Open Letter to all Steemians - Hardfork 21: Culture Change

yabapmatt (69) · 5 years ago

I feel like this is all a bit backwards. We're basically all trying to figure out what the best way is to give out all the STEEM that's being created rather than trying to figure out why people should want STEEM in the first place.

It seems we all have this assumption that people just want STEEM, which is true, but only because it can be sold for fiat or other cryptos that people want instead. It's just something to be milked and sold for something you actually have a use for. For Steem to succeed there needs to be another reason people want to own STEEM other than to earn more STEEM.

If you look at your list of things HF21 is supposed to do, they're almost all some form of "buying/holding STEEM will allow you to earn more STEEM". If that's the only reason people want STEEM then the price will continue to drop until finally no one cares about earning more STEEM.

I would love to see the focus shift from how the STEEM is distributed to how we can give STEEM value - or rather show the world the value that Steem already provides.

$10.21

lookplz (62) · 5 years ago

I think that having social influence on a social platform is a major reason that one might have demand for steem. It's partially a reason I'd like more steem tbh. This is a community filled with real people (mostly) who have real opinions and can give real feedback/assistance. Not only can I share my ideas/thoughts/feelings/etc here, I can potentially get paid for doing so. In addition to being able to get paid, I also have the ability to pay. This means I can contribute not only intellectually, from online, but now also financially in a direct way.

That's just one way you can perceive value for steem too. There are countless ways! :)

I stated this in my other comment, but even just looking at steem like an advertising platform, you're paying to promote your product (Which in some cases may be yourself.) and the potential for others to see it is great when you have enough stake to promote your content decently.

Ex: Say Nike buys steem to promote their products to steem users. They buy 1mil stake. Now they upvote themselves every post, to get themselves onto trending/hot/whatever. Their incentive to buy was to get the exposure with their ads. Now, Adidas wants a piece of the action, they want to be higher up than Nike though. They buy 2 mil steem and begin to self-vote their ads. Going much higher than Nike. Now Nike wants to respond to that, they buy another 3 Mil so they are double what Adidas is. The cycle continues.

This is obviously a far-off example (Possibly a fever daydream, who knows. lol), but that is another way to look at this. There are a lot of very real people on steem and anywhere there is a gathering of people, there is potential to market products. This is also an example where steem has been adopted to a level where Nike and Adidas and the likes, are even concerned about having a spot in the community's space.

Even without that being the climate of things, my point is, the demand behind steem is varying and to each person/company/etc it will have different perceived value. The demand that is presumed by most IS there, it's just most people aren't exactly sure as to why other people would want steem.

Why do you want steem?
What's it's perceived value for you?

Personally, I think for me it starts with exactly what I started with. The ability to share my ideas/thoughts/music taste/experiences/etc with other people and to be able to have more people see it. That is incentive for me to buy more. Then there's things like Steem Monsters and such, that are directly aligned with steem, that give it added value (to me). I don't think steem would even be around today, if massive amounts of people didn't see massive value in it. Some may not be able to exactly explain why they see value in it or where that value comes from, but the point is, they are still here, they are still posting, they are still participating.

We don't always have to know exactly why something has value, to know that it does. :)

$0.12

soy-venezuelien (55) · 5 years ago

The value of things is an agreement between humans.
Although neuroscience is now used to deceive and make people believe in the value of things.

But many of us enter steemit because of the global crisis in the world because of monetary survival.

There was a time when the biggest steemit traffic was in poor countries like Venezuela. I saw it once online

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lookplz (62) · 5 years ago

Therein lies another great purpose of steem, then. :) The ability for it to lift up those who don't have the best situations in life. I'm glad that it has been able to help in some way, that is the power behind this!

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lookplz (62) · 5 years ago

Also, I am sorry that countries like Venezuela even have to deal with those conditions. Another way steem can be used would be like charities. A way to give back to the people of other countries who need it, but on a more personal and direct level. This could be great for ensuring the people who need help are getting it.

lookplz (62) · 5 years ago

Also, @soy-venezuelien made another great point. There is the ability to transfer value to anywhere in the world. :) From anywhere else. That ability is incredible as well. Currency becoming digital and able to reach places that other currencies can't or can but are taxed insanely/etc... this may not differ from other currencies, but think about how fast you can transfer steem compared to bitcoin. It's insane to even think they can be compared. I've never had bitcoin reach my wallet instantaneously. Well, not for a long ass time now. ;) Also, there are no fees with steem. If I send 1 steem, you get 1 steem. If I sent you a whole bitcoin, you wouldn't get a whole one after fees. The fees for steem are paid out in much better methods, directly to witnesses from the reward pool. (I think? Still new to steem.) As far as a payment processing system goes, nothing can really compete with steem. I can drop cash into a bank account and it'll still take a couple minutes to go through. Turn that into a check and you're looking at at least half a day for most banks, closer to a whole one, maybe two. None of those issues exist within steem.

Also, why is gold worth what it's worth? Limited Supply. Same concept applies here to steem. There is a limited amount. That's how things are. That means only a certain number of people can hold a certain amount and that's it. This provides scarcity and where there is demand and scarcity, there is value increase.

I'm not sure how anyone who understands basic economics could doubt the future of steem. You've seen where it's been when the market was in ideal conditions. Where do you think it will be when conditions become ideal again? Do you think there's potential to go even further? How many more people are part of steem now compared to then? How many of the old users continue to post? To comment? To vote? I think there are many people doubting the future of steem simply because of the low prices currently.

Would there be as many posts pointing out possible negative outcomes, if steem were currently trading at $1? As opposed to $0.18-0.20?

I believe that for steem to have stayed above 15 cents since I have invested into it, is incredible. What this means to me is that there are enough people buying to counter how many people are selling and keep it fairly stable for a while now. Yes, things are low, but if we have the ability to counter the selling off with buying in a market this down... think about the snapback that will have when the markets all recover. Like a rubber band, we are pulling and tugging as the band stretches to lower lows than have been seen in a while. Then, when resistance gives and the markets recover, we snap back. The more we've pulled on this rubber band, the more potential energy we've collected. Maybe I'm fantasizing again, but looking at the charts, I see steem at the very least popping back up to 60-80 cents. That may not be as good for others as it is for me... but I'm sure it would make everyone feel a lot better for it to recover to that level. I just see higher highs, that's all. :)

Sure, I may not have traded steem prior to recently on any markets, but I believe it has the same potential as any other market, to act as those markets have. This means large recoveries for those who are down and massive profits for those who bought in at the low lows. Keep your hope up folks, it'll get much better. I feel it.

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hobo.media (64) · 5 years ago

I agree, visibility is the value of STEEM. This, in my opinion, is why the demonization of bidbot services and self-voting is a huge mistake. Self promotion is the killer app for Steem. Isn't that really the killer application for all social media? So, maybe its unwise for us to be so anti-self promotion.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

"For Steem to succeed there needs to be another reason people want to own STEEM other than to earn more STEEM."

I'm your huckleberry. The rewards on my content are coups, not money. I don't value money highly. However, I do value Steem other than as money, as it is a measure of the regard folks have for me.

That I do value highly.

I concede that this isn't going to change others, however I also reckon many others more highly value other societal matters than money. Steem is so contrived that it adds monetary value to those other metrics, such as factual reporting. Unfortunately, Steem is also so contrived that it enables other folks to degrade more important societal values profitably, such as by voting so as to maximize ROI from curation rewards rather than other benefits of content, such as factual reportage.

In order for this to be sorted and no longer work against itself, the code needs to change. Thus HF21. However HF21, instead of decreasing the financial incentive to cast votes that is contrary to curative purpose, increases it, and further degrades actual curation. Profiteering isn't curation. As a result I expect Steem price, market cap, and user retention to worsen after HF21 is implemented. Many people do not realize they value other things more than money, and are mystified when their financial endeavors do not increase their quality of life. HF21 is going to be an example of that dynamic. Curation is actually what we want. Profiteering, which HF21 will greatly increase incentive to do, is not, and is contrary to capital gains. Capital gains and profiteering are diametrically opposed.

If this is the case, we will have evidence that social media is not all about money for most people, and it will be time to recognize that those other values should be more the focus of financial rewards than profit. This may seem counterintuitive, but it's actually how society works. Money isn't bad, but valuing it more than people is.

We need to put the society first, and the money will come. HF21 is bass ackwards from what we should be doing. If it worsens Steem society as measured in the three metrics I mention, that will reveal what HF22 should do. I have posted mechanisms that will exert the effect I have recommended before, and will not detail them here, but when the time comes, we should discuss them.

Let me know then.

ura-soul (75) · 5 years ago

Money isn't bad, but valuing it more than people is.

Fully agreed. Facebook has billions of users because - despite the fact that behind the scenes it is highly exploitative and probably even evil - it does provide the social features people use. Facebook seems to have found ways to value money more than people but still give people the impression that they value people more than money.

If we create a system that values everything appropriately - there is potential to beat facebook.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

It is impressions that matter more than actual reality to most people, and the demonstration of this is Steem not being more successful than other social media, despite enabling some monetary reward other social media platforms do not.

HF21 not only doesn't acknowledge this fact, it exacerbates the impact of negative impressions, which is why I expect it to be a disaster.

ura-soul (75) · 5 years ago

The situation is much more complicated. Facebook has a huge number of groups, many of which are private. There are viable ways of having privacy and stopping trolls hassling you. Steem doesn't have any of that - so that's a deal breaker immediately for a large percentage of the world.
Beyond that, most people don't produce content that is unusual, so would not have much to gain from being here. The problem is partially Steem, partially the funding here, partially the lack of will of the population in general and partially the massive funding of Facebook et al.
There are, surprisingly to me, actually a fairly high number of people who like censorship and want control to be able to silence people. Communities on Steem will help bridge a big gap here and are absolutely fundamental to Steem's success. They should have been THE top priority all along.

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preparedwombat (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

We're basically all trying to figure out what the best way is to give out all the STEEM that's being created rather than trying to figure out why people should want STEEM in the first place.

Too much focus on the 8% of of the Steem that will come into existence over the next year (inflation), as opposed to the 92% of Steem that already exists?

elbrava (55) · 5 years ago (edited)

Not just that. Because that is still looking at the value in terms of money.

There are countless things that people spend money on, because it has more value to them than money.

I did play an mmorph world of tanks where I bought digital tanks, simply because I liked the looks of it or because it gave me a competitive advantage in the game. I did not care one bit how much in-game gold their value was.

We need applications that use Steem power delegation as the form of payment to get access to a certain product or service.

Now that would change the game completely!

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joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

There's an Dapp for that. Just kidding but there should be apps that are developed on Steem, if there aren't already, that has premium features and pay per play and pay per view and all kinds of things like you said perhaps, a real game changer.

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hobo.media (64) · 5 years ago

I have long believed that a delegation economy could be a huge selling point for owning STEEM. Imagine if you never had to pay for Kindle Unlimited like services or HBO subscription like fees but rather than subscriptions you just had to delegate 50 SP. It is an interesting form of subscription economy that could be worthwhile.

Here's the problem with that. People are anti-self voting, which means that the businesses are not going to get 100% of the value of your delegation, which means that they need to double the amount of SP they require, which might get to unapproachable levesl at some point.

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improv (67) · 5 years ago

Yes yes yes

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marki99 (54) · 5 years ago

Great comment. We need sinks.

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resiliencia (68) · 5 years ago

I agree about what Tim has stated on the post.
I also think that the main focus after SMT should be adding value to STEEM and easy onboarding.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts with us Tim and Matt.

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https://review.hunt.town/bigmac/en-US?channel=steem&unique_id=&username=yabapmatt

michealb (66) · 5 years ago

your post value is worth 9 big macs :)

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stuffbyspencer (61) · 5 years ago

absolutely agree

I understand where people are coming from, they think making STEEM easy to get will help encourage growth, but imagine building a platform that gives out worthless shitcoins as incentive.

If more useful dapps & games & commerce & overall reasons to actually use the damn STEEM, then that's what we'll become sooner or later.

Let's hope that something in this upcoming HF will slip past us & unknowingly spark a huge demand & use-case for STEEM.

Wishful thinking? ...yeah, I know... 😓

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binkyprod (67) · 5 years ago

That's an excellent point. I for one am very concerned.

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boosta (69) · 5 years ago

Curation is now more profitable, so there is more reason to buy STEEM and power up - @timcliff

Why don't you start buying? You are powering down :-).

$4.68

12 votes

timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

I have a large amount of STEEM that I am holding onto in the hopes that we head way up. I am also selling some to pay the bills (which doesn’t go far these days unfortunately). I am very much vested in STEEM going up.

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joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

Diversify your portfolio. Invest in many things. Don't keep all your eggs in one basket.

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acidyo (80) · 5 years ago (edited)

Awesome post, Tim!

I am very much in the same boat with you and I agree with most of your views. I am hoping the use of downvotes will increase but not the use of unfair downvotes. I am hoping people will see the long term potential of Steem like many others of us do and start investing back at these prices (especially smaller users - this is your and our chance at a great distribution even though we are one of the best distributed currencies out there already and it will hopefully only get better with HF21 - get there before the whales pick it all up). I hope there will be some projects that will use other people's downvotes wisely and unbiased and that we get downvote delegation pool possibly on the next HF with SMT's to mitigate blind retaliation and at the same time I hope projects will spawn that will counter such retaliation and that people find value in that and assist it with stake.

I could go on and on about things I hope will start to occur after Tuesday but don't wanna make this comment too long. Let's unite as likeminded people and protect the rewardpool, our fellow users and show the world what we have here and welcome them with open arms. There is still nothing compared to Steem while all the older centralized giants are only getting worse and worse, it is our time to shine.

$0.96

16 votes

boosta (69) · 5 years ago

Maybe it's just me but I can't imagine a single person (outside your circle jerk) who will buy STEEM to vote for you. What do you think?

$4.67

6 votes

whatsup (75) · 5 years ago

The concept is that we use inflation to reward social media users, the way companies give out free pizzas.

As more gather others build things for them to do: SteemMonsters, Gambling, Silly Games.. You know the kind people play every day on Facebook.

Where people gather they begin to buy, sell and trade. (The Network effect)

Usually in investing the concept is to raise the value of the thing you bought.

Not drain the value in a huge ponzi scheme.

I get that most "traders" who like to call themselves investors don't really get the concept of investment. Which means... You put money and effort into something that is getting better so you can take more money out later.

By later I don't mean tomorrow. :)

While you can say people buy steem to vote for you that is an over simplified version. I don't blame you for getting stuck on it, because SteemIt Inc has done a terrible job of painting a vision.

It was never supposed to be the endusers who buy tons of Steem. Their presence is essential if you want the next steps to happen.

Anyway, have a great day.

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boosta (69) · 5 years ago

Who are you? Who are we? Could you please explain why you and your friends are draining the value in a huge Ponzi scheme? Most of you didn't buy single STEEM, but that's why you know best what to do to increase the price. Do you think that everyday posting (shit) brings any value to STEEM? Your shit is better than mine. For sure. But what about others. You can't keep (with few votes) here any real author with that concept. You should have understood that by now.

I didn't want to shitpost here. That was my response to bots and "friendly users" which blocked my friends here. You should stick with blockchain neutrality. This is the only thing that distinguishes Steem from other social networks. I'm afraid it's too complicated for you. You crave power, so you have increased the power of down-voting. Mao Zedong would be proud.

$3.66

8 votes

valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

"Do you think that everyday posting (shit) brings any value to STEEM?"

Social media has proved to be the best business model in the world today. The FAANGs have proved this by exceeding the market cap of other businesses, and very quickly.

People interact and create society, and an economy is part of society. It is not the most important aspect of society, and extracting rewards isn't why most people use social media.

Extracting rewards by self voting, buying votes, and so forth, reduces the monetary value of the Steem token, because it extracts that social value before it can inure to the underlying investment vehicle.

Profiteering produces ROI, and before Steem it has long been the business model of outfits like Bain Capital, KK&R, and other firms that buy a controlling stake in a company and sell the assets of the company, profiting thereby. This destroys the companies they buy, but they make money, so it's all good from their perspective.

That's what is happening on Steem, but the forges and equipment of Steem are authors, and they can't be sold. HF21 is going to increase the incentive to profiteer on Steem, and further decrease the value of Steem. If we want capital gains, we need to reduce the incentive to extract rewards by self voting, selling votes, and so forth, allowing rewards to encourage creators and produce capital gains.

Mitt Romney would be proud.

whatsup (75) · 5 years ago

People build websites and attract users every single day there are many models for doing it. This isn't rocket science or even anywhere near as hard as we were making it.

I was buying for a while and I also could buy more, I don't because of this... Too many stakeholders who think they can milk profits out without building anything.

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joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

Are you against the free market?

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jaki01 (74) · 5 years ago

I get that most "traders" who like to call themselves investors don't really get the concept of investment.

They just aren't real investors but wannabe short term profiteers.

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7 votes

valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

"Usually in investing the concept is to raise the value of the thing you bought."

"Not drain the value in a huge ponzi scheme."

Capital gains are reduced by profiteering. Warren Buffet and Bernie Madoff both made ROI. The former builds things up, and the latter destroyed them.

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joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

Exactly.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

"...we are one of the best distributed currencies out there..."

I do not think this is the case. Do you have a source for this?

Thanks!

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boosta (69) · 5 years ago

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Reveal Comment

http://steemreports.com/outgoing-votes-info/?account=acidyo&days=30

acidyo (80) · 5 years ago

http://steemreports.com/outgoing-votes-info/?account=boosta&days=30

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boosta (69) · 5 years ago (edited)

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Reveal Comment

ew-and-patterns (70) · 5 years ago

This is the best post I have read here in a long time.
resteemed to my 4700 Followers.

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6 votes

bleujay (70) · 5 years ago

Well said @timcliff.

What a concise and clear explanation.......thank you.

All the best.

Cheers!

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d0zer (59) · 5 years ago

I’m curious how things will work out. I think the major positive thing here is that we’re actually seeing things getting done unlike the past.

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5 votes

galenkp (75) · 5 years ago

Hi @timcliff I’d like to thank you for a really measured and balanced post about HF21 when many other seem to have been weighted one way or the other.

I’m a small account and have blogged my way to that status with what I hope has been reasonable content. I’ve enjoyed it, and still do, however have the same fears and concerns others do. Your post has gone some way toward allaying those fears and for that I also thank you.

I look forward to the future here, to continued content creation by myself and others and I look forward to HF21 making a positive change. Most of my steem has been earned by content creation and (manual) curation however I’ve added some purchased with hard-hearted fiat so I’m eager and optimistic on the future. I believe we can do this.

Anyway, I just wanted to say this.

Enjoy your weekend.

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whatsup (75) · 5 years ago

Well stated!

Also don't forget to let everyone know this is NewSteem!

It's alive, active, busy and thriving.

#NewSteem It's what we make it.

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7 votes

lookplz (62) · 5 years ago

I think it'll be great. People have essentially said I'm naive at times because I'm new here, but I see far too much potential, even considering the bad, for something this big to fail in any real way. This is one of the greatest concepts of this decade, I don't see it or us going anywhere any time soon. :) The community here is wonderful too. The good far outweighs the bad from what I've experienced so far! Looking forward to the future!

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culgin (71) · 5 years ago

Great article! While I still hold on to my thoughts that the effect of the economic changes will be unpredictable, I agree it's a good change overall

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7 votes

pfunk (72) · 5 years ago

I just came across this post and I don't agree with creating a dichotomy between stakeholders and users on Steem. Especially when it's a post encouraging a new shift in culture. @curatorcat touched on this point a little, but nobody else seemed to mention this.

Surely there is a difference in approach between someone who has a larger stake in Steem and someone who is making posts and cashing out the rewards. There are also big differences between people's stake. However, if you're renewing the culture of Steem, the best way of doing so is to remind so-called users of Steem that they are stakeholders. This is the original intent and culture of Steem and I think it was a wise place to start.

To create a dichotomy by saying stakeholders vs. "users", and saying they need to work together, reinforces a dead-end culture for Steem.

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

That is fair, and I definitely agree with the idea of emphasizing the fact that users are stakeholders. At the time the post was written though, the community was already quite polarized over the hardfork and how it benefited (large) stakeholders at the expense of “smaller stakeholders” (i.e. users). I understand the overlap and relationships between the two, I’m not trying to argue. The point probably would have been lost on the audience at the time though. Something to keep pushing as part of #newsteem for sure.

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viking-ventures (69) · 5 years ago

I really hope you're right! I want to be positive, but it's difficult because I'm well below the cut-off for where the changes will hurt - at least to begin with.

I've been saying for awhile that it's hard to be both a quality content producer and a good curator! Perhaps as the curators materialize, good content will benefit. I've also been saying for awhile that Steem needs a way to pull in content consumers - we can't do both! This is the chance to make it work - I hope it will.

Thanks for your take on this.

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nancybriti (70) · 5 years ago

One of the serious problems I see with this platform is the little or no advertising out there. We are a closed circle that waits for people to come, without thinking that we can also go out and look for users. There's a lot of talent here. So I trust that this new stage of STEEM will be for the good of all and not for the fat and few killer whales that exist. Greetings

$0.09

5 votes

smooth (70) · 5 years ago

Most successful social networks and internet platforms generally have relied relatively little on advertising for their growth. It is sometimes used, but only sparingly as a narrowly targeted boost to an existing growth engine. Without being able to organically grow through word of mouth, as well as retain users who do join, advertising can just turn into a huge money pit.

If we are able to crack the growth engine challenge and show that a particular form of advertising has a sustainable positive return, then funding for it can be proposed through the SPS (part of this hardfork).

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anonsteve (62) · 5 years ago

I wouldn't count on organic growth. Most Steemians are pseudonymous or anonymous and do not want anyone in the walking world to know about their activities on Steem. Why? First of all, I'm betting over 90% of Steemians are not paying income tax on their Steem income. Everyone in their circle of relatives, friends and acquaintances being able to go to Steemworld to look at the entire history of their financial transactions on Steem would be begging for trouble with the IRS or whatever the tax authority is called in their country. Secondly, not many people would necessarily want their spouses or employers to know about earning some extra on the side. So, forget about most people telling people in the walking world about Steem let alone persuading them to join. In most people's opinion, Steem is way good to be true to begin with anyway. Many people think it must be a scam.

I don't think Steem is done for, however, and that there is no chance for growth. I think if Steem is ever going to have millions of users, those users will be completely cut off from the reward pool and be posting through guest accounts or only having a wallet address (a lite account) at their disposal. They will be players of games like Splinterlands and paying for it. Producing content will always be done by a very small number of people. They will be professionals earning big rewards. Those of us who have been lucky enough to have participated in the beta phase of Steem as bloggers earning dollars on blog posts about our cat or something like that will be able to make money by renting out our Resource Credits to apps that have large numbers of paying customers.

joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

Do people prefer getting banned on Facebook than being on Steem?

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anonsteve (62) · 5 years ago

The vast majority of people are not getting banned anywhere.

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joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

Millions and millions of people.

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anonsteve (62) · 5 years ago

Where are they?

And what proportion would you really want here? Many of them are kooks you wouldn't want to associate with.

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joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

I am one of them. Just ask around. I was banned many places. So many people are writing about it. The fake news is lying to you and you are falling for the fake news, good for you.

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Show 2 more replies

smooth (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

I don't know that I agree with all of your generalizations. There are many bloggers and others on Steem who are not anonymous. People who are anonymous can still tell their friends about it without doxing themselves (especially if they have multiple accounts). Apps which become popular may get press coverage and similar forms of buzz which drive growth without paying per user. Etc.

I agree that earning rewards can't be the main draw.

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anonsteve (62) · 5 years ago

Yes, there are some people on here that are not anonymous. And yes, having one social account under one's real name separated from the money and having multiple accounts for various purposes including delegating to projects, curating etc. might actually become a trend.

I'm glad we're on the same page about rewards not being able to be the main draw. The math wouldn't work if the idea were that the rewards would amount to anything too big. But I would love it if Steem apps with real accounts owned by their users put a stop to the power of social media giants and cause the profits to trickled down back to the masses. I'd really love to see that. But the way people I know from IRL have received these ideas has been a massive disappointment to me.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

" Producing content will always be done by a very small number of people."

That's not how social media works.

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anonsteve (62) · 5 years ago

I should've specified that I meant content that earns anything. Sorry about not being clear.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

It's still completely wrong. Fakebook, Youtool, and so on and so forth prove that people participating in social media is the most profitable business model in the world today.

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pharesim (74) · 5 years ago (edited)

What's profitable about them is the stalking, tracking, collecting of data and creation of profiles for the ad customers.
There is no data collected here a user is not giving away willingly by putting it on the chain. And what they put there is freely visible for everyone. No way you could compare the two models.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

People posting family pics aren't doing so to make Facebook money. The reasons people use social media are generally unrelated to ROI, and the focus on monetization has been a mistake on Steem, from the standpoint of onboarding masses of people. It has attracted a particular market segment, and not the mass market, which is not seeking mere economic return from using social media, but more valuable aspects of society.

The models are comparable with trivial facility. The market segments served by social media are difficult of compare, because of the complexity of society, not because of the marked differences between social media platforms, whose differences are relatively small.

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anonsteve (62) · 5 years ago (edited)

What is completely wrong? That I claimed that users love those platforms despite them not paying anything to them? That statement is precisely correct. You don't get paid for using Facebook, YouTube or any of the big mainstream social media platforms. And yes, those platforms are hugely profitable - to their owners. The users use them and do not expect to get paid a single cent. The whole concept is so alien to them that when you talk about earning crypto by blogging on Steem to YouTube users or other mainstream people, their eyes will go completely blank - or they'll assume it's a scam.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

" Producing content will always be done by a very small number of people."

This is completely wrong. It remains completely wrong even if you moderate it by adding monetary rewards. Steem was but the first social media platform that potentiated monetary rewards, but it is not the only one anymore. The monetization of content by users has just begun.

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marki99 (54) · 5 years ago

I am very reluctant to use the SPS for marketing proposals. When dealing with marketing, everything is in the grey, there are no clear results, and we don’t know what causes new users to sign in.

We might be funding some person for marketing, then notice an increase in user growth and attribute that growth to him. While in reality it was just organic growth with which he has nothing to do.

This will keep us trapped into paying him for a useless job.

Posted using Partiko iOS

smooth (70) · 5 years ago

All fair points. No doubt we will have to learn and come to stakeholder consensus over good and bad uses for SPS.

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marki99 (54) · 5 years ago (edited)

I have made a comment under @exyle’s last post. Is it possible for you to read it? I want to reach influential people on steem because I really think this might be a huge issue.

Edit- It's not the last post anymore, here is the link: https://steemit.com/exyle/@marki99/pwqjo5

Posted using Partiko iOS

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

Some interesting thoughts. I've generally been in favor of a much shorter power down time (whatever is needed to avoid exploits which seems to be something like 5 days), but there isn't consensus for it. If we look at similar but more successful chains like EOS, they have (I think) two day power down and they don't appear to suffer for it any significant way.

Perhaps with continued discussion and comments such as yours more consensus can be built.

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marki99 (54) · 5 years ago (edited)

Consider this: in the recent bitcoin run up from 3k to 13.7k I’ve had some friends calling, wanting to get in. I advised them not to.

They still wanted though and sent money to their new coinbase account. On this day Bitcoin was at 13.7k. Fortunately, the bank transfer took a while to complete, and when their money was received on coinbase bitcoin was already at 10.8 k. A much better price. The waiting time also allowed them to gain some perspective, and not to buy bitcoin with all the money they sent, since it’s not going straight up anymore. Now the price is even lower. the bank transfer only took two days.

This was great for them, but bad for the bitcoin price and its hodlers. The two day EOS powerdown will similarly protect people who panic at the bottom. And the volume is always the largest by far at the exact bottom and top. So even that short powerdown will help the weak hands, and will be bad for the hodlers of the coin.

However, it’s already wayyy better than a 13 week powerdown, which is also slowly released, allowing dollar cost averaging. With this, we are creating large amounts of selling pressure and for longer times, while the buying pressure will naturally go down as a bear market develops.

Weak hands will sell their holdings for dollar values that are multiple times greater than in the alternative (if they panic sold).

This issue is a must-solve. Since it hit me I can’t ignore it. It also provides benefits in other ways. It won’t discourage investors from buying steem (who see the long time needed to powerdown), and it might enable us to add a small fee of burned steem, a nice sink. However those positives are minor compared to the market mechanics described above.

valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

Steem has been progressively killing it's marketing department. The folks making posts and comments have been demonetized by stake weighted profiteers, and driven off. Adding a 10% tax on top of halving author rewards and the modified rewards curve will but increase that demonetization.

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

The folks making posts and comments and earning rewards from them (which includes a great many comments, including some one-character comments, posted solely for the purpose of self-upvoting) have not been and are not an effective marketing department with how things have been going.

I prefer to think of this as an attempt at a reboot than as an incremental change of X% here or Y% there. The only way it will make any real difference in Steem's trajectory is if it helps to inspire major changes in the overall platform, community, and economy. If the biggest change is percentages then we'll continue circling the drain anyway.

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hobo.media (64) · 5 years ago

The biggest issue I see honestly is the 20 STEEM thing. I get the reason for it, but its the threshold level that is just too extreme. Why 20? can I get a solid rationale for this? Because I can get behind setting it at 5 STEEM, but 20 is insane. You have to attract a lot of whales for that.

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

That was the curve the developers were comfortable proposing at this point. There are some key properties that the reward curve needs to satisfy and you can't easily just pick any shape you want without causing problems somewhere else. It can be updated later, but one thing to keep in mind is that we won't really even know if 20 is the right break even point until after the new system has been in operation for a while. The numbers 16 or 20 come from running the existing votes through the new curve but that is nonsense because people will certainly change voting practices, there will be more (how many more we don't know) downvotes pushing rewards around, etc. So we'll see.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

Word of mouth is the most effective marketing. Ask any marketer. However, as profiteering discouraged folks that made the effort to come here, the effect of that marketing was to discourage new users by those discouraged relating their complaints about how things were here. That's very effective, just not at bringing new people here, as we see.

All the changes HF21 brings are percentage changes. How do you achieve qualitative evolution with quantitative changes? All the complaints the one million or so users that were chased off had are being increased. I don't believe anyone expects anything different from what's going to happen as a result of making people less welcome here than they were when one million were chased off.

You don't have to bang your head on a brick wall 21 times to realize it hurts, and how to stop hurting yourself.

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago

All the changes HF21 brings are percentage changes

Free downvotes is brand new and not a percentage change. Some percentage changes can have a qualitatitive effect once thresholds are reached and it tips the system into a new balance point. We'll have to see to what extent that happens or not.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

While you are correct to point out that quantitative changes can concatenate to create qualitative changes, free is simply less expensive. TBQH the downvote pool isn't free at all, since it comes at the expense of other benefits that would otherwise be paid from the pool, in exactly the same way that free healthcare, college, or any other welfare proposal isn't free.

However, I do believe it will result in qualitative changes. I foresee the development of a market for downvotes, and this will have an extremely negative impact on Steem society, as have all other automated voting mechanisms.

We will indeed see what comes of it.

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago

TBQH the downvote pool isn't free at all, since it comes at the expense of other benefits that would otherwise be paid from the pool, in exactly the same way that free healthcare, college, or any other welfare proposal isn't free

That is a bad analogy. Free downvotes do not cost or expend any significant resources, unlike healthcare, college, etc.

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shadowspub (70) · 5 years ago

where else do you write about Steem other than on Steem? Talking about products / platforms is advertising. BTW, I'm seeking people who are also writers on Medium.com for a Steem related project. People can DM me on Discord for details.

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joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

I write on Medium sometimes but prefer Minds.

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shadowspub (70) · 5 years ago

are you on Discord? can you DM me and we'll talk?

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

I came here because I searched a topic and a Steemit post came up. I see Steem posts regularly on other platforms that discuss topics of interest.

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shadowspub (70) · 5 years ago

what other platform? and other than HF21 which was triggered mostly by the press releases that Steemit Inc did .. what topics about Steem are they discussing.

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

Various blogs and the chans have cited Steem posts, besides Steemers deliberately promoting Steem on social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and so forth. I recall recently seeing a post from @ausbitbank cited on /pol/, for example.

As a platform intended to resist censorship, Steem has an outsized impact on the wider web, due to people posting here what is censored elsewhere. Also, other than deliberate promotion of Steem earlier mentioned, none of the posts I refer to were about Steem itself. Many of them were regarding topics prone to censorship, and due to my own focus on politics, tended to be politically motivated.

IMHO, Steem posts about Steem are not the best marketing for Steem. It is posts that would be censored on Twitter, Youtube, and Facebook that best advocate Steem and promote censorship resistance that are.

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shadowspub (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

so what is /pol/?

Posts that are what you called censored on those other sites are often seen as cleaning up a cesspool by some. Thus making their presence here a mixed blessings as it will bring some and turn others off.

a politics tribe .. especially one geared toward those who are unhappy with the other social media would be good to see.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

Every post and comment is an advertisement for Steem.

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cwow2 (65) · 5 years ago (edited)

If you learn to curate smart as the little guy. It would way easy to grow compared to making posts and get them seen.

Curation and commenting is way more fun than posting for me.
So I am looking forward to HF21

freebornangel (73) · 5 years ago

I've lost a lot of hope since steemit said the rich will be getting richer and screw the little guys.
Props to them for at least being honest this time, but the people that were here for a few pennies a day are out, and those that were making dollars now get pennies?

I don't think this place thrives only rewarding sycophants of those that already have steem.

Nobody, with their dignity intact, agrees to play by those rules, imo.

smooth (70) · 5 years ago

steemit said the rich will be getting richer and screw the little guys

Nobody said that. In fact, everyone is getting poorer at this rate.

What has been said is these are steps which a significant number of Steem stakeholders (and certainly not all whales or even close) believe can start to make a difference in righting the ship. We may all turn out to be wrong for whatever reasons, but the effort is sincere.

Literally no one is trying to get rich or richer by shifting a few percent of token rewards around on an asset depreciating by 90% per year. That's absurd.

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freebornangel (73) · 5 years ago

Then how do you explain an exponential sublinear curve?
Didn't we just fork an exponential curve out because it favored the rich too much?
Now we are gonna fork one back in, except that this time the curve punishes the poor for being poor?

How did 20 steem become the cut off and not 3?

What I got from this admission that posts with 20 steem will be getting more, and those getting less than 20 steem will be getting less, is that those that were here for the pennies can fly a kite and those that were here for the couple dollars can now have pennies.
Irregardless of how that impacts what is left of the community.

It is still premature to nail the top on the coffin, atp, downvoting can still ride in to save the day.

. In fact, everyone is getting poorer at this rate.

I'd say that when you tell your workers to like it, or lump it, and decrease wages 40%, what do you expect?

Until we appeal to the everyman, we are treading water in a riptide, imo.

I still contend that the whale experiment with the n2 was as good as it gets.
Instead of making thousands of users happy, maybe prompting them to store value in steem because they counted in the math, the interests of a very few were protected at the cost of mass adoption.

I know the early adopters were told they could use steem as their personal atm and that it was sustainable to remove max rewards, but clearly they were misled.
The sooner we help whomever to get over that misconception, the better, imo.

smooth (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

exponential sublinear curve

I'm not sure what you mean by that phrase. The curve is superlinear at every point (adding 1% rshares/votes adds >1% share of the pool), however it converges to linear.

The entire process is an exercise in balancing various considerations in a dynamic system, not just looking at shifting a few percent of rewards given an assumption of everything else being static.

The curve itself is in fact pretty mild and close to linear overall. Payouts below about 16 STEEM (I guess there are different estimates as this is approximate and I can't say that with some different assumptions 20 is definitely wrong) will get somewhat less than linear and those above will get somewhat more than linear but this is a matter of percentages and is not extreme.

The overall effect is actually reasonably close to the n^2 whale experiment that you liked where there is still a degree of superlinearity but it is muted to the point that the largest stakeholders and vote concentrators can't take effectively (nearly) all of the rewards.

decrease wages 40%

There are no wages being paid here and if there once were (which there weren't, this is a distribution method for a token intended to help the token accrue value) they've already been reduced by 99%. Arguing over protecting the remaining 1% "wages" at the expense of restructuring and rebalancing the entire system to where it at least might work better and avoid another 99% decline is quite pointless.

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freebornangel (73) · 5 years ago

The curve is superlinear at every point (adding 1% rshares/votes adds >1% share of the pool), however it converges to linear.

Ok, so now the curve resides below linear and moves towards it.
That isn't sublinear?

At this point, this is better than nothing.
Maybe it brings balance to a highly contentious debate.

The devil will be in details that won't be readily apparent for some time after the fork.
Does 7 days balance the moving parts of the math, or will it potentially take longer?

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago

Ok, so now the curve resides below linear and moves towards it. That isn't sublinear?

Not in mathematical terms. It is superlinear because it always grows faster than linear. However, the degree to which it grows faster than linear decreases. Let's not get too caught up in the terminology though.

The devil will be in details that won't be readily apparent for some time after the fork.

Agree

Does 7 days balance the moving parts of the math, or will it potentially take longer?

Maybe. The devs said they adjusted some paramaters so the discontinuity should be small. Let's hope they did a better job than HF19 which took a month or two to rebalance, but we will see.
To the extent that behavior changes, that will likely take longer. I wouldn't make any snap judgements on the state of the ecosystem before a few months.

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freebornangel (73) · 5 years ago

Ok, a few months for everybody to adjust.
At what point do we look at fixing the decision to run off ~90% of authors?
Who is going to continue to post when the platform cuts their incentive to do so to zero?
What incentive do the remaining/benefitting authors have to reduce their rewards to attract adoption?
At what point did we stop trying to attract everyman
bloggers?
Should we stop claiming to be a blogging platform for everybody and start letting people know that long haired freaky people need not apply for accounts?

Not in mathematical terms. It is superlinear because it always grows faster than linear.

If rewards never reach linear, only closely approach it, then the rewards that were linear are now less than linear, no?
That superlinearity is now down for steem poor people instead of up for steem rich people.
Equating to bringing back an evil doppleganger of the n2.

That only the authors that get less than 20 steem experience the superlinearity, and that experience is to see their rewards go down, sounds like a curve that favors those that are already established to the detriment of the newbs.
Which sounds like a doubling down of favoring the already favored under the current rules to the loss of everybody else.

How much sp is going to be required to make a solo vote larger than dust on a comment?
That number is going up alot, yes?

I've been very fortunate to have picked up a benefactor, but at 15 steem, my rewards are going down.
Unless the flagging raises what is available from the pool, I see most folks calling it a wrap.
That may take awhile to live down.
Two forks that killed adoption is a tall hurdle to surmount.
I'd suggest that that 20 steem be adjusted lower before most of our authors throw in the towel.

smooth (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

Running off 90% of the authors (as well as non-author users) is mostly a function of the value declining by 99% and the overall value proposition being weak IMO.

That being said, if hypothetically 90% of the authors did leave, the rest would see their rewards increase by 10x. It is self-correcting in that sense.

That superlinearity is now down for steem poor people instead of up for steem rich people

There is no difference. That is the exact same thing stated two different ways.

That only the authors that get less than 20 steem experience the superlinearity

This is not true. Every single vote has non-linearity (whether we call it super- or sub-linearity). The cutoff point of 16-20 is a rough estimate of where things will be similar in some sense to the status quo, but this depends a lot on how voting behavior may change,

As I noted earlier, the degree of non-linearity is somewhat modest. Even at the very bottom (near zero), the relative value is something like 50%, which is much much less of a non-linearity than existed under n^2, even with the whale experiment. At modestly less than the 16-20 range, say 10, the non-linearity is still there but it is much smaller. I don't know the number but I might guess at say 10%.

How much sp is going to be required to make a solo vote larger than dust on a comment?
That number is going up alot, yes?

As I understand it, something in the neighborhood of 2x. Solo votes aren't really the point though. Voting is supposed to be a consensus process. i.e. Go ahead and put your vote on there even if it doesn't reach non-dust. The effect of that is another minnow can add their vote and perhaps get to non-dust, which they wouldn't be able to do alone. If the comment is truly meritorious, we should expect more than one voter to think so.

Solo voting is almost synonymous with milking. It's what we have to get away from, not what we have to protect.

Overall I think we will have to see how things work out including the knock-on effects of more downvotes (which redirect rewards from that being downvoted to everything else, including potentially low-vote content, offsetting some of the above effects), etc.

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stephen-somers (63) · 5 years ago

Change is always hard but so many great Steemians have jumped ship and I just can’t see how much of these new rules will help encourage existing Steemians to stay and get new people joining.
Time will tell I guess. This place used to have a special vibe but flag wars, bid bots and scammers have certainly tarnished this. I can’t see how the changes will address these issues in a positive way.
@timcliff I do certainly respect your opinions and if you think it’ll overall be a good move then let’s roll the dice and see what comes up. Hopefully not crap.

joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago (edited)

Encouragement:

Possibly the most important factor, like you said, is encouraging more curation by giving them 50% rewards. To some extent, potentially, that decentralizes the curation system. It gets more people involved in curating. That helps curators and it more importantly helps content creators.

Centralized Users

A single account may now only get 50% in rewards, in HF21, which is less than 75%, which we had before.

Mathematical Magic

Yet, ironically, mathematically, curation is like a funnel. The single user is a central point. Instead of increase the smaller end of the funnel (posting rewards), theoretically, expanding the other end of the funnel (curation) has the potential towards expansion. I have my fingers crossed for this new hard fork.

Content Creators

Some might argue that content creators, to some extent, might be like employers. Imagine allowing employers 50% profits. I like that. Some might say that's too much. But before HF21, it was at 75%. So, this might be a step in the right direction. And other people argue that it should remain at 75% or more. I understand their concerns. But mathematically, the curators are like the employees. They upvote the content that is provided by content creators (employers). If you give a thousand curators more money, then they might curate more. And 50% of that goes to the employer. More curation means more votes. And more votes means more money for the central users. So, in theory, this will improve the Steem system. Mathematically, it's easy to understand the funnel system. I hope this second pool, the downvoting system, helps as well.

binkyprod (67) · 5 years ago

How are content creators emplyers? We are just as much employees as curators. We work hours at a time and put content on the platform. We don't deserve to be taken for granted and hf21 is basically saying Steemit doesn't care about us. It won't reward the little guy just because we make less than 2p Steem per post.

Posted using Partiko Android

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hobo.media (64) · 5 years ago

I argued against the 50/50 change, but in all honesty, 80% curator 20% content producer would possibly even work better than 50/50. I know it sounds bad but it would sort of be turning curator into a true profession. At 20/80 I could genuinely imagine average joes buying $5000 worth of STEEM and setting up shop as a professional content hunter, almost like being a professional editor, but working for yourself rather than at a publisher. This could turn curators into the much needed gatekeepers for the indie publishing revolution.

Indie publishing is awesome, but it does have a weakness, which is that now we have an over-abundance of content. Now it is difficult for you to find quality content. So, Steem could have the potential for "employing" thousands of indie editors/curators that would support the indie content producer revolution with curation.

Think about it another way, what's a more profitable post? A post that gets 75% of $5 or 20% of $50? The percentage that content producers get is not as important as the amount of authors to curators. I would say that right now we have a massive imbalance in author to curator ratio, with there being more authors than curators. That's a problem, because we needs thousands or hundreds of thousands of curators to each author in order for authors to truly benefit on Steem. That's why I don't think it is problematic for curators to get a larger percentage.

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joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

Exactly. Thus why I call content creators like employers in the sense that bosses do better with more staff in some cases at least. It's a funnel. It's a sprinkler.

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kommienezuspadt (74) · 5 years ago

Well said, @timcliff. My commitment to Steemit hasn’t wavered at all. Once @mada first explained to me what the site and blockchain once, I had a very literal “You take the blue pill - the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill - you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes.” moment. I took the red pill. My distain for silo media, and the principle alone that I could earn anything at all for my content, was enough to lock me down till the bitter end.

In many ways, I think Steemit is well positioned right now. I hope HF21 solves a lot of these issues. I’m seeing dozens of my creator/illustrator/artist and model friends leave Instagram in hordes. It’s a mass exodus, and they’ll need somewhere to go.

I’m really excited about the DAO proposal platform. I have some very outside the box ideas and spent last week making wild pitches for projects to @lovejoy and @roadscape. The day that proposal submission form is live, I’m going to be bombarding the community with new ideas!

Thanks for always fighting the good fight, @timcliff!

free-reign (66) · 5 years ago

Is buying steem going to be easier?

timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

Not as a result of the hardfork.

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michealb (66) · 5 years ago

excellent!

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fleur (65) · 5 years ago

I am a fan of the Steem engine tokens with 50/50 and 60/40 split as I have always done manual curation and as an author, I find people are more likely to vote on my posts as they will be better rewarded. I think this change will improve the Steemit experience. Your post also clearly explains the changes in layman’s terms so is helpful, thanks. I would like to invest but the disparity between the higher bitcoin price and low steemit price is a deterrent. In the uk, you cannot exchange fiat directly for Steem and if this were to change and the interest rate was not extortionate, I would invest. My main motivation these days however are the spin offs, Steem engine (and initially actifit until the recent changes which made it less rewarding for the newer members) 🙏🏽

Posted using Partiko iOS

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joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

I hope so.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

SE tokens were not ninjamined. The massive stake differential on Steem is not present on SE tokens.

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angelro (58) · 5 years ago

Thank you Boss for writing a brief, articulate article on the new system in the simplest way possible. After going through many posts related to this there was more Confusion than clarity. Now this post cleared some basic doubts.

Though economy part was not my main aspect while I joined two years back I have to completely agree with the fact that steem had lost its appeal midway. Even I made a post on it. And we need Iittle more proactive approach to make the steem shining again so that everyone will gets benifited at the end.

Thank you, Have a good day

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sayee (66) · 5 years ago

I usually go by what my conscience says and something tells me that Steem is going to attain new heights. I may be wrong but if I am not, then we can sure see some happy faces of all those who invested heavily in Steem and believe in the power of what it can do.

As for good content and rewards and all, I think that a person writes because he/she wants to write for the sake of it and not just the rewards only. The incentive for curating good content will make people search for good work and make them share it as well. So, good content will certainly get more rewarded as you point out.
All the best and I believe in you guys. We are in good hands, so why worry?

valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

Ninjaminers hoarding more tokens will not grow Steem.

You had a choice: support HF21, or no longer be a witness.

I think you made the wrong choice.

timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

Ninjaminers hoarding more tokens will not grow Steem.

To be technical on wording, there was really only one ninja-miner: Steemit, Inc. Everyone else who mined tokens early were simply early adopters.

We can't keep looking at the way things have been and extrapolate out how they will be in the future under the new changes. Those of us who have been working on this (for literally years now) are hoping that as a result of these changes - six months from now we are looking at a totally new Steem. Whether we can pull it off remains to be seen, but I am hopeful.

You had a choice: support HF21, or no longer be a witness.

That is 100% false. If I was not in support of HF21, I likely could have stopped it. It is a choice between HF21 and the status quo though, and I am strongly in favor of the opportunity that HF21 gives us over the state we are currently in.

I think you made the wrong choice.

Fair enough. It is quite possible I did. The results of this HF are impossible to predict, but I chose to vote for the path that I felt gave us all the best opportunity to see the platform succeed in the long run.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

"If I was not in support of HF21, I likely could have stopped it."

I appreciate your measured response to quite inflammatory comment. I don't think you are right that you could have stopped HF21, but I certainly could be wrong. However, your integrity is showing here, in the face of my apparent hostility, so I will refrain from blaming you for what I believe will prove to be disastrous results. Clearly we simply disagree on certain matters, and you are utterly forthright in stating your positions AFAICT.

The coming market for flags will be disheartening to you I expect. It was not something that would have been revealed by testing, since those intent on profiting thereby would not have revealed their intentions during testing. Due to financial incentives, I expect shitflags to result from that market, just as shitposts have from bidbots. It's not as if we don't have evidence for shitflags and professional flaggers on Steem already, and enabling the cost of such flags to be offshored to the pool will greatly encourage that business model.

I have proposed mechanisms that will obviate profiteering, and Steem market cap has dropped ~50 places since I did. In the event you eventually realize that profiteering and capital gains are not compatible and are faced with taking action to promote capital gains as necessary to prevent further harm to Steem, please do consider those ideas. It was a while ago, and I know digging is a time sink, so upon inquiry I will be happy to either repost or reiterate them.

hobo.media (64) · 5 years ago

What I want to know from the witnesses is where this 20 STEEM number came from. Can I get a detailed explanation why it had to be 20 and not 5... 20 is really huge!

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago (edited)

The number was calculated by running the current voting data though the new rewards curve and comparing the results.

The problem with this discussion is that it assumes no changes in behavior among the voters. If there is no change in behavior, then things will be worse for users who are not earning much. The whole point of the hardfork though is to drive a change in behavior.

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hobo.media (64) · 5 years ago (edited)

I hope it does change behavior. I feel like Steem has drawn too many content producers compared to curators. I support the 50/50 change, I would have supported 20/80, I support the 20 STEEM threshold thing, though I wish it was 5, but I get the idea and agree. My main concern is the free downvotes. I get that a lot of people believe in downvotes, but I feel that too many people into the idea of being able to downvote stuff are not paying attention to how strongly it offends the downvoted person.

It literally enrages people, and I believe it creates a toxic environment. I believe in positive encouragement and techniques that favor quality over quantity, but I want a happy environment on Steem, not a battle. I want quality to win not because crap gets downvoted but because people just love the quality content producers. Youtube doesn't prevent you from putting complete garbage on their platform, but it simply won't earn anything because nobody values it. That is what Steem should do.

In my view we just need to encourage quality and not go after the crap. That is why I get the value of the 20 threshold (though I wish it as 5). It makes it extremely difficult for poor quality content to reward itself and rewards viral content. I'm down for that, I get the value there. But I do fear that the free downvotes are going to either lead us down a path of constant flag wars or overly authoritarian whales scaring the shit out of people like Aggroed just did. He threatened bidbot services, it doesn't get more authoritarian than that. I really wish we could utilize positivity rather than negativity. Imagine if Steemcleaners and flagrewards just hunted undervalued content. I think people would feel so much better about their experience on Steem.

timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

too many people into the idea of being able to downvote stuff are not paying attention to how strongly it offends the downvoted person.

Sorry, but users need to get accustom to the fact that there are downvotes. Downvotes are a necessary evil in order for stakeholders to decide BASED ON CONSENSUS what gets rewarded. Rewards are not rewards until all stakeholders have agreed through voting (or lack of voting) and the seven day payout is complete.

I know there are some stakeholders who take it a step too far and cross the line into an area where it becomes abusive. I am not trying to argue in favor of that, but in a decentralized system - we are not going to be able to control that type of thing completely.

If it becomes a big enough problem, then community members can propose solutions and get them funded via the SPS.

Youtube doesn't prevent you from putting complete garbage on their platform, but it simply won't earn anything because nobody values it. That is what Steem should do.

That's basically what downvotes do.

joanstewart (65) · 5 years ago

Appreciate your insight into imminent change Tim, let us hope this is the right way to tackle an ongoing problem.

Many invest both time and money into steem, those who arrived to rape the concept hopefully have moved on, with interested investors remaining.

Number of members is not always a criteria, commitment in assisting those who do put in the effort, growing a strong community will attract new arrivals when knowing what is expected.

Keep sharing steem content to other platforms, that in itself is advertising.

binkyprod (67) · 5 years ago

I will monitor the situation, but to know that content I share, for which I put weeks of work into, will be getting less, is very disheartening. Less rewards and then even less for earning less that 20 steem per post. I have invested over 2 years, am a delegator, contribute multiple times a week, have grown organicalky. I feel like Steemit is trying to push us away. I just can't see the positive. I want to be proven wrong, but I just can't see how hf21 will help minnows at all.

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

Do you want more users who have the ability to add significant rewards to your content to be actively seeking out good content to vote for? One of the goals is to make active curation profitable again, to the point that stakeholders opt for this rather than simply putting their stake towards passive income options like bid bots. Whether we can actually accomplish a culture change remains to be seen - but that is the goal.

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binkyprod (67) · 5 years ago

Well when you put it that way. I still don't like it, but I also want to be proven wrong. I have never used bots, so I'm not sure how those work, but if the change does make curators find good content and those of us who contribute all the time get more upvotes, then that compensates for the less rewards.

I also have a lot of concerns regarding the flagging downvote change. I worry there will be abuse and bullies.

I am willing to give the change a chance, like at any fork, because if I leave, it impacts the communities I'm a part of (gotta think of the family sometimes too) but if abuse and bullying happens and becomes a new norm, then I'm out. I won't be able go support a platform that encourages that kind of behaviour.

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

I share your concerns. Let’s hope it works out for the best :)

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lukestokes (75) · 5 years ago

Thank you, Tim. As always, you bring a voice of reason and personal responsibility which is the only thing which will move us forward.

hilarski (76) · 5 years ago

I hope you are right. I am a buyer of Steem here.

institutdpos (49) · 5 years ago

No other blockchain out there will be able to match steem for the next 3 years. So we have 3 years to make steem great again and later on build a bridge with other social network. Steem will be the glue. Steem on!

joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

True.

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steem-bounty (72) · 5 years ago

This post has been revived by steem-forever and will get extra rewards. This happens when a post is upvoted on steem-bounty.com after the 7 day post life.

Users can simple upvote via steem-bounty.com continously, so posts can live and earn rewards forever.
Authors can share their steem-bounty.com links and get upvoted forever.

We hope this will allow everyone to earn more meaningful rewards over longer timeframes than before.

theguruasia (67) · 5 years ago

@timcliff,
Not this one I am looking at the next fork! I think that's the major one in STEEM history!
$trdo

Cheers~

5 votes

trendotoken (59) · 5 years ago

Congratulations @theguruasia, you are successfuly trended the post that shared by @timcliff!
@timcliff got 6 TRDO & @theguruasia got 4 TRDO!

"Call TRDO, Your Comment Worth Something!"

^{To view or trade TRDO go to steem-engine.com

Token distribution bot developed by @ali-h}

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steevc (73) · 5 years ago

I've been saying for ages that we need good content to get rewarded better. There has been too much of a dash for cash. Investors would look at trending and see junk. I'm interested to see if that changes after next week. The economics of buying votes will change, but will it go away? The sellers will find other ways to keep going.

I believe in the potential of Steem, but it's really up to us all where it goes.

revisesociology (73) · 5 years ago

A nice write up.

The new system should also encourage more flagging of large abusers by smaller accounts...

Given that it will be much less worthwhile to post mediocre content (no one's going to be earning $5 for posting about their daily meal anymore) then they'll be less posting of that sort - so less or no opp for retaliation if they do flag larger accounts.

And of course flagging doesn't effect curation returns.

I think flagging's going to be key to this new system.working.

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joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

How did you make you avatar? Love it.

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blewitt (72) · 5 years ago (edited)

The 20 Steem threshold frightens me a bit to be honest. Most of my posts don’t obtain that and I’ve been here a year and a half, gone to Steemfest...networked...and gave out over $5000 worth of comic books to strangers at the event, work my ass off here, actively recruit new users in my community, and invested several thousand dollars of my hard earned money to purchase tasty Steem to power up and reward others. For the most part outside of a handful of folks, nobody gives a shit about what I post...and that’s fine.

I’m not entitled to anyone’s support or anything like that, but I’ll tell you this right now...a few people I’ve dragged on that have have been posting and interacting with some regularity are real nervous. These are the people who always fall below that threshold. I’ve been talking this place up and working my tail off to slowly and organically build my community, and pretty much everyone is going to be beaten down a bit more by this aspect. That’s a bit demoralizing and a slap in the face to new users. Just my opinion and I hope I’m wrong about this, but it is just THAT much harder for newer smaller users to build towards success here. That’s a shitty thing as it was already tough to do prior to Tuesday.

I’m hopeful that we as a community can work it all out and in time prosper...but there definitely is a bias towards the larger accounts with this specific move. I don’t see how anyone can honestly say otherwise with a straight face...

Can someone smarter than I am explain to me how this specific number was decided upon and the reasoning behind it?

timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

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blewitt (72) · 5 years ago

Good point. I guess we will have to wait and see. You guys are a gazillion times more knowledgeable than I am about the inner workings of this place so I’ll side with your background and expertise.

I just know that IF behaviors do not change, we are certainly in trouble. If we struggled to get new users to come and stay before....

But I’m hopeful.

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fredrikaa (70) · 5 years ago

It is too hard for new users to get noticed.
The platform is too confusing.
Signups are too difficult to onboard at scale.
There is a lack of funding (outside of Steemit, Inc.) to pay for community development and marketing.
Users who contribute a lot of value are not sufficiently rewarded.
Users who don't contribute a lot of value find ways to milk the system.
There is not enough of an incentive to buy and hold STEEM.

At least we found a way for us to fix 1,2,3,4 and 5 without the need for any forks :)

blewitt (72) · 5 years ago

Fingers crossed!!!

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jaguar.force (72) · 5 years ago (edited)

"Hardfork 20 alone is not going to get us there,"
typo, correct
Also, pass me the crack.

timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

Thanks :)

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curatorcat (67) · 5 years ago

It will definitely be interesting to see what happens with this hardfork @timcliff, and I think you hit the nail on the head with the statement that we need a culture change in order for this all to work out.

I definitely hope HF.21 takes us in the right direction.

For me (and maybe I am just totally out in left field with this) one of the "elephants in the room" that never gets talked about is a general lack of definition of what "this" actually IS. And — more specifically — the great emphasis often placed on the primary sales pitch to the external world (about Steem and all the communities) of "make money."

Truthfully? Most of us are here to make money, but there's a semantic disconnect in using that particular approach.

Why?

To MOST people (and ESPECIALLY those "trolling" for sources of "money for nothing") the idea of "making money" suggest that I DO something, get paid, and then walk away and buy a cup of coffee, or a pizza.

Why is this a problem? Because the implication is that we're all about current income (which drains the system and puts downward pressure on the price of Steem) rather than investing and gaining from longer term appreciation.

Hence, there is a HUGE difference between "create content and get paid" and "create content and become a stakeholder."

THAT, right there, surely must also be part of the cultural change we need to strive for, here...

I do share a lot of your optimism and hope for this community, but something has to give, in terms of how we approach telling others (externally) about what we have here!

=^..^=

kimzwarch (69) · 5 years ago

Love the write up! That definitely sums up what will be happening in the coming week where HF will take course. Curation is definitely a very important part to incentify users to write more and better contents here on Steemit as well as other alt platform that utilize Steem blockchain. By having that good chain of incentives, it will get more traction whereby Steemit could make things profitable through activities like ad. In overall, sustainable is the key!

camiloferrua (68) · 5 years ago

I really hope everyone does their part. I also believe in the great potential of this platform, but it has to be more friendly, the UI has to be changed and new apps developed.

Please take a look at this proposal I made some months ago.

I think projects like this are the way to make Steem more actractive to no crypto users.

timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

The SPS that is included in the hardfork will provide a mechanism for people to make proposals and have them funded.

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joeyarnoldvn (61) · 5 years ago

Awesome.

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stuffbyspencer (61) · 5 years ago

Hey @timcliff, could you explain to me how you see the new 50/50 reward split is going to encourage whales to manually curate?

Dies the increase in curation rewards also benefit bidbots? Why wouldn't one just keep their steem going towards that, a lot easier to make profits no?

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

It is going to depend on whether the new economic model results in a culture change.

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stuffbyspencer (61) · 5 years ago

That sounds... not very promising haha

I don't see how a change in code will result in a change of whale's minds.

Profit is profit, people will seek it above all else, always.

Would love to be proven wrong about this though 🙃

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

Yes, the increase in curation rewards will inure to bidbots, and they will simply pass them on to delegators to maintain their profitability.

Whales will just make more Steem, although they'll make less money. The ninjaminers didn't invest to get their stake, and seem to have little grasp of how to encourage capital gains. Profiteering and capital gains are diametrically opposed, and considering the market and marketing department a drain on ROI is why user retention is horrible.

HF21 exacerbates all the things that chase off new users, reduces the price of Steem, and worst of all will be the downvote pool, because substantial stakeholders will use it to flag rewards back to the pool, where they can extract ~90% of it. More actually, after HF21 more than halves author rewards.

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stuffbyspencer (61) · 5 years ago

So I take it your excited for the 27th eh?

Lol, jk. See, all of what you just said seems, to me at least, be the most likely outcome of this upcoming HF.

That's why it's pretty upsetting to hear people who are on the otherside, promising #newsteem & better mechanics, to simply respond to these criticisms with "Don't worry, it'll be ok because people are going to just magically change."

Like, no. Code can't do that to people. Or, at the very least, this code won't.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

LOL This is why I have an exwife.

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stuffbyspencer (61) · 5 years ago

lol 😂

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resources (44) · 5 years ago

steemit resources.png
Word cloud of this post and all comments.
Brought to you by @resources and https://worditout.com/

amico (66) · 5 years ago

People definitely need to rise up!
!giphy rise+up 👆

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giphy (53) · 5 years ago

// You can support giphy by using one of your witness votes on untersatz! //

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briggsy (64) · 5 years ago (edited)

This goes a long way to solving a fundamental problem with Steem, and that is the automated systems that take a little slice of Steem (basically a transaction fee) to provide a service that solves a problem that these systems created in the first place.

Upvote bots are not a long term sustainable business model, and it's obvious that the velocity of Steem has plummeted even as the price drops and the supply inflates. While the bots can be used to fund a project, Steem-engine is even more effective to fund a project in that users will fund a good idea, instead of someone running a bidbot to fund a project that they personally think is great but may flop because it wasn't something users want.

Steem is prepped to take an evolutionary step, and the bidbots are going to shrink in the broader ecosystem where creativity and innovation get the funding instead of a vote-ception market. And vote bots will die anyway and be replaced with communities that collectively vote where the good content is, instead of letting their account be used for paid upvotes that only reinforce a need for paid upvotes to keep the circle jerk going.

End of an era, beginning of a new era. The negativity surrounding these changes is to be expected, but once the growth and potential of a broader system is realized, the developers who are simply in for a quick buck will be forced to compete in a broader software market against other talent for funding, which will increase the price of Steem on the open market and incentivize developers to produce content that users actually want.

HF 21 gives hope.

10 votes

tattoodjay (73) · 5 years ago

Such an interestign read and I am waiting to see how the Hard Fork affects the platform, it could be a good thing rat least I hope so it will most likely reduce what I earn on posts but if it does lead to an increase inthe value of Steem and the interest for people to get on board with Steem in the long run it will be a good think

chireerocks (72) · 5 years ago

@timcliff, This will be time taking Process but for sure Culture Change is needed, if we will not change then change will change us itself. Stay blessed.

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago

Well said!

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improv (67) · 5 years ago

The huge thing that you and all the other folks proclaiming that this solves problems are missing is:

Steem is a social media site. Most interactions are people interacting with their community. The communities that thrive draw new people in. Not rich investors usually, but friends and family. You're all jumping the gun on this "Steem is broken" line and throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

The new curve is going to incentivize piling on to popular content rather than discovering and welcoming new users. If my vote can give someone I like $0.20 or someone I don't know yet $0.10, I'm going to vote for the former. And will I ever offer an encouraging upvote on comments??? Never. Because the comment isn't going to get other votes.

You will change the behavior of most users. You will change it so that we no longer behave like regular people.

I joined just before we got linear rewards. I was near quitting feeling like my posts would never be worth anything. Then it switched. I didn't know why at the time, but suddenly they were worth more. They were proportionately as valuable as other posts I saw around. Still less, but not exponentially less. It made this thing seem possible.

I wish the people in power had the imagination to understand what Steem is like for minnows and what it will be like in hf21. And not everyone is the same. But for a lot of users who have given a lot to building and bringing their communities to the platform, it will be a gut punch.

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anonsteve (62) · 5 years ago (edited)

Steem is a social media site. Most interactions are people interacting with their community. The communities that thrive draw new people in. Not rich investors usually, but friends and family.

This is precisely where Steem is failing. Very few people want to expose their Steem wallet to the world while having it tied to their walking world identity. Do you accurately report your Steem income to the IRS? If not, would you want hundreds of people in the walking world to know that @improv is you? Only one person you have pissed off could cause you significant harm by reporting your Steem income to the IRS if you don't accurately report and pay earned income tax on your rewards. And everybody's wallet and their post earnings are displayed by every front end.

If everyone were able to carefully track their Steem earnings and sell enough of the liquid portion of their income to pay their taxes, that would add a great deal of selling pressure on STEEM.

If we want millions of new users, they will have to be entirely cut off from the reward pool. Billions of people happily use social media without ever earning a single cent. Light accounts (mere wallet addresses) are key. Those users will not come here to earn money but to spend it on playing games like Splinterlands. Blogging for crypto will be remain a mere footnote in Steem's history. Those who mined STEEM were the first wave of early adopters. Those who earned it by creating and curating content were the second wave of early adopters. The masses will not earn anything here. They will be the consumers who will spend money here. There is no other way the economy will be able to work in the first place.

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improv (67) · 5 years ago

Well that's certainly one vision for Steem. It's not an inspiring one, seeing as traditional social media already serves that purpose. Why would anyone switch to Steem in your vision of that future?

Also also, "people won't want money because then they have to pay taxes" seems illogical at best. In the world where Steem incomes are prominent and reliable, a service to take care of your Steem taxes for a fee seems like a profitable business idea. Do people avoid buying stocks and bonds because they have to pay taxes on profits?

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anonsteve (62) · 5 years ago

Well that's certainly one vision for Steem. It's not an inspiring one, seeing as traditional social media already serves that purpose. Why would anyone switch to Steem in your vision of that future?

People certainly are not switching to Steem now. On the other hand, billions of people have joined traditional social media.

But social media is by no means the only possible use case of Steem. Steem can also store JSON objects (text), which is made use of by many games such as Splinterlands. Blockchains allow for the true ownership of digital assets such as Splinterlands cards. The state of the game is recorded on Steem, which means that even if the creators of the went AWOL and shut down the front end, anyone could develop a replacement and the players could continue the game. That is impossible on a traditional centralized platform.

Also also, "people won't want money because then they have to pay taxes" seems illogical at best. In the world where Steem incomes are prominent and reliable, a service to take care of your Steem taxes for a fee seems like a profitable business idea. Do people avoid buying stocks and bonds because they have to pay taxes on profit?

We are extremely far from Steem incomes being prominent and reliable. Most people here are anonymous or pseudonymous and are most likely not paying taxes on their income, which makes it understandable that they're not "doxxing" themselves en masse out there. There are very few people on here willing to go and get people to join Steem in the walking world, which organic growth is all about.

You do realize that if everyone actually paid tax on their earned Steem income, that would increase the selling pressure tremendously.

Also, it is completely impossible to pay any kind of significant rewards to, say, hundreds of millions of Steemians in any case. It's completely clear that even with the low price of Steem, most of the content here is not worth the fiat value of the rewards. STEEM is a middle-tier altcoin whose valuation is largely speculative at this stage.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

No. Most people that come here aren't leaving because of potential tax liabilities. It's a non issue. You equate blogging with mining, ignoring that Steem was actually mined into existence.

Lite accounts are crap. No one wants them. People want to participate in social interactions, and the FAANGs prove that social media is the most profitable business model in existence today.

Unless Steem enables rewards to inure to folks that socially interact here, it's gonna continue to die. You advocate a gaming platform. You aren't on one. This is Steem. The gaming platform you seek is called Steam.

Lrn 2 difference.

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anonsteve (62) · 5 years ago

No. Most people that come here aren't leaving because of potential tax liabilities.

I've never said people are leaving because of potential tax liabilities. What I've said is that most people are not inviting friends and family to join partly because they don't want people who know their real identities to know they're earning on Steem, some very significant amounts, and that this is partly because most of them are not paying any tax on their Steem income.

It's a non issue.

It most certainly is not a non issue.

You equate blogging with mining, ignoring that Steem was actually mined into existence.

What are you talking about? Income gained by blogging on Steem is earned income. The issue of mining has nothing whatsoever to do with this. And despite some STEEM having been premined, most STEEM that will exist will be generated as content rewards.

Lite accounts are crap. No one wants them. People want to participate in social interactions, and the FAANGs prove that social media is the most profitable business model in existence today.

Using a lite account doesn't mean one cannot participate in social interactions on Steem. That is entirely doable using guest accounts provided and maintained by an app. Logging into the app could be done using one's Facebook account, an email address or whatever. That is the most convenient way for the average person to use any app. The average person doesn't give a flying fuck about decentralization and I suspect will not be bothered with creating an account for themselves using AnonSteem or any such service or even to maintain their own keys.

Unless Steem enables rewards to inure to folks that socially interact here, it's gonna continue to die.

Steem has failed to even begin mass onboarding. I've found the opportunity to earn to be highly suspicious in the minds of a lot of people I've told about Steem. And I'm not the only one having observed that. For me, it's a complete no-brainer to use it to earn. But most people do not care about that at all. In a way, that will make things massively easier for Steem as an ecosystem because it implies that the masses can be onboarded without any need for them to earn anything, just consume and pay for shit. They will eventually give our investment the kind of value we're hoping it to have one day.

You advocate a gaming platform. You aren't on one. This is Steem. The gaming platform you seek is called Steam.

(Steam does not provide players true ownership of their digital assets because it's centralized.)

App developers do not need your permission to develop precisely the kind of apps they see fit. Splinterlands operates completely outside the reward system. It has nothing to do with creating content. It is arguably the healthiest and most thriving application in the entire ecosystem.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

Steem isn't decentralized. A couple dozen people own the accounts that possess the vast majority of Steem - all of which was originally mined by the ninjaminers. The rewards being issued are a fraction of that Steem, and most of them inure to the original ninjaminers because they use stake weighting to extract them into the wallets of their thousands of accounts.

The votes for witnesses are stake weighted, and therefore the witnesses serve at the behest of the ninjaminers. Splinterlands is great for folks that want to play games. Folks that want to play games are a fraction of the folks that want to engage on social media. You can restrict your vision of Steem however you want, but your claims and plans basically are in denial of provable facts.

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anonsteve (62) · 5 years ago (edited)

Steem isn't decentralized. A couple dozen people own the accounts that possess the vast majority of Steem - all of which was originally mined by the ninjaminers. The rewards being issued are a fraction of that Steem, and most of them inure to the original ninjaminers because they use stake weighting to extract them into the wallets of their thousands of accounts.

I was originally talking about Steem rewards being taxable as earned income, in which context what you're saying above is completely irrelevant.

Splinterlands is great for folks that want to play games. Folks that want to play games are a fraction of the folks that want to engage on social media. You can restrict your vision of Steem however you want,

Despite paying its users to use it Steem is failing to attract large crowds of users. Steem is still paying its users something rather than nothing unlike every mainstream social media platform in existence.

Why is the Steem user base not growing organically and fast at that if the rewards are such an important attraction? (Surprisingly, they're not. Mainstream people can't be bothered with learning to use Steem and earn some money while blogging. Very few Steemians have been able to get people to join and STAY on Steem for any length of time. Either the rewards are too good to be true and stories of them are met with extreme scepticism or they're measured in pennies and nobody gives a fuck. Not even piss poor Venezuelan students who you'd think be interested in grabbing whatever money coming their way are clamoring to join Steem. These facts really boggle the mind.)

but your claims and plans basically are in denial of provable facts.

You can repeat that to yourself if it makes you feel better.

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

My point in response to your claim that aversion to taxation was a primary reason people weren't Steemers was that it was irrelevant, and the overwhelming majority of Steem was not available to most users on which to be taxed. You claimed that was not true, and now you claim that despite it being true it is irrelevant. You may not like the facts, but bobbing and weaving around them will not make your statements true.

"Why is the Steem user base not growing organically and fast at that if the rewards are such an important attraction?"

I address this issue in detail elsewhere. To skim: financial rewards are NOT a primary reason people interact socially, and people are extremely sensitive to fairness. Indeed, vertebrates are extremely sensitive to fairness, meaning it isn't just some meme issue. Dogs will fight to the death over tidbits if they are provided intentionally unfairly.

Profiteering is destructive of business endeavors, and the ninjaminers were great coders, not experienced investors that were well informed regarding mechanisms potentiating capital gains, the means used to drive investment since prehistory. ROI is not capital gains.

You can ignore these facts to your heart's content. That won't make them go away, and when you do not acknowledge facts your statements will remain false.

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

The new curve is not a switch back to the old curve. I don’t know what else I can say other than I have the exact same concerns as you do, and I agree that they are valid concerns. Despite that however, I still feel very strongly that we need these changes.

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improv (67) · 5 years ago

Can we not make the two other EIP changes without the curve? Are top witnesses prepared to roll back the changes efficiently if what we think will probably happen seems to be happening? In talking to witnesses, it seems like everyone is especially concerned about the curve. That seems valid. Why isn't anybody leading from the front on changing that component? It's not too late.

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago (edited)

The time to decide against particular portions of the package has past. We don’t get to pick and choose parts at this point, we either accept the changes as a package or we don’t.

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improv (67) · 5 years ago

I mean, I'd say everyone should reject the package as a whole and then implement a package without the curve. You've all been aware of this problem the whole time, but it seems like it's been too late to change anything since it was announced. Someone has to be willing to do the right thing even when there's tremendous pressure to go along with what was decided by others.

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

There was a lot of discussion about this prior to the hardfork being developed. There is consensus among the witnesses to proceed forward. You frame it as the “right” vs. “wrong” thing, but it is not that simple. I do not think that what we are doing is wrong, otherwise I would not be voting for it. The hardfork is the best deal we could come up with to try and fix our issues that could be developed in a reasonable amount of time and be accepted by a super majority of witnesses.

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improv (67) · 5 years ago

Fair enough.

You know how many of us are frustrated, though, right? There was to be community feedback on the proposed changes. Before we had a chance to point out the flaws and suggest fixes, it was a done deal. All we can do now is oppose it. And since the changes do especially benefit those with large stakes and we aren't far enough into this for the stake to have significantly decentralized, it's not something that even a bunch of dolphins can effectively oppose, let alone minnows.

It will be harder than ever to decentralize, as the funds will flow to those who can get whale votes even more, which has always proved to be whales themselves.

We all hope I'm wrong at this point, but if hopes were horses, we'd be crushed in a stampede.

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

I do. There was a lot of feedback taken into account before consensus was reached. There was a lot of back and forth, push and pull. In my view, this really was the best possible deal that we could all reach. I am excited and hopeful that this HF will be a really big (positive) deal and that six months from now Steem will be a very different (better) place. I'm of course worried too, for all the same reasons that you are. The results of all this are going to be impossible to predict, so at this point all we can do is hope for the best and do what we can on an individual level to turn this into the place we all want it to be.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

"Are top witnesses prepared to roll back the changes efficiently if what we think will probably happen seems to be happening?"

No. They're not going to do that. Exchanges don't like HFs.

I don't think what exchanges like or don't like is going to matter much when none of them will exchange Steem after it crashes.

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holoz0r (71) · 5 years ago

I'm looking forward to increased curation, but as a creator; I'm not looking forward to the inequitable decline in reward for my time.

Curation is fast and easy. Taking the time to produce and share content that is too often under rewarded sees many talented authors go elsewhere with a captive audience.

I really hope the quality of engagement improves dramatically.

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

I think the core point here is that if Steem does not right its course and become more successful, all the "STEEM rewards" in the world are still worth next to nothing. Job #1 in the success of Steem. Who gets what rewards within the system, how much, and for what reason are all a distant second.

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holoz0r (71) · 5 years ago

We need to significantly simplify onboarding (not through "light" accounts), ensure consistent contributors of quality, unique content are rewarded for their labours, and at the same time, give people a reason to use / trade / "spend" Steem.

I agree with a "course-righting" move, but fear that many (barely) (be it in Steem, or fiat) rewarded creators that I regularly support may just find it not worth their time.

Those that persevere through this, and remain highly engaged will reap the eventual rewards.

The size of those rewards is yet to be determined.

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago

So far the biggest problem numerically has not been onboarding, it has been retention. We've onboarded probably close to a million users (over a million accounts, but after subtracting the obviously fraudulent ones, the true number is likely below a million but not hugely below). Yet most of those users are gone, having given up long ago. I've personally created accounts manually for several dozen people to help them get around the clunky registration system, yet only a tiny handful (maybe just one or two) of those people is still around.

There are many challenges to address, which of course has both upside (if they are addressed) and downside (if they are not).

As for what is worth people's time, Steem has lost 99% of its (fiat/purchasing-power) value. That's the main reason why anything would not be worth someones time, why development resources to address usability, feature, and retention issues is a huge obstacle, etc. Getting worked up about relatively small reallocations of that massively shrinking total value is a huge distraction from the challenges we face. IMO.

holoz0r (71) · 5 years ago

Why do people leave the platform entirely?

What can we do to keep them coming "back to the window?"

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago

Those are great questions and I don't have an easy answer other than to say we haven't yet found a formula that really works. We need to keep iterating.

holoz0r (71) · 5 years ago

I'd like to offer an answer from my own brain...

Creators require some sort of support or "patronage" to make their "art" - the trope of the starving artist exists for a reason. Just like all things, if something doesn't make economic sense (ie: ROI) why would anyone bother doing it?

Further to this, creators, and artists, musicians, writers and like minded individuals will create whether there is an audience or not.

Whether they'll share that work or not depends on a number of reasons. They may have an exclusivity clause with another publisher, venue, or gallery. They don't "own" that content, and the only reason they can "live" is because the big "corp" stands behind them while milking them as the teat of a cow.

The difference between this traditional model and Steem is similar to btc and wealth. With btc you can "be your own bank", and with Steem you can be "you own content".

If, as a "capitalist creator" (if such a thing exists, you'll go where the payoff is greatest)

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holoz0r (71) · 5 years ago

And part two (because I forgot the second question and on mobile)...

A real sense that there's a constant stream of new content that engages with that individual - tribes are doing this to some extent, and gets me the feeling of subreddits, and that, in combination with the "free downvotes" coming in HF21 makes me keen to reward the better content by actively downvoting the "unfit" and "bad" content.

I'll be justifying my downvotes with comments, I hope that others will do the same.

Community led moderation(something not necessarily stake weighted but 1 person = 1 vote) is something I'd personally like.

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goldmanmorgan (59) · 5 years ago

'iterating' and 'hashing' .... :/ is not words you bring the masses in with im gone but im just here for one last constructive on the main

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

"Steem has lost 99%..."

Profiteering destroys capital gains.

HF21 doubles down on profiteering.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

Huh. So the incentive to participate and grow Steem is a distant second to growing Steem.

Makes sense. In some other universe.

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

Participating does not in and of itself grow Steem. There are many milkers who are "participating" and doing nothing for growth. What matters more is the nature of the participation and how much various forms of participation actually align with growth and value add in practice.

The incentives need to be more precise framed and effectively targeted. HF21 is a sincere attempt to at least start do that. I respect your point of view if you disagree that's what it will accomplish, and I don't even necessarily disagree with the prediction but that is the purpose of it.

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

I have thought pretty hard about your comment. While I don't disagree that many (perhaps better phrased as much stake) are extracting more than they add, I do disagree that Steem will benefit most from seeking to align users to it's particular goals.

"Participating does not in and of itself grow Steem."

The reason I reckon Steem should not seek to specify which users are most promoted is because I disagree with the quoted statement. Folks that troll, post pics of their breakfast or stolen memes are actual members of society, and their participation broadens the inclusivity of Steem social media - an existentially important feature of a social media platform intent on mass onboarding.

In fact all participation does grow Steem, although certain extractive participation also shrinks Steem more. Insofar as a particular viewpoint is promoted by design, this will be based on the particular biases of those doing the promoting. On Steem this will very likely be devs and cryptocurrency advocates, and particularly Steem boosters. This is a small subset of society, and such promotion will only seek that subculture, not the masses.

I find the idea of communities responsive to my expectation that the masses will sort per their values and interests. This potentiates the market for Steem to grow to the limit of the ability of communities to represent society, which maximizes the market for Steem best IMHO.

As you have pointed out, sometimes quantity creates quality, and this is true for financial markets and social media platforms alike.

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago

In fact all participation does grow Steem, although certain extractive participation also shrinks Steem more

I'll just leave that right there. Or maybe amend my statement to be "Participating does not in and of itself grow Steem net net"

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deemarshall (66) · 5 years ago

I have noticed that some Stakeholders are creating new identities on, I think, Github and Steempeak. Will they be able to make more curation payments for themselves by upvoting their own posts with these new identities?

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

The amount someone earns is 100% based on the stake behind the votes, not the number of accounts voting.

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deemarshall (66) · 5 years ago

Thank you for info.

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

Yes, they will. Upvoting their own accounts will deliver to them both curation rewards, from the upvoting account, and author rewards. The ratios to each will change, but they will capture all the rewards if they well stake their voting accounts.

They're fitting to game curation based on curation rules that benefit early, large votes best. Stake weighting. In this way they will capture the value of other people upvotes as well.

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deemarshall (66) · 5 years ago

Thanks for confirming what I thought. I suspected that was why they are creating so many accounts even paying for them. Ah well, if you can afford it, make it work for you, I suppose. The accounts are usually operated by voting bots so it's easy money.

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago

Don't be misled by confirmation bias. The information @timcliff gave you is correct and the information @valued-customer gave you is not correct.

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deemarshall (66) · 5 years ago

Okay, thank you for your info.

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valued-customer (67) · 5 years ago

So a big fat upvote right after the timer runs out doesn't capture all the curation rewards? I'm sure all the curators and guilds using that principle to gain financial rewards will be surprised to hear it.

I'm not much of a curator, and I could be wrong I suppose. I just upvote what I want to encourage. Doesn't pay much, and it won't after HF21, but that's because real curation isn't undertaken for money.

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smooth (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

Voting after the timer only works if there are no/few votes already during the timer. That's generally not the case for well-known content, so if you do have the chance to get in the first vote after the timer, this is lesser-known content for which curation should be more rewarded, but where you are also likely taking a chance on whether the content will get significantly more votes anyway. If it doesn't then you get some curation share from your own vote but it isn't much, relatively speaking.

There is nothing wrong with some people curating for profit and others doing so in a more casual manner. It is exactly the same as anything else in life where some people will devote a lot of effort to optimizing and strategizing and generally get more out of it and others won't.

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kiaromauw (42) · 5 years ago

Just joined in yesterday. Hope it’ll be a good one :)

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tuck-fheman (74) · 5 years ago

great initiative!

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happyphoenix (66) · 5 years ago

I just hope that HF-21 will attract new good stakeholders, because for this time there isn't many good stakeholders who concern about good users in this platform.
Steem for this moment only full with speculation investor, they only take profit and leave after get it. They're only Short player.

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goldmanmorgan (59) · 5 years ago

something constructive before i pick up my vow of silence and hope to keep it for a week

blame, blame, always blame, not the part where i dont see "reward discarded" as i dont feel anyone should but steemit itself (but i also feel no one should get paid to run a node ... i'm a weird mofo after all)

See that feed ? that's not blame, that's hard reality on "bills have to be paid" but also the biggest dump because there's no alternate source of income
You got here, a huge pack of IT-genius who could easily provide service, PAID, to third party (there was also the option when the world was young to PATENT a system that's more than unique enough i like to think)

BRIBING ... steemit never votes ?

bribing zynga to bring farmville ... panem et circenses (but i guess that's morally not acceptable in the "the right way to do things" you need to bring a friend with money into the hyperinflation and his 50 euros will do the trick)

sarcasticat at your service, its the world of finance, no compassion in the marketplace , i really dont believe the "ask not what your country can do for you" approach is gonna bear much fruit and yet i really hope i will be proven wrong on that part

there's more than zynga, my little script to calculate a votes worth seems to be broken , probably the json output changed but it doesnt matter and last time i checked they were at 32 million, now at 29 .... q.e.d. and resting that case b/c it really feels like its way too much on my head daily for getting zero cents a year out of it with about 90% of all steem i have paid for out of my own pockets ...

gud then, a month of silence but the posts (if anyone checks my thing , that stripmining i do here for four cents a post is basically a demo of what you can do with a €150 pc with a celeron cpu, steemchain and condenser, comes down to something that i been running since 6 months before the first announcements of SMT's, runs steem-equivalent at a level of 25 digits deep (but only uses 8) and is intended to be playcoin for a game im trying to develop) @tyrnannoght , https://tyrnannoght.alleycat.be with an e.t.a. of nAn, around 2050 maybe as its just me, but at least im trying (to get something that gets me actual money)

kudos ...

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mysearchisover (70) · 5 years ago

Plerase undelegate to and/or take me off the @spaminator hitlist!.

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

I have no control over the list. Have you reached out and talked to them?

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mysearchisover (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

I've commented on their blog and comments.
I guess I need to go on discord or something??? I'm not even sure how I can find them on discord or if it is even possible to find them on discord. For all I know I am completely SOL.
Feel free to share any ideas you may have. :(
I realized killing accounts was a key feature of Steemit.com but I guess now it's like the #1 priority by far. lol

https://discord.gg/7FkETjJ

timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

Here is a link to their discord. If you go there and try to have an adult conversation about why they are downvoting your account and what you can do to resolve the situation, then they should be able to help. If you go in there with an entitled attitude and vent about what they should/shouldn’t be able to do with their stake - it is a lot less likely to be productive.

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mysearchisover (70) · 5 years ago

I think guiltyparties runs Spaminator and I think he took me off. :)
I think https://discord.gg/wNJuwfV is the correct discord.
Hopefully they start checking their replies on Steemit but I guess they only run on discord.

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

Cool, glad you got it figured out.

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haikubot (54) · 5 years ago

I have no control
Over the list. Have you reached
Out and talked to them?

^{- timcliff}

^{^{I'm a bot. I detect haiku.}}

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coinchaos (63) · 5 years ago

We are all crabs in the bucket.

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doitvoluntarily (77) · 5 years ago

looking forward to see how the changes unfold 😎

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arcange (73) · 5 years ago (edited)

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steem-ua (64) · 5 years ago

Hi @timcliff!

Your post was upvoted by @steem-ua, new Steem dApp, using UserAuthority for algorithmic post curation!
Your UA account score is currently 7.189 which ranks you at #75 across all Steem accounts.
Your rank has not changed in the last three days.

In our last Algorithmic Curation Round, consisting of 147 contributions, your post is ranked at #1. Congratulations!

Evaluation of your UA score:

Your follower network is great!
The readers appreciate your great work!
Great user engagement! You rock!

Feel free to join our @steem-ua Discord server

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aaronhawk (57) · 5 years ago

Thank you for restoring hope for this project!

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witnessnews (2) · 5 years ago

This post has been resteemed by @witnessnews.

Follow @witnessnews to keep up with active witness updates.

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pennsif (79) · 5 years ago

This post has been included in the latest edition of The Steem News - a compilation of the key news stories on the Steem blockchain.

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mysearchisover (70) · 5 years ago

FYI I don't think @spaminator really needs your delegation. lol

Why does Steemit focus of killing accounts?

If it wasn't for Steemleo.com I might be 100% back on Facebook. lol

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

What’s the issue?

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mysearchisover (70) · 5 years ago

I finally made the hit list and noticed that even without your delegation they have plenty of power to kill off all the accounts on their hit list.

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

What did you do to get on it?

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mysearchisover (70) · 5 years ago

I think about a week ago. Maybe 2 weeks.

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

No, not when - what? What did you do to get on the list?

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mysearchisover (70) · 5 years ago

I think maybe protesting? Could have been using bots though. Hard to say. I think I'm on both spaminator's list and Mackbot's. At least my comments aren't banned from the platform yet like coininstant's. lol

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timcliff (73) · 5 years ago

You could try talking to them. They are usually willing to back off if it was targeting a specific behavior and the behavior stops.

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mamunedt (31) · 5 years ago

Good post

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drhoofman (49) · 5 years ago

Upvote 100% and resteem! Good luck to us all!

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jaydih (79) · 5 years ago

Very motivating post! Great!

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drakos (70) · 5 years ago (edited)

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Reveal Comment

shadowspub (70) · 5 years ago

@drakos I absolutely love your consistency in speaking up on this. Thank you

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