And here was his response

smooth (70) · 5 years ago

I'm mildly in favor of the 4 weeks. I don't think it is that big a deal either way. But I do strongly disagree with this:

Part of what makes Steem a community is that people can't just up and leave

What makes a strong community is that people can leave but choose not to. They renew their ties every day when they decide to stay. A "community" where people can't leave is a cult or a prison.

$2.57

14 votes

cryptopassion (79) · 5 years ago

Fully agree with that. We are not in a bank system where we have to beg to have back our money... Why not put in place something similar to tezos where you need to wait 1 month before your delegation or power up here starts to produce interest. Like that people are free to have back all their money when they want it but they have also reason to avoid power down

$0.21

4 votes

thecryptodrive (70) · 5 years ago

Amen to this:

A "community" where people can't leave is a cult or a prison.

$0.00

me-tarzan (80) · 5 years ago

Dear @smooth I have been targeted by @buildawhale and he is downvoting my posts to nothing . I have posted here on steemit every day since I joined steemit in July 2016 and invested a lot of money in this and if this sort of thing is allowed to continue then steemit will never recover .
Here is what I wrote him to ask him to stop and then I will show you his response .

To @buildawhale

I do not post anything offensive and do not bother anyone .

Please leave me alone or I will power down and leave Steemit as so many others have done from these " down voting plagues."

As you well know, Steemit is declining in active accounts . As long as this type of down voting continues , Steemit has no chance of ever returning to its former glory .

It is beyond my understanding as to why you want to destroy Steemit .

Who in their right mind would ever put any money in Steemit when someone like you can come along and destroy their investment ?

I have invested money and time in this and the money was before people could down vote someone and not use some of their own voting power to do the down vote . Just look what has happened to the active accounts since the last hard-fork : I hate to say this , but If Steemit does not fix this soon , this site is doomed.

Remember the Golden Rule : " Do unto others as you would have them do unto you " . Would you really want someone with millions of Steem Power to down vote your posts to oblivion ? I think not .

And here was his response

$0.00

enforcer48 (68) · 5 years ago

Yeah, that's problem.

You don't do anything. You are just a mini-Haejin.

$0.00

smooth (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

Just look what has happened to the active accounts since the last hard-fork

What happened after the last hardfork is that the long-running decline in active accounts, posts, etc. slowed down a bit, but not dramatically. Recently some measures of activity have been on a bit of a rebound, though it is probably too soon to say how significant or sustainable it might be.

I'm not and can't be responsible for how someone else votes.

$0.00

me-tarzan (80) · 5 years ago

@smooth thank you for your reply

$0.00

smooth (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

The instant power down concept, regardless of the cost/burn, destroys the security feature altogether. A hacker won't care about burning 5% or 20% or even 50%. Anyone who is hacked will lose all their funds instantly.

Also, proposing that people invest without powering up is ignoring the cumulative cost of Steem's high inflation. If you are day trading you don't care about inflation, but few serious longer-term investors can (or will) really accept an extra 8% per year for the "privilege" of investing in Steem, especially over a longer term holding period. That would be like paying an 8%/year management fee, which is almost unheard of.

$0.73

17 votes

blockchainguides (46) · 5 years ago

You are spot on! At such as high rate, its ridiculous and a major tax on people.

$0.00

geekgirl (72) · 5 years ago

Respectfully, I find your arguments to keep long term SP contradictory for what you and Steem in general stand for. On one hand we want to give power back to people, on the other force them to lock up their funds. Doesn’t make sense. SP should be eliminated and Steem alone in the wallet can be used in a similar fashion as SP. Let the free market decide if people keep Steem here or take it to exchanges. Justifying 13 week SP with the purpose of keeping people and their funds here sounds authoritarian.

Sure people say if you want luxury of staying liquid you can do so, but that doesn’t make sense. Why would anybody be interested in buying and keeping liquid steem when inflation dilutes the value of steem and doesn’t let them participate in the economy in a meaningful way.

Perhaps its time to give the options for people to set the parameters as they like. If security is the concern, increase the lock up time for savings.

I don’t think Steem continuing to play a central bank kind of role is beneficial. Anything that lowers the power of witnesses and gives more power to users regarding funds would make steem more attractive as an investment. Until then we/steem will be stuck in this semi-centralized/semi-decentralized limbo.

$0.51

11 votes

fredrikaa (70) · 5 years ago

SP should be eliminated and Steem alone in the wallet can be used in a similar fashion as SP.

I've made this exact point repeatedly in various witness chats. It seems to me like a natural subject for the next fork post SMTs anyways. First to simplify things in the face of multiple new tokens that will otherwise be a mouthful for new users to wrap their heads around an already complicated platform. Second to judge whether or not inflation-derived rewards from stake-based voting should continue to exist on the main token once SMTs are here.

An ideal situation would look something like this: Steem Power and the STEEM savings account are both removed completely. You simply hold STEEM in your wallet. It can either be liquid (default) or locked for a specific time period. Carrying out actions that require the use of resource credits, or casting witness votes, will necessarily lock the required STEEM to be granted those resources, or the stake that you decide to support a witness with, for a given amount of time (to avoid abuse of resource credits by people who could otherwise swap STEEM from one account to another and take up the available bandwidth). Users can then also themselves lock their STEEM for any given amount of time specified by themselves as a means to add security.

This would simplify things by several orders of magnitude for any new user coming to Steem and wondering what they need to do in order to participate, and what is up with all these different names for basically the same token.. It would also allow for flexibility in terms of different users with a different wish for security versus liquidity being able to choose what they want without us needing to find a "middle ground" which in the end doesn't satisfy anyone.

Finally, we would not have this childish term "Steem Power", which may be cool for an SMT used in a gaming community, but isn't fit to describe the main resource powering an "enterprise-grade" blockchain.

Obviously, this requires a serious rework and a lot of discussions, which is why I believe it deserves its own fork rather than being lumped in with the long awaited SMT fork.

$0.20

5 votes

geekgirl (72) · 5 years ago

I like your ideas. I hope you will be able convince other witnesses. After SMTs Steem as a currency will have to take a different role to power the larger economy which may require better liquidity and flexibility for participants. I think Steem wallet is one of the best features of Steem, and removing SP would unleash its true power.

$0.00

theycallmedan (75) · 5 years ago

I agree with aggroed. But I am also a fan of a way to instantly power down + burn 5% as a fee to do so. Creates a sink, liquidity and is good for large investors who don’t want to be locked in a speculative asset with no way out for 13 weeks. I don’t like the idea of a 1 month power down as it does nothing for anyone. A month is still too long for a large investor to YOLO on(power up) and dosent satisfy a way to get out instantly.

$0.23

13 votes

jaki01 (74) · 5 years ago (edited)

... burn 5% as a fee to do so ...

That's a really interesting idea but doesn't change the fact that in case your account got hacked, with a shorter power down period the attacker could get a bigger portion of your STEEM before you would have the chance to change your keys.

Maybe 2 FA should be implemented in the long run.

Maybe there could be the option to determine save withdrawal addresses (white listed addresses)?

Also, wouldn't it be possible that every account holder had the option in his own account to either select a 4 or 13 week power down?

$0.75

8 votes

therealwolf (75) · 5 years ago

Also, wouldn't it be possible that every account holder had the option in his own account to either select a 4 or 13 week power down?

Absolutely. And keep in mind that 4 weeks and 13 weeks are random numbers. They have no meaning and the powerdown period in the future should be far more dynamic than that.

$0.06

thecryptodrive (70) · 5 years ago

ideally I would like the option to extend PD for certain long term savings accounts and have others in 4 weeks etc, but I don't see that being possible for this HF due to complexity, 4 week only is a simple number change.

$0.00

gadrian (66) · 5 years ago (edited)

If the 5% fee were to be implemented, I am more inclined to support it, if it were opt-in based. And the opt-in effect should be delayed (2 weeks, 30 days?) in order to prevent someone who compromises an account to opt-in and automatically withdraw. As for the destination of the fee, I'd allow options, regarding the destination: @steem.dao, @null, maybe @steemalliance if they can take this kind of funding.

But on the long term, I prefer the solution @therealwolf proposes with differentiated interest benefits, based on the duration of committed power up. With the possibility to have different "deposits" with different interests, kinda like at the bank. That doesn't exclude the possibility of implementing both.

Both are not the kind of easy fixes Steemit expects, like changing "13" with "4". Both will require some work and some code auditing afterwards, especially since we are dealing with wallet code changes.

$0.03

smooth (70) · 5 years ago

Anything is possible however if you take a look at the original post here, you will see that the change to 4 weeks is only being considered for the upcoming hardfork because the code change is trivial and low risk:

To implement this change, all that would be needed is to change that number from 13 to 4. Therefore, this change could be implemented without significantly delaying the SMT hardfork ...

Of course it is possible to discuss any other sorts of changes such as configurable power down time, but not within the context of something that is feasible to deploy soon.

$0.03

jaki01 (74) · 5 years ago (edited)

you will see that the change to 4 weeks is only being considered for the upcoming hardfork because the code change is trivial and low risk

Yes, @steemitblog wrote it was easy to implement, but the reasoning for considering it is also that there was support for that idea within the community:

We are very excited about the fact that such ideas are being proposed by the community ...

What I meant with "interesting idea" is the suggestion of @theycallmedan to burn a certain percentage of the STEEM always if anybody wants to initiate such a faster power down. So if one could fulfill the necessary security requirements (or if some people - I am not one of them - by their own choice optionally could accept a somewhat higher risk in exchange for a faster power down) that could be an interesting instrument to reduce the inflation of STEEM.

Thinking the idea to burn STEEM (whenever possible) is interesting doesn't mean I was supportiing the proposal for a shorter power down period (currentIy I am not).

$0.96

6 votes

smooth (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

Sorry, in case it wasn't clear I was answering the question in your last paragraph:

wouldn't it be possible that every account holder had the option in his own account to either select a 4 or 13 week power down?

by pointing out that, yes, it is certainly possible, but not possible within the constraints set forth for the current hard fork. It would have to go into a future one, probably in six months to a year. For this one, the options under consideration are simply 4 weeks or 13 weeks.

Your other ideas (2FA, whitelists, etc.) are also very good ones which should be considered in the future.

$0.09

russia-btc (60) · 5 years ago

I like the idea of white addresses to which I can get (this solves all security problems) speculators move the price in markets around the world, so we need them like air !!! 100%

$0.18

freddio (61) · 5 years ago

I dont like the idea of a burn. I dont see any benefit for Steem to do that.

Burn means Steem is not a valuable resource, otherwise it would be a donation for instant powerdown to Steem DAO.

If you need to burn token the design of the token is bad.

$0.00

jaki01 (74) · 5 years ago

I dont like the idea of a burn. I dont see any benefit for Steem to do that.

One of the reasons for the high bitcoin price is its scarcity, whereas STEEM still has a rather high inflation. In my opinion burning some STEEM helps to curb the negative effect of inflation on the value of STEEM - at least for now.

$0.60

freddio (61) · 5 years ago

dont get me wrong but with onboarding and more usecases we get the same effect in a more sexy way.

Steem is not Bitcoin.

If we remove current SBD from rewarding and make a Version like DAI out of it, we have the same effect beacause Steem get lockt up and less ( not control able) inflation.

And nice site effects like a real scalable 1$ pegged Coin on Steem.

I think things should be build for longterm and not for shortterm.

$0.05

jaki01 (74) · 5 years ago

dont get me wrong but with onboarding and more usecases we get the same effect in a more sexy way.

No problem, that you have a different point of view than me. I know what you mean, STEEM is not mainly (only) a value storage but also a fast and flexible blockchain with many possible use cases. Sure, there is a difference between STEEM and bitcoin, but for now we have no 'mass adoption', yet, just a crypto currency which is losing more and more of its value (which not only hurts current stake holders but also makes it less attractive for potential new investors).

I wrote "for now" I like the idea of burning STEEM, because I think that at least at the moment inflation, the fact that Steemit, Inc. is selling lots of STEEM and other reasons are causing an already long-lasting price decline pressure.

$0.00

berniesanders (77) · 5 years ago (edited)

Nobody is going to lock up coins knowing they have to take a 5% cut to get out quicker than 13 weeks, that's a losing proposition with Steem.

And you're wrong, a 1 month power down does more than "nothing" for true investors. Maybe you need a little more time in crypto to understand things before speaking about them.

$0.00

4 votes

dalz (68) · 5 years ago

How about an internal exchange SP to STEEM .... I believe this was mentioned before

$0.84

8 votes

ssjsasha (67) · 5 years ago

if someone compromises my account (somehow) the 5% burn for instant power down would be the last thing I want available

$0.22

8 votes

freddio (61) · 5 years ago

for hackers 10% ok too :D

$0.00

themagus (68) · 5 years ago

And you're wrong, a 1 month power down does more than "nothing" for true investors

Can you elaborate?

$0.00

freddio (61) · 5 years ago

Instant powerdown or 4 weeks are only if opt in.

Like:

" You want a less secure account and 4 weeks Powerdown press here (owner key required)"

Same with Instant Powerdown with fee.

But i would say the fee goes to DAO. So if the price pump DAO gets more funds, or use it for account tokens for onboarding.

useless burns would change nothing.

$0.00

mexbit (60) · 5 years ago

Good idea!!! But the fee should better be 30% for the instant power down instead of 5%!

$0.00

ethereumalist (51) · 5 years ago

That burn feature is a nice idea. It seems like its a flavor of the HEX token's "emergency unstake" feature, but yeah, would be good to see that option.

$0.10

valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago (edited)

"It happens anyway, but there's a bunch of people that'll post here up until the blockchain flatlines."

I don't think either of those metrics is appreciably affected by the contemplated difference in powerdown time.

"My guess is that there's more problems seeing the utility of Steem and getting in and out is a tiny side show."

Again, the difference in powerdown time makes little difference. That there is a lockin at all probably is far more relevant.

A while back I made an error that enabled a hacker to swipe all my liquid. Had there been no lockin I certainly would have lost all my SP as well. This was revelatory to me, and has moderated my opinion, which was previously completely opposed to the lockin. I see it more as a security measure now LOL. This brings me to the fee for faster powerdowns. It seems to me the security aspect of the powerdown time is obviated by that potential, as hackers would certainly be willing to burn as necessary to make a quick cash grab. Therefore I do oppose that.

Beyond that, I reckon your judgment far superior to mine in this regard. I have far too often demonstrated my ignorance disagreeing with you =p

Thanks!

$0.06

4 votes

ecoinstant (68) · 5 years ago

All of this. The answer is to change nothing about how this works now, because it is a security mechanism.

$0.09

jaydih (79) · 5 years ago (edited)

I agree with @aggroed. Also +5% burn for instant power down. But considering potential compromise from instant burn to powerdown as highlighted by @smooth, can we setup up a max cap for instant power down ? For instance maximum of 10%(TBD) of your SP can be instantly powered down with 5% burn with cool down time of 30 days for the next use thus if you want to use another instant powerdown you need to pass 30days from the last instant powerdown date.

Time to time people will need some urgency of liquid funds in their life regardless of how much they love about steem. Life is no guarantee. ;)

$0.05

jenkinrocket (64) · 5 years ago

Agreed on almost all points. Even if we did want to change, the change should be much more conservative. From 13 to 10 weeks, for example.

Make incremental changes, observe results, and make further changes if necessary.

$0.02

allcapsonezero (61) · 5 years ago

Ya, 4 is a big jump from 13.

$0.00

bosman (52) · 5 years ago

"Part of what makes Steem a community is that people can't just up and leave". This is a good thing? So we will just keep other people's coins locked so they can't go? Why don't we increase it back to 104 weeks? Who cares about small users here on steemit when whales are the ones that are controlling everything.

Let the users decide if they want to stay or go. Create a better environment and they will definitely stay longer.

$0.00

blake.letras (54) · 5 years ago

Its a good thing when people have consented to it. Know anything about certificates of deposit? Locking your USD gets you more USD, because it is good for other people. In Steem you agree to lock up your STEEM for "powers" and it benefits others because you do it. This is a consensual relationship, you agreed to have your STEEM locked up, so don't go around calling it an attack on free will.

$0.10

marki99 (54) · 5 years ago

But the thing is that people NEVER leave when the token is going up in value, at most they sell a small part of their stake.

People leave only when the price is going down, way down. And this bear market has proved that people still powerdown, it doesn't keep them in.

At the same time, we are not allowing investors to panic sell. I know it's counter intuitive but we want them to panic sell so that they get rid of most of their stake at the lowest price possible.

Removing the powerdown will allow us to take a big punch whenever price capitulation happens and then recover quickly.

However, with this powerdown in place, selling pressure remains throughout a bear market, and that's a big part of why Steem fell in ranking on coinmarketcap.

Let the weak hands leave quickly so that they get replaced by strong hands quickly.

What needs fixing is the price of steem more than anything else, so let's take this into consideration and make it an instant powerdown, or make it an option (in case someone still wants the security it provides).

$0.00

blake.letras (54) · 5 years ago

You're wrong here. People do dump during a bull market, smart whales do. Imagine who this benefits most. It helps whales dump on the market and get out as price rises. This is not good for the little people that don't realize that their STEEM's value is about to plummet over night as a massive sell wall gets created. Giving whales this power will result in the inevitable death of Steem and leave poor people poorer.

$0.10

marki99 (54) · 5 years ago

Whales dump only part of their stake. If they dump everything, the coin will clearly stop going up in price.

$0.00

eternal.auction (46) · 5 years ago

That is one of the things we need to be cautious of. How can we know that certain whales are not pushing this 4 week shift because they want to dump everything and leave everyone else will greatly devalued STEEM? We wouldn't know until it was too late. 13 weeks on the other hand slows a whale's ability to dump all of their coins.

$0.08

marki99 (54) · 5 years ago

If they dump at this price then it's the best thing that could happen to steem. We are near all time lows.

$0.00

z8teyb289qav9z (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

"We all go to the same moon"??? Are you fucking serious??? What is this kumbaya bullshit?? This is fucking crypto, not some bullshit furry forum.

Burning wouldn't be required if there were actual use cases for Steem. The fact that we have to "burn" tokens is fucking absurd. Do you see ANY other LEGIT project doing that? No.

It just makes Steem look like the amateur playground it is.

$0.00

6 votes

blocktrades (74) · 5 years ago

Token burning has been used by too many crypto projects to even name. I can't believe, you're not aware of this, bernie/nextgencrypto. And why are you using such a lesser known identity for your posting of this?

$0.00

berniesanders (77) · 5 years ago (edited)

Because I was on that account doing some voting and didn't care enough to change accounts, not that it matters.

Any of the token burning you're referring to that has been successful was planned in advance and not used as a way to try to bandaid a broken system. I can't believe you're not aware of this, but, those weren't Larimer coins...

$0.00

enforcer48 (68) · 5 years ago

Just look at how Stellar did their burning...did nothing for their coin.

$1.30

18 votes

skepticology (57) · 5 years ago

"Part of what makes Steem a community is that people can't just up and leave."

You've created a prison, not a community.

$0.00

9 votes

futuremind (70) · 5 years ago

"Came for the rewards, stayed for the,... wait.. no.. we're being held hostage."

$0.46

geekgirl (72) · 5 years ago

lol

$0.00

jerrytsuseer (67) · 5 years ago

There you go!

$0.00

eternal.auction (46) · 5 years ago

Saying a 13 week power down is a "prison" is like calling a business contract a prison. People can't say they are being forced when they knew the terms to an agreement before hand and then agreed to participate.

You're on Steem, which means that you are a willing participant. No one is forcing you to be here, and no one is forcing you to write or curate on Steem. So, you have consented to the 13 week staking system because you decided you wanted to participate in the game mechanics of Steem.

$0.08

eirik (69) · 5 years ago

Exactly.

$0.00

tngflx (61) · 5 years ago

People should be able to leave and stay as they please. You shouldn't force someone to wait 13 week just to leave the platform or even for legit business to get their earnings faster. If steem here to stay , time will tell. if not, this might just hasten the destruction of steem. Steem needs more value to attract more people using it.

$0.00

freddio (61) · 5 years ago

@aggroed if i want power but also be liquid i can lease Steem, where is the problem....

So i spend some Steem for a delagtion and big part can be liquid.

Easy wallet creation is a bigger problem. Because i dont care as a investor about power down, if i dont have a wallet right?

$0.00

cryptictruth (62) · 5 years ago

I’d vote for the burn over a change to the actual power down schedule. Good idea @aggroed

$0.00

bozz (70) · 5 years ago

Sorry I didn't realize you had already touched on this. I think a 10% burn fee to power down faster would be a good idea if they decided to move forward with this.

$0.00

richq11 (72) · 5 years ago

I agree... it also gives the larger share-holders the ability to negatively affect the value of Steem by powering down more rapidly.

$0.00

eternal.auction (46) · 5 years ago

That is what I think too

$0.08

sidsun (57) · 5 years ago

Thumbs up to Instant power down for a fee. This is crypto and let's not try and be communists. Give people the right to choose to exit. This is fundamental.

$0.00

blocktrades (74) · 5 years ago

It's not about communism. People can exit under the current system. The delays in place are a strong protection for active participants in the system. People who just want to speculate can hold their funds in an unpowered state, probably on an exchange, where their safety (or lack thereof) is determined by the exchange anyways. But active voters (powered up participants) are responsible for their own funds, and the powerdown delay has saved many people from losing all their funds.

$2.50

9 votes

kendrahill (41) · 5 years ago (edited)

$0.02

blocktrades (74) · 5 years ago

Could you clarify exactly whose incompetence you're referring to here? Are you saying new users are incompetent for losing their funds? Or do you mean that devs are not competent enough to make this change, but are afraid it's technically difficult, so are hiding behind this as an excuse? Because if the latter, it should be pointed out that devs have already said this is an easy change to make, from a technical perspective.

$0.00

allcapsonezero (61) · 5 years ago

Safety is often used to sell something to the ignorant while keeping other agendas private.

$0.00

cnstm (69) · 5 years ago

Strongly Agree. We feel that what is more important now is SMTs, launch them, and then promote them. SMTs are of great value. We visited a lot of community owners in China and they really wanted something like this. But at the same time, they need simpler settings and a better client experience.

$0.00