 mean nothing because as many as 90% are follow for follow trolls. They will never look at your posts again. I have 500+ followers, but only 20-40 that regularly visit my Posts.

This is me now. Once I have more followers, I won't upvote myself (or use minnowbooster) 😃

P.S. Ya got an extra upvote cause I was logged into my cannabis page.... Woot! LOL!

$0.00

em3 (60) · 7 years ago

Woohoo dbl vote!! XD

Yeah, I have been upvoting myself less recently. In the end my own upvote only adds pennies.
Still waiting for a Curie find.

I would say, if you are very confident a post is a winner, don't upvote or buy votes, try and garner some support .....promote yourself to friends, and pray it will take off!!
Ya never know!!

$0.00

carrieallen (66) · 7 years ago

I do that. For instance, if you scroll below I explain... but I minnowbooster a contest entry post today, that while TOTALLY amazing... Meh. Lol!

$0.00

truthforce (66) · 7 years ago

Hi Shony, you need to make more posts before people notice you. If you are here to only get money from getting upvotes it will take awhile to get a big enough following for that to happen.

If you are here to have fun and make posts then this should be no problem for you. We all do want to make money, some money, or a bunch of money. Getting into Steemit as a completely new person with no following won't make you a bunch of money.

You should try putting affiliate links to amazon in your blog posts or other affiliate stuff. That way your fans can support you through other ways.

$0.00

shadowspub (70) · 7 years ago

be careful with the use of affiliate links. You need to be clear they are affiliate links and if you use them in a spammy way, you may very well draw downvotes.

$0.00

themadgoat (61) · 7 years ago

I, sadly, resort to vote buying bots to increase my visibility. It sucks, but that's the world we live in.

$0.04

techslut (70) · 7 years ago (edited)

You make a lot of good points, though I am not a fan of the flag war. In any case...

I've given this a lot of thought in the past week, and I wholeheartedly agree that vote buying bots are hardly a solution to the current state of affairs on the platform. But love them or hate them, their existence is a natural evolution of the platform AS IT IS. Curation communities are a good idea, and they've been around since steemit has, but they are a START. Not the whole solution.

The way I see it, part of the problem is the flood of content. There's just too much of everything on the blockchain, making it that much harder to gain (and give) exposure to new original and high quality content. I need to spend a lot of time sifting through shitposts to find an author worth following. Not to mention the crappiness of the search and tagging features currently in place. Let's all face it - steemit.com is one of the least user-friendly content platforms.

What we need are more interfaces with the steem blockchain that address different audiences who don't want to sift through news about bitcoin and motivational posts. Utopian is one example and bescouted (a photography specific interface) is another. I am eagerly expecting more of these as I believe they will change things significantly.

I can't code, but if anyone out there decides to create a utopian-like platform for stories, books and poetry - I would totally want to moderate it, move there and eventually stop using steemit.com.

$0.03

bashadow (65) · 7 years ago

spend a lot of time sifting through shitposts to find an author worth following.

One way to perhaps find interesting things/people to follow is to look at who is leaving comments to your work, and your comments. I know a lot of new users like myself initially feel intimidated about leaving comments, but we get over it. That is one method I use to find people to look at anyway, and maybe avoid some of the shit posters.

techslut (70) · 7 years ago

Oh totally. Comments are life. Also, checking who the authors you like are following. But neither is the solution to the sheer quantity and variety of content.

$0.00

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

Communities is coming soon (like I mentioned in my post) and it will solve nearly everything you have mentioned here. Each subject can have its own community with its own moderators ala Reddit. Content would be easily discoverable, and trolls and miscreants can be muted from the communities. Post in communities you like, and all of the pain points that exist today will vanish.

techslut (70) · 7 years ago

Yes please. Where do I sign? :)

$0.00

apsu (65) · 7 years ago

This is a bit off-topic, but it's nice to see you decided not to leave Steemit completely :)

$0.00

techslut (70) · 7 years ago

Peer pressure. Yeah, I am a week woman at times. :)

Still not publishing any new content, but am lurking around seeing where I can help out with whatever I can. And curating when I have some time.

$0.00

em3 (60) · 7 years ago

Good to hear!

$0.00

dj123 (60) · 7 years ago (edited)

Glad to see you back @techslut, I have read some of your older post and they were just wonderful, I'm still in lurking mode...week 3+ here in Steemit, honestly I think we all need to welcome diversity, especially if sustaining income will not be the main attractions at least to steemit......I would elaborate, but need to save some time and thoughts later to reply and support such good postings like these.

$0.00

dj123 (60) · 7 years ago

Up-Voted because you're a true Steemian for hanging around and openly sharing no matter if others disagree or not.

techslut (70) · 7 years ago

Thank you for reading! <3

$0.00

dj123 (60) · 7 years ago

You're welcome...and it's my pleasure my dear.

I've done with my lengthy reply below.....do let me know if you agree with those crazy thoughts of mine.

you can just scroll down below or click link to load (assuming you have a fast connection): https://steemit.com/curation/@liberosist/a-review-of-vote-buying#@dj123/re-liberosist-a-review-of-vote-buying-20171119t055606630z

✌Peace, Lots of 💏Love & Plenty Cheers 👏!

techslut (70) · 7 years ago

Replied, upvoted, followed. <3

$0.00

dj123 (60) · 7 years ago

Thank you for the feedback @techslut. I appreciated you reading this, I'm new here and I really identify with these good posters, wanted to show my support by not holding back on my replies.

Yeah, maybe I should just stop writing such long ones in replies (wrong forum I presume....but it was intended as support and feedback for @liberosist than anything else....and I'm not sure how else todo it to show support besides buying Steem to vote, which I plan todo shortly)

mrblu (62) · 7 years ago

this vote buying is just like politics,in order to go on the top on election, just to elected on the position some political personnel will welling to pay to buy some votes to the people..its under corruption. this is only my opinion on the topic..

thomasfarley (48) · 7 years ago

I don't think vote buying is that much of an issue, I understand what the problems are but most of the time it is usually people with better quality content that do the vote buying, it less likely that people with bad content are going to pay for their post because they know it requires not effort. Some of the voting whales are facing troubles at the moment anyway, Randowhale for instance. Thank you for the post!

$0.00

oropeso (36) · 7 years ago

Medium.com, the nearest analogue for steemit I can think of, doesn't seem to have a problem with vote-buying.

$0.00

noly (59) · 7 years ago

I agree with you for the most part. It is really hard for new users to gain any following. I've managed 60+ followers thus far. Had some articles on the Hot list before but I don't believe any of them have ever hit 'Trending' which is no big deal.

I have used paid votes to try to boost my post exposure maybe 2 or 3 times, but I didn't have enough money in my account for it to make a difference anyway (all of my earnings have gone to SP besides like $7.).

I do agree that the paid upvotes give a scammy appearance to Steemit. If not scammy then a sort-of 'elitist' view of it where the people with money are the ones that get seen. But, I guess the free market is kind of working itself out with these flag wars. Kinda curious to see what effect this will have in the end.

$0.00

oropeso (36) · 7 years ago

YouTube rates content by views. Medium rates what % of the content has been read. Steemit giving bots a simple button to click on makes it too simple. Some witnesses and whales are directly involved in selling votes, in direct violation of steemit's own rules. Like congressmen getting lobbyist's money, they have perverse incentives to maintain the status quo, or kill the rule, rather than fix this problem.

$0.00

spinx23 (51) · 7 years ago

I am so new at this that I still don't even understand how it all works. Thank you for making this post, this is very helpful. I will follow.

$0.00

steemcenterwiki (59) · 7 years ago

Thanks for sharing! Links to your post were included in the Steem.center wiki articles about Curation and Upvotes Bots. Thanks and good luck again!!

$0.00

didarulselim (47) · 7 years ago

your fact list nice, your point nice

$0.00

danyelk (69) · 7 years ago (edited)

I am not a big fan of buying upvotes but I do it because I am working 3-6 hours on my posts nearly every day and without buying me an upvote I would earn almost nothing. In this way I can't make a lot SBD because I am using them for the upvotes I am buying. But at least I am getting some SP in this way which I can use to give higher upvotes on other peoples posts.

$0.00

nasrud (64) · 7 years ago

I myself see it like this. Bots belong to someone who has spent capital to enrich themselves. Imagine many people sending them SBD / steem regardless of the quality of the content. Shameful, or qualified, they do not care about it, provided that the payout is sufficient according to the standards they have set.

also, in my opinion, bots have damaged the reputation of the content, it should not be useful content is not in the tranding topic, but because of the work of bots that provide full SP power so that in a short time post is in the hot topic category.

Bots just make some lazy steemians use their creativity. lazy to create long-term content. Aplagi expect quality. No, bot users, generally do not care about the quality of their content.

it's me.

regards @nasrud

$0.00

steeminator3000 (74) · 7 years ago

Finally people taking action

$0.00

moorkedi (57) · 7 years ago

maksat burda oldugumuz belli olsun üşedim okumaya :D

$0.00

bitgeek (62) · 7 years ago

Congratulations @liberosist, this post is the second most rewarded post (based on pending payouts) in the last 12 hours written by a Superhero or Legend account holder (accounts hold greater than 100 Mega Vests). The total number of posts by Superhero and Legend account holders during this period was 27 and the total pending payments to posts in these categories was $807.30. To see the full list of highest paid posts across all accounts categories, click here.

If you do not wish to receive these messages in future, please reply stop to this comment.

$0.00

jeanpi1908 (63) · 7 years ago

I totaly agree with what you are saying. You made a good sumary of the thing.

$0.00

creatovert (58) · 7 years ago

This made me think... I was thinking of buying votes in the near future... Now I don't think I'll do that. Thank you for your insights!

$0.00

ellamaeamor (43) · 7 years ago

No one is here to support the vote seller like minnowbooster because they are suddenly caught in the basket. Couldn't escape.

$0.00

mrkstn1 (51) · 7 years ago

Good read..... Thanks for your post

$0.00

dhimanyog (34) · 7 years ago

Thanks for sharing such Useful Info!!

$0.00

dhouse (57) · 7 years ago

It's not reasonable to ask people to just stop, if it is profitable, legal, and not against any rules. The only solution is a solution that is part of the blockchain system itself.

$0.00

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

It's reasonable for anyone to express their opinion however they want. Just like in the real world, law does not cover etiquette or ethics, the same is true for a social platform based on a blockchain.

$0.00

dhouse (57) · 7 years ago

Law doesn't cover ethics in the real world? Uhhhhhhhhh, you might want to think about this a bit more

$0.00

dhouse (57) · 7 years ago

In the real world, if there is a legal way to make good money, you bet people are gonna do it and ain't no one gonna stop them. Same thing here. You can shake your first at the sky all day long but it's not going to accomplish anything. Blockchains work because they correctly incentivize people.

$0.00

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago (edited)

I must live in a vastly different world from you. I'll go back to reading about EA's very legal but very devious addition of microtransactions in Battefront II. Which caused a massive backlash from the consumers, and ultimate EA canceling all microtransactions.

So I'm afraid there's no discussion to be had here. If you want to blindly accept your land's flawed laws, feel free. I'll stand up and protest for what I feel is right, particularly as throughout history protests have proven to be very successful. Thanks for your thoughts.

PS: This is particularly true of Steem. There have been many hardforks that have completely turned the blockchain rules on its head. I might add I have personally supported and campaigned for many of these changes.

$0.00

dhouse (57) · 7 years ago

"...EA canceling all microtransactions..."

Don't you get it, there is no equivalent of EA here. Who are you directing your protests at? There is no government or authority or company that owns the Steem blockchain. Who do you expect to listen to your protests and what do you expect them to do?

$0.00

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago (edited)

I suppose I need to spell it out for you -

My post was targeted at:

Minnow Booster and other organisations that provide the services much like EA.
Encourage curators and curation groups. Consider them to be startups or sole proprietorships that can challenge establish organisations who offer a questionable service (EA).
Witnesses who form the governance on the Steem blockchain. It is an appeal to developers and witnesses to take notice of the flaws, devise solutions, and implement them in future hardforks. (If you see the roadmap post, people already are suggesting solutions to some of these issues)

I assume you're new to Steem and don't understand how it works. I and others have had a lot of success in campaigning for new hard forks, and we shall continue doing so. Some of the major changes we have brought about are the change from hyperinflation in HF16, the move to linear rewards in HF19, and soon, easy account sign up in HF20.

$0.00

dhouse (57) · 7 years ago

Ok. Good. I agree with you.

You just shifted gears quite quickly though. It was not at all apparent that you were campaigning for a hard fork. You don't mention it once in your post. In fact, it was the opposite: it was very clear that you were simply asking people to stop and I was arguing that a hard fork was the only solution the whole time. And now suddenly you are telling me I don't know how steem works?

I also don't particularly appreciate the passive aggressiveness and snarkiness, especially given your stated enthusiasm for etiquette.

$0.00

liberosist (70) · 7 years ago

Ha, I was just responding the same tone as you, assuming you would be comfortable with it. I apologise though, didn't mean to cause any offense.

fixedbydoc (63) · 7 years ago

thanks for the info. being new here it is hard to know what to do...

$0.00

janvanhoess (52) · 7 years ago

A review of vote buying. buying what.

JANVANHOESS

$0.00

carlgnash (69) · 7 years ago (edited)

Great post @liberosist, and on a subject I have been thinking about posting on for a while. I think part of the issue is that the average newcomer to Steem has almost no understanding of how the curation reward system works, in part because they think they have no incentive to understand how it works.

"I have next to no SP and can't possibly make any money on curation rewards, so why do I care how it works?" - this pretty much sums up my attitude toward the subject my first few months on the platform.

Unfortunately this contributes a great deal to vote buying - authors do not understand that they are giving any potential curation reward (or the lion's share of it anyway) to the vote buying service. Buying a $1 self upvote on your post within the first hour of publishing it makes it much less likely that a curator will upvote and resteem the post - and it doesn't do more than a blip in terms of increasing post visibility. I think if beginning authors understood this they would be less likely to buy small self-upvotes.

$0.00

projections (47) · 7 years ago

Love your point on Section2 of your post where you mentioned about Reddit and Twitter (would add Instagram and Facebook)
'that Steem connects the creators directly with the audiences, without the middlemen (producers) who often stumble in misunderstanding the demands of the audience'...
This is so true. Producers often in those platforms uses what they call 'The Social Staff', employed (remuneration paid) individuals with the tasks to post everyday into (twitter, instagram or facebook timeline) in the name of mainstream 'artists' - directors, pop stars or film stars (which has a high number of followers) and are not even interested in 'socialize' with their public directly then (and it happens several times, I mean everyday, right now) the supposedly 'artist' to show off as a 'cool' person who does not care about social media networks, does an interview (looking at the cameramen) with the expression: -Sorry I don't even know my Instagram, Facebook or Twitter address. What is it? ...The Plastic People as I would say.

$0.00

dhani-singh (25) · 7 years ago

Can't be more agree. Great article.

$0.00

aggroed (78) · 7 years ago

I think you probably should have thought of before HF19. I think my response is don't hate the player hate the game. The reason this exists is the change to linear rewards and the voting 40x-->10x. The thing you are now posting about that you don't like was exactly caused by the changes you were promoting.

Telling someone to stop using the service is crazy. Practically all those directly involved make money and the only expense is the network as a whole. If they stop using the service it's not like the profit goes away. There's a whole steem ecosystem that's interested in using the service. Not using it on good posts simply makes it so shit posts win the day.

You're basically proposing to pick fights that offer 100K+ SP accounts. that's also a pretty crazy idea.

You're better off proposing some changes to the steem blockchain away from the madness you were in favor of with a statement like "Hey, maybe I was wrong about all the changes I helped influence to happen."

$0.02

$0.00

globetrottergcc (61) · 7 years ago

Nice explanation and you have proved your point of view quite effectively and I support, acknowledge and second you. Preferably, its better to be focused on something valuable rather than making this platform as a mere money game. Vote buying is not the solution at all to get noticed and going. Though mostly people take advantage of such services in order to boost their posts yet could only be good and wise if done rather occasionally rather than making it a habit. This would be like when you buy a vote, you make something and when you don't you make nothing comparable. An audience building is rather a better strategy, yes it takes time and effort as a matter of fact. At the end of the day its so rewarding.

$0.00

cryptopie (81) · 7 years ago

Sir @liberosist I am just here to request for your curation to my blog if you so wish to do it for a donation for me.
Thank you.

$0.00

tusharvasave (52) · 7 years ago

Ewll explained, great information. You done good work on steemit. Keep it up.well done.

$0.00

torico (63) · 7 years ago

someone pointed to this post as a good analysis, so i am late to weigh in. truthfully, i can see both sides. investors may vote without bidbots, but bots are their way to make profit. what is needed is an analysis of how much they make without a bot and with a bot to see what they actually earn versus a minnow.

the other factor is curation. only so many curators can find good content. theres not an endless pool of good content pouring in to support all the potential curators. also, for the time involved, the payout really isnt all that. another thing is that curie needs to widen their gaze, because discriminatory curating that rewards one person $100 and 5 other articles whose author is out of some parameter $0 stinks.

im wondering what an equal split on all well done articles without the stringent parameters would look like. 20 articles at $5 each gives 20 people incentive to write better instead of one person. spread the love. this is why people resort to bots, because their good work is going unnoticed.

another point is... make a curation for articles that arent 4k words or more. not everyone has time to do in depth research or write a long ass article. they have kids, jobs, etc. art especially takes time to create, yet little time to evaluate. creating a curation for good but not great work will pull more people in to making better posts if they see if can be profitable without the upvote.

until you make writing a good post for curation more viable, bots will continue to sell votes. not all the people who buy upvotes are shit posters.

$0.00

abh12345 (76) · 7 years ago (edited)

A few slightly contradictory points if I may.

I have been buying votes via the bid-bots for a while, not always with success but there is a feel good factor seeing a blog over $5 that i'm struggling to escape from.

Approach whales to delegate (or follow) their unused SP. Make deals with them so you can send them (or they send you, in case of following) a percentage of your curation rewards.

I've been requesting leased SP (for all the curation rewards + publicity) as a footer on my blogs for a little while now, as I think if delegations were given to willing curators and monitored, instead of heading to bid-bots, the platform would be growing in a much better fashion.

If/when the floodgates open, we are going to need many more people/teams than @curie, @ocd, @muxxybot, etc. It seems obvious to me that the SP gained by whales will grow the quickest if delegated out to 100's of eyes.

I live in hope... and promise no more bots at 65.

$0.00

dhouse (57) · 7 years ago (edited)

All these posts discussing what "should" be happening here are appealing but ultimately futile. There's a reason for laws and governance, which is something that is kinda sorted accepted by humanity as a whole and has been for quite some time.

But steem only has the rules that are set on the blockchain. Don't you all understand that?? There is no one that can enforce anything here. There are no owners, no one with any authority. If there isn't a hard fork with changes to the algorithms in the blockchain, vote buying and self voting et all will continue forever. People generally are not totally altruistic.

If you don't see that, you are deluding yourself.

$0.00