Why I Avoid "HF21 Flagging" So Far.

hitmeasap (71) in steem • 5 years ago

2.5 free flags or downvotes per day is cool. I think they can and eventually will be used in good ways to prevent "reward pool rape" and they will be used to reduce rewards from low/poor quality content and I also believe that they will be used to limit shitposters from getting extreme payouts, eventually. (We have already seen results!)

@theycallmedan has recently announced that he will put in hard work to achieve these goals with his "rekt" list, and he has got a lot of support from others who jumped in immediately. Especially after he offered people upvotes for spotting spam and bid-bot abuse.

These are obviously good intentions, and I appreciate the effort, but personally, I think the outcome has already started to look like a "witch hunt" in many ways... And that is also why I have decided to avoid these things before I see what type of standards there will be in place.

With Great Power Comes...?

What I don't like, and the reason I think this already has started to look like some sort of stupid "witch hunt" is due to the fact that many users seems to be flagged for doing practically the same thing as well-known and established users are doing... But the latter is not being punished for it.

The mindset & mission for this whole "flagging-operation" is very simple, but both confusing and difficult to understand at the same time.

We want to reduce the rewards for:

Low/poor quality content that has multiple Bid-bot votes.

But, we also want to reduce the rewards on content that has little engagement (articles that have few replies & comments), and we want to reduce the rewards on short-ish posts that doesn't involve "so much effort". Because truth is, that many of those posts are considered to be of low quality.

This is where things are starting to be really complicated, even though these things are very easy to understand at first sight.

Let me give you some examples:

(Taken from @theycallmedans post)

User: crystalliu

This is clearly spam, and this user is buying votes for some of those posts. This is a clear case of "minimum effort/maximum reward", or an attempt of it. This should obviously not be rewarded. Downvote!

User: taifkhan

This is where it starts to become complicated, according to me.

@abh12345 said this:

Anything by taifkhan will do nicely, no engagement (apart from downvoters stating reasons) and some posts in the $80 - $90 range.

We all know that I love Asher so this is nothing personal against him, and I would actually agree with him on this, 100%, if the same would apply for everyone. - But more on that later.

Asher also wrote a comment on one of the posts:

"I'm here for the lack of positive engagement on any of these posts.
taifkhan - Your content is seemingly unappreciated by the community in its current state. The posts regularly hit trending, but receive next to no engagement. Doesn't this tell you something?"

That being said, Asher doesn't necessarily want this type of content to have less rewards, it's about the engagement. That basically means that the content or author doesn't bring much attention (judging by the comments/replies) so he does not deserve trending-posts.

And why is this complicated?

Everyone talks about rewarding quality, so we shouldn't reward authors for being who they are. That's the first problem I see, because this is literally exactly what people are doing. We reward friends, family etc. more than others.

Secondly, the type of content should not be judged, as we have different tastes. Some people like gameplays and others don't. So we shouldn't reward authors based on the type of content, but the actual quality of it.

So, how can someone who does not like gaming, reward gaming content in the first place? They can't see the difference between high or low quality.

Having said that, we get to the next thing on the list: engagement.

I watch streamers several hours per week on Twitch for instance, but I never chat. I watch hours of YouTube videos on a daily basis, but I don't subscribe to channels or leave comments.

Steem is also not a very "social" place anymore in general, even though that is what we want to change...

Personally, I have very mixed results when I publish things:

As you can see, mixed results.

My gaming highlights or stream posts for instance, they often generate 0 comments. More than often, probably 9.9 out of 10 times. Am I not allowed to earn from those posts?

Look at the article second from the top, a bunch of more comments... right? It's 36 comments more than on my gaming-related posts. But, I earned less...

Now, this might not be a problem in my case, because I haven't bought votes for any of those posts...

But where is the line between having too much paid votes and not?
How much am I allowed to earn? And who can I ask?

Am I supposed to ask the people who already flagged me because I had "too little engagement"?

What if I had become close friends with a handful of whales? I could basically have earned anything from $10-$100 due to auto-votes and my relation with those whales, right?

It's time for the last example:

User: gooddream

More or less the same payouts on each post. A couple of comments and/or replies on each of the posts. Posts that I personally would consider to be of rather good quality, comparing to many others I have seen with similar rewards.

Now, from what I can see, gooddream haven't received any flags (so far), but he was mentioned in the "Spam/Bid-bot Abuse!"-article from theycallmedan.

How much am I allowed to earn, in whatever way I want, if I get

1 comment?
10 comments?
100 comments?

And is engagement what actually matters here, or are we talking about the type of content? Should I have received more for my article with 36 comments than the one with 0? Would it have been okay to buy votes for 50 SBD on that one? How about all the artists that are spending hours on a drawing? How about that one guy who spends 9 days on a vacation and takes hundreds of photos... Should he be rewarded something for one single photo with just a short sentence or not? More importantly, how much are they allowed to buy votes for?

And, perhaps the biggest questions of them all...

How much is enough?

How much are users allowed to earn before they will be put on the "rekt" list? How much are you allowed to buy votes for? And how do you measure the overall value? Would it be okay for someone who earned $1 to buy votes for $10?

Honestly speaking, gooddream, (the last example) has been doing this for a long period of time, in an attempt to grow his stake etc... Just like all the @ocdb users did. Most @ocdb users probably spent more than gooddream on votes too... So, I fail to see the problem.

What is bid-bot abuse?

I can totally understand that spam and duplicate content would be bid-bot abuse, but what about my streaming posts, and what about that 30 minute long DTube interview with only 3 comments but 50 viewers. How much are they worth, or allowed to earn?

#NewSteem is far from perfect and we have a long way ahead of us, but I am here, ready to learn, adapt and thrive with all of you... But I seriously need some better "guidelines", so I know what I am allowed to do and not..

Truth to be told...
I think everyone would benefit from it.

steem newsteem palnet neoxian funwithflags

5 years ago by hitmeasap (71)

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bashadow (65) · 5 years ago

Guidelines those things you step over around or walk under, just prior to the whole tower falling down on top of you.

Something broke on HF21, so HF22 is going to fix it, but it had nothing to do with the down vote pool.

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2 votes

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hitmeasap (71) · 5 years ago

Yeah, I heard about that, I'm glad they've been putting in effort to quickly solve it though. This isn't so much about the down vote pool or that flags will reduce rewards as much as who to flag though, because I can seriously not understand how this would work long term under these circumstances.

We need clearer instructions and/or guidelines to follow, otherwise, this will continue and quickly become a large pile of bs. And I have already seen some signs of that.

Also, due to the new reward changes, any flag I do, will benefit the already large accounts even more, as it will basically free up more rewards they can earn for their content instead... And, it could ultimately cost me even more in the long haul, due to potential retaliation flags from authors I have flagged.

So, under these given circumstances...
Nope. I'm not likely to flag anything.

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gooddream (82) · 5 years ago

And, it could ultimately cost me even more in the long haul, due to potential retaliation flags from authors I have flagged.

And because of this no big account that probably does deserve to be flagged ever will be in any sort of meaningful capacity.

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hitmeasap (71) · 5 years ago

My exact thoughts. It's easy to go after smaller accounts, that doesn't hurt the wallets as much... And the funny thing is, that fulltimegeek amongst only a handful of other people flagged people before HF21, and they sacrificed their own rewards by doing that...

Now, when people suddenly have free downvotes, people are more interested to "change" things. Honestly speaking, free downvotes feels like the perfect thing to add along with the reward changes, as larger accounts will have even more to win.

Not saying it's the reason for these two things to come in at the same time though... But it feels pretty logical to me.

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bashadow (65) · 5 years ago

People did not follow the steemit guidelines for down votes prior to the free down votes, I really do not understand how they think anyone would follow guidelines just because of the free down votes.

I think in the two years I have down voted twice, both for plagiarism. I don't see my habits changing at this point.

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metzli (64) · 5 years ago

What broke? When Hardfork 22?

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bashadow (65) · 5 years ago

The steemitblog post said they could not delegate SP to new accounts. HF22 is expected to be done tomorrow/today at 11 AM EDT 8-29-2019. At least that seemed to be the time they were mentioning.

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gooddream (82) · 5 years ago (edited)

Thanks for writing this. I agree with everything you wrote and not just because I am featured on it.

I try to encourage more dialogue but some things, like when i review a video game or a film... what sort of dialogue can we really have? Especially when i discourage spoilers in the comments section. I have made a few political posts and those encourage dialogue but really, people get too worked up about that stuff so i tend to stay away from it.

My story is one that every Steemian dreams of... I was writing for a few cents here, a few cents there and then lo' and behold, one day I caught the eye of a powerful account, and then several others who decided to promote my stuff. I do no know these people and i have only received a comment from one of them... ONCE. So some powerful accounts like my stuff.... isn't that exactly what curation is? The payouts are the same(ish) on almost every post because a vast majority of it comes from those big players.

I have never used a bidbot and I always make sure that my content is original and at least somewhat interesting. Like your comments about making videogame posts, I don't entertain any notion that EVERYONE is going to be interested in what I am talking about.

I also am extremely active in the community and reward anyone who makes even a somewhat coherant response on my stuff. I also check out their stuff and if it is good, i follow and "curate" them.

I think that if the downvote lynch mob wants to go after me there will be nothing i can do to stop it... but I believe there are much more worthy targets for this rage.

Sorry that was long, but i went on a long bike ride yesterday and had a lot of time to think about it. Anyway, great article... I would say that even if my name hadn't been in it because it is true. I am joining you in not downvoting as well.

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2 votes

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hitmeasap (71) · 5 years ago

I have not included the "@" when I mentioned you or the other two examples in this post, and I did that on purpose to avoid the notifications going out.

Perhaps I could've used an even better example, as you haven't received any flags (so far), but I wanted to use you as an example because I know that you have been doing pretty much the same thing for a very long period of time, I have talked with you previously, and you were also involved in some of the "push people"-initiatives in the past... I know that you respond and reward others etc.

That being said, I basically wanted to use you, (your rewards, the engagement etc), as an example because if you would start to get downvoted, this whole thing would be bs, if others wouldn't be treated the same...

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gooddream (82) · 5 years ago

it's fine man. I don't mind being showcased in this thing. I didn't want to write it about myself and yes, nothing has happened yet. I suppose we'll have to wait and see :)

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deadspace (69) · 5 years ago

Don't worry, if any mobs try to come after you they'll be getting some daily shots of goatse from me, baby. Preferably while I have a middle aged Japanese man electrocuting my nipples. Just to make it extra spicy.

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gooddream (82) · 5 years ago

well if that doesn't scare off literally everone, i don't know what will. 😋

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deadspace (69) · 5 years ago

Well, I wasn't hoping to scare them. More just entice them to pay for my gamerdude nudes on Patreon. Maybe offer them some of my shower water to boot.

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gooddream (82) · 5 years ago

i hear showerwater is all the rage these days. $30 a bottle, right?

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deadspace (69) · 5 years ago

Those are some pussyboi numbers. We're talking about 100 percent pure gamerboi water. We're easily talking about $2800 per bottle.

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newageinv (70) · 5 years ago

Interesting that engagementbis wanted yet it feels that the incentive to engage has been reduced with the changes as I cannot seem to provide enough value for upvoting comments.

Posted using Partiko iOS

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1 vote

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hitmeasap (71) · 5 years ago

I am not sure if this is the case or not, and it might be a little too early to judge, but it looks like upvotes for comments have decreased, and I guess it's due to the reward changes. You don't earn as much curation rewards while upvoting comments... So, if that is the case, we are literally trying to encourage and increase overall engagement by rewarding it less...

I'm sure I'm not the only one thinking that it's a pretty dumb idea.

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steevc (73) · 5 years ago

Downvotes, as with upvotes, are a personal choice. Of course some people vote strategically for profit, but others actually apply proof of brain to reward good content as Steem was intended to be. There are plenty of obvious abusers. Some will say they didn't think it was wrong to but lots of votes, but there are no rules here and the community gets to decide what has value. Now they have more power to do that.

I will continue to assess each case I see before downvoting.

What we need to beware of is ending up with a trending page that is just about Steem. It should have a good mix of content as it's the first thing new visitors see. The big accounts ought to reconsider giving themselves big votes.

I've already seen people crying that this is censorship, but it is just reward redistribution. They cannot make as much from buying votes now anyway. They should try building a real following. That takes work, but so it should if you expect to earn.

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1 vote

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hitmeasap (71) · 5 years ago

"I've already seen people crying that this is censorship, but it is just reward redistribution. They cannot make as much from buying votes now anyway. They should try building a real following. That takes work, but so it should if you expect to earn."

Well, I do agree with you. The idea is good. People shouldn't buy a shit ton of votes for crap...

But, I can honestly not understand how this is supposed to benefit any other accounts than the larger ones. Lesser accounts, (not established ones) already earns less nowadays, except from curation, but truth is, curation rewards for someone with ~100 SP doesn't yield much results.

However, each downvote, will free up some extra rewards that are being redistributed, so others can earn that piece of the pie instead. A good idea, but who will earn those rewards? - The larger accounts. Those with 20+ Steem rewards on their content already...

This is done to make a better looking trending page. - Sure. But I miss to see how that will benefit anyone but the already established accounts. Especially now when upvotes on comments seems to have decreased too. Feels like we're pissing on the poor once again, and that is the exact opposite of what should be done.

I might have missed things, and things might not have stabilized yet after the HF, but so far, it doesn't look good to me. At all. Not when a "witch hunt" has started to reduce rewards for authors who've been working hard for a long time. Regardless if they have bought votes or not, while doing it.

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steevc (73) · 5 years ago

There's no perfect system and style will lose out. I do okay, but then I've put in loads of work to build up connections. It will be harder for new people, but that's inevitable. I do what I can to get rewards to smaller accounts who earn them. We need to give this change some time before we can really judge the impact.

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hitmeasap (71) · 5 years ago

"We need to give this change some time before we can really judge the impact."

That is obviously very true and I realize that I might not have stressed that enough. I basically judge the things I have seen so far (which isn't very long), and also based upon my own interpretations.

Hopefully, things will turn out okay and I also wish that I will see enough positive impact to reduce my skepticism.

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cwow2 (65) · 5 years ago

Thats also my problem. What is bid-bot abuse?
I mainly post actifit post and thats it. It hits around 0.3-0.4$ daily unless Actifit comes in with their big bought vote and gives my posts 1$ vote. Is that bid-bot abuse since its on a actifit post?
What about people with a lot of sbi shares, those are also bought votes x)

And if I use 1-5 steem on one of my post from tipu which is actifit will that be bid-bot abuse during to it not being quality?

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1 vote

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cwow2 (65) · 5 years ago

Ye. I can understand that too. But 5 steem? From one bot, I wouldn't call that abuse x)

Ye. The witch hunt is maybe going to be shit x)

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2 votes

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hitmeasap (71) · 5 years ago

I think that is a very good question actually. It's obviously easy to understand that if you bought votes for 200 sbd in total on your actific post, that would be called bid-bot abuse. It's not like I am stupid, I understand that too.

What I am concerned about, is the "witch hunt". That people are starting to go after authors just for the sake of using flags. Because if and when that happens (which already seems to have happened to some extent), we're going in the wrong direction with this.

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cicisaja (66) · 5 years ago

Don't people realise that sometimes "engagement bounty hunter" can make a non-standart article become popular? I was so much into engagement last year to get some prize, but it's not fun anymore, then I stop. Right after I stop engaging like crazy on other posts, the comments on my posts still the same😂 2 or 3 comments only. Im not posting a good quality and standart article according to who? and I want to stay on steemit.

what can i do?

I'd love to downvote some post, but then I think the posters have the same problem like me, we're not authors, just trying to share what we like and dunno how to engage due to language barrier.

I think, the witnesses should publish some chategories of the real abuser posts to downvote. What if I downvote a plankton post and the reward pool upvote goes only to the richest?

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1 vote

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hitmeasap (71) · 5 years ago

"I'd love to downvote some post, but then I think the posters have the same problem like me"

You are not really supposed to go after small accounts though. They want to focus on the authors who abuse bid-bots and end up with high payouts due to the amount the authors have spent on the votes...

But, for each downvote you do, you 're also facing the risk to get retaliation flags, which ultimately can take away the little earnings you are able to earn. And, those small amounts you are able to give back to the reward pool with your downvotes will ultimately end up in the hands of the larger accounts...

I can't see how my downvotes will benefit me personally, or any other "lesser" account so far, so I am not likely to downvote anything at this point.

I will probably change my mind when I see something that is done for lesser accounts, and something that actually helps lesser accounts to earn more instead of less.

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cicisaja (66) · 5 years ago

I think I'll do the same like you... I'll go with 200 accounts of the community if I want to downvote it😂😂😂 joining a troop of flag wars😆 if.. only if I have time.

Im not ready for the retaliate either, i earn small income from my post, why would I take risks by reduced it just because I have DVP aka Down Vote Power. That's not my game. It's merely bid-bots owners game, there is nothing really like a whale vote everything manually.

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xcountytravelers (65) · 5 years ago

Wow, what a great post. You definitely have thought this through. I figured, when i began reading that you were just going to discuss why but did nit expect the detail you went in.

I am expecting to see many flag wars over the next few weeks wbile people tey to figure out this new flagging power.
Ren

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1 vote

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hitmeasap (71) · 5 years ago

Thank you. Yeah, some people used flags before HF21 only to "bully" others too, so having free flags will obviously not change that.

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metzli (64) · 5 years ago

I’m not gonna be using the flags - unless of course I do on something randomly super unpleasant. Seriously though, I tried bidbots before, either I wasn’t spending enough or I was just really shitty at “cheating” because I did not see the long term benefit.

Sometimes I like the posts of a flower with a one word description- sometimes I stare at that flower for hours and wonder if the word was poetic and well placed or just... a random word.

Sometimes, I write something really juicy and get disappointed that it was mostly ignored while the one word flower got a nice payout - but that’s just how the cookies crumble...

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1 vote

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hitmeasap (71) · 5 years ago

"Sometimes I like the posts of a flower with a one word description- sometimes I stare at that flower for hours and wonder if the word was poetic and well placed or just... a random word."

Exactly, so while you love that specific photo, and you think it's amazing, you also appreciate the quality of it... And some others might see it as total garbage. Hence, low quality and flags will be thrown because they earned "too much". But what is "too much"?

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bil.prag (68) · 5 years ago

because you are waiting hf22 to pass?

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