Ouch. . .wow. . .yikes. Things did take a nasty turn here. But you can expect me to side with Cork, if not in tone, then in principle. It's the effective charity work that made me want to align with his witness and become part of it. Those accomplishments are irrefutable. I realize that in a cutthroat world, altruism and philanthropy are the wrong horses to bet on. But I'll put my money on them every time, regardless.

Cork's "delivery" doesn't bother me overmuch because I'd rather see someone walk the walk than talk the talk. Is it really arrogance if it's true? Maybe, but how else would the point get made? This is the Wild West, and everyone is scrabbling for a foothold. I'd like to see less nastiness on the platform overall. But I can dream, right?

For what it's worth, I am for things that make sense. Decaying vote power for dead or dying witnesses is logical. A voting page with more than 50 choices is logical, as well. The platform is growing. These types of things need to grow with it.

Anyone who thinks we don't have problems here at Steemit needs only to look at the statistics published last week by paulag . New user signup is down by 50%. That should be scaring the shit out of anyone with a vested interest in the platform. Or maybe I just don't know what's happening behind the scenes, i.e.: if there's a reason investors want users to go away. The only thing I can do is assure everyone that I'm doing everything in my power to make this a place where content creators feel welcome and appreciated. That in itself is a battle royale in the current paradigm.

Becoming part of a witness team with Sircork (or anyone else) is not going to give me an edge with that. I know this. I labor under no misapprehension. But I do think top level witnesses are out of touch with things happening at the "street level" of Steemit. Basically what I've seen in this conversation is Cork raising his voice to be heard over the noise, and feeling frustrated at the amount of effort it takes to get a point across. Maybe witnesses do need better communication across the ranks. I think the business model of Steemit will have to incorporate a lot of changes like that to make it as scaleable as it needs to be to survive.