Bid bot owners, please unvote this abuse.
Blacklist will not stop this from recurring. We need firm action.
Attention Steem Community!
I wanted to bring this to your attention. We worked to remove as much rewards as possibly and kindly asked @MinnowBooster and @SmartSteem to unvote this blatant abuse.
We have already hit it with the flag trail and hardly left a dent. I now bring it before you to review as a last ditch effort. Feel free to drop your flags and xlaim @steemflagrewards votes via flag mention comments. See the other comment we left for an example
This is a problem.
Easy reverse image Source
After bringing this to the attention of both @minnowbooster and @smartsteem, the best we got is them being added to their blacklist by MB.
I am hoping that @therealwolf will take action to demonstrate the risk of loss when abusing on this platform. Blacklisting is not enough or giving a mere warning. Giving slaps on the wrist (if you would even call them that) will not quell the abuse.
Do you think that stops abuse? No..They simply move the funds to the next account? Then, rinse and repeat. It's like taking 🍬 from a baby!
The cycle perpetuates. When we leave votes on worthless content? Is that curation? What about proof of brain? Do we even care about these things???
I'm not happy. Far from it. This makes me question what the point of what I do is. Why do I work so hard so these usees failing or refusing to unvote undermines those efforts everyday? Of mine and every honest person on this platform. It's unsat.
Use you witness votes wisely, friends
I think I am just about done with this platform and having to deal with this crap. Any bot owner that willfully leaves a vote on content positively identified as abuse is doing the platform and community a disservice.
@reggaemuffin and @thecryptodrive. Please, I ask you to not let this stand.
I appeal to your sense of community as both standing members of the @steemalliance working group to show us your resolve for the platform and it's community. You have been elected to serve the interests of the community so here is the opportunity to demonstrate.
Update: Had a case of mistaken identity, @thecryptodrive is not a member of the WG.
I would love to hear the communities opinion on this. Is a mere warning or blacklist sufficient for a user attempting to abuse or should there be a stiffer penalty?
¡ARG!, I guess I will have to wait until someone with the true skills & willingness to build this so desired Steem SimCity utopia. Like this one we are all living in here right now. Finally can be able to come with something better conceived, masterfully coded and well designed from the roots up. 😡
Those bots ain't got no sense of morals, or right or wrong, like or dislike. They just do what they're programmed to do. Of course, you know all this.
To ask the admins to check every vote that gets cast, how does that incentivise them to make more profits and have more freetime on their hands? Going to call on their sense of moral justice?
Eventually, some people get tired of that when they feel like shining white ethics are getting in the way of their ability to make fast, easy, and continuous money. Maybe they just want to look like they are mostly good, and not all bad, by demonstrating that they do good things to make up for the bad stuff they didn't intend to enable.
Time to start calling out which witnesses are benefiting from possible misconduct. Often times these guys are backing the witnesses with their votes. True colors start to show.
Thanks for bringing this to everybody's attention @anthonyadavisii.
The problem is three-fold in my view:
1. ALL bots should be banned! (Maybe we should have a bot killer? LOL)
2. All meme's, funny pictures and videos should be banned.
3. People who upvote memes, funny pictures and videos are clearly not the brightest sparks in the matchbox so should be banned.
It's a nice idea but I am joking of course, apart from number 3 perhaps? ;-)
Don't forget, you can upvote comments as well as posts!
Lol
We'll, I enjoy original memes. Keyword original. There is so much derivative junk memea being rewarded more than creative work on this platform it is mind-boggling.
I created a meme curation and abuse fighting program called @smartmeme to combat the meme ripoffs artists and reward original creators for that reason.
If this user does not relent, I will coordinate flag campaigns and everybody here that flags can earn their esteemed position in the meme rank.
On that note, plan on updating the ranks to add Dr. Downvote from YouTube. He's a character from Nerd City. I appreciate good YT commentary channels that rip on bad content creators. We need some of that on Steem as it is a gold mine for silly narcissists.
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lol
The @dolphincouncil hold a combined SP of over 1million. @kabir88 is it possible your group could address this please ? A further 1m hit would make a hole in their profits.
hey @nathen007, we don't have a coordinated approach to flags at the @dolphincouncil just yet, but I have sent a link to the all our members on discord, so hopefully you will find a few more flags there to support soon
Whoa. They're strong already. Wish I were a dolphin.
On day you will my friend.Keep working :-)
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When I joined steem, to buy your way into dolphin status would have cost $3*5000, which is $15,000!
Today at $0.34, it costs $1,700.
I know some are waiting for a further drop before buying in, it may come... It may not.
Either way, earning more steem always helps
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Given how often "rinse and repeat" is literally utilized, it would be wiser to include whitelists in the mix. Then again, with recent examples we have seen, some people take the time to infiltrate the ranks in order to benefit from the votes.
Realistic me says that perpetual whack-a-mole is in our future.
It will never be resolved. Nobody will bother to hire "curators" to check out bids as they are sent. Everything that is done on the platform to combat abuse is
reactionaryandpassive. There are very few active approaches to prevent them from happening.I won't say much, everything that could be said was already said in the comments... the only thing that I can add is "ban all bidbots"!
My reputation is shit because I've never used a bidbot, it's hard to get my content on the trending page because it's full of bidbot abusers, so my content is buried under spam-bidbot-abusing crap(nice proof-of-brain)... there is no manual curation anymore, this whole thing is getting worse and worse... bidbots are ruining the whole STEEM. If this continues the only businesses that will come to STEEM are more bidbots...
We don't need to remove delegations, we just need an effort by top whales, orcas, dolphin council and witnesses to flag any content upvoted by bidbots until the amount the bidbot gave goes to 0$ (only the amount the bidbot gave), making the post only earn through real curation, through proof-of-brain...
I don't want to use bidbots but I'm more and more inclined to get 60Steem together and just start going apeshit on bidbots to get my content on the trending page, with more views and comments and to increase my reputation (reputation system is stupid because of bidbots)...
Would love to get a counter argument as to "why bidbots are needed" if there are any arguments at all...
Damn, I early voted because your comment filled me with much vigor but I went ahead and voted a quality post of yours to compensate jumping the gun.
Yes, I know it is tempting to just follow suite after those participation trophy buying vain sons of bitches but it will be a cold day in hell before I allow myself to become like them.
You earned your 56 buddy and nobody can tell you otherwise. I think the activity on the blockchain reveals much about our character. For example. When faced a choice, will we stand for principle or profit?
We have chosen the difficult path. Playing Steem on hard mode when most those vote buying buffoon are playing with cheats enabled.
I hope they read this. I hope it stabs at their tender little egos. Peradventure, they will see themselves for who they really are and are humbled accordingly.
A fun project I plan to do is writing a script to reveal the actual rep of all 70+ rep accounts bot votes, circular voting )which I like to collectively call collusive voting) were removed.
Think of it as putting the needle to the balloon. I look forward to seeing just how much hype some people are. It's gonna be good.
As for the elusive "counter argument", I've been looking for some time and have not found one argument I was not able to refute but maybe that unicorn is out there somewhere.
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Hard mode only makes games more fun xD
I'm waiting anxiously for that script, I really want to see what some of the people I follow are made off.
I'm going to keep strong and not bow down to the "bitchbots"!
Added my flag but as you say, they just jump around.
The established bot owners might do something but what of all the dodgy ones?
There's lots of those who care just about as much as this guy.
Hi @anthonyadavisii, thanks for reporting this. Please understand that our first line support only have the authority to blacklist as you can appreciate unvoting has a financial loss implication and such actions have to to be escalated for approval. Even I would not make such decisions on my own but would consult with our internal commitee and since have done so and have unvoted the post now.
Thanks again for letting us know about this and for being a champion of abuse.
He meant “against” abuse.
Holy crap, this dude just steals photos and uses bid bots to profit off of them?
Dude that's toxic as hell - but how do you stop it? Maybe you could alert the owner of the photo so they can pursue legal action
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I know, right? What a loser but probably would be making much more than me if it weren't for Utopian.
We should not even have to compete with that garbage but the vote sellers have made it that way.
They keep it up and think they will be sorry when the people eventually rise up, create something better, and cut them all off.
We can make the vision a reality. It would make for some epic justice porn.
I just don't want my friends to lose money so trying to do everything short of forking the code first.
I really don't see how it can stop unless someone makes a list all bot operators with votes of over say 0.5 SP then gives them categories of good and needs improvement.
Send the owners warnings and suggestions and tell the major delegators what's up.
Work up the list until it meets acceptable standards. I'm sure a lot of people voting just go for whatever is most profitable, but if they are mailed a list of suggestions and profitable alternatives, they may do the right thing.
The problem is deciding acceptable standards.
I've compiled a list in the past but would like to devise a script to do it via pattern detection. Maybe it scour through active posts to develop a comprehensive list of bots that use memos (does not include those that use off chain transactions)
We have been successful in coordinating removal of MB delegations on abuse but tbh I many users don't care or don't see the financial incentive. At least the the ones with the stake that matters.
For example, @blocktrades will not pull delegations on positive abuse reports for spam and plagiarism. They are also a top witness. That seems to be a conflict of interest.
Witnesses are charged with securing the network and I would say such extends to limited users that demonstrate breaches of ethics from gaining further influence. This isn't beneficial from a business perspective so I understand their inaction. It is not in the best interest of the platform to have it dominated by spammers and scammers.
They may be doing some good things but I don't see how a DAO will address these underlying issues. Dishonest stakeholders and their influence is the problem but it just continues to grow and grow while honest stakeholders influence wanes relatively.
That's not good to know that if I adhere to reasonable morals and ethics that I am put at an instant disadvantage while scammers can rake it in.
It's essentially the same issue for witness / bid bot operators. Unfortunately, they are the ones that possess the stake that determine our shared future here.
One potential solution is attempting to bandage the situation with a front end with certain features in place; however, I don't see how that can help the underlying issues with distribution towards manipulative and/or dishonest.
I would love for the users to prove me wrong. Maybe they will zero out that post and restore my hope in this chain.
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I never considered that many of the bot owners or supporters are witnesses.
I know several of them are engaged in flagging and antispam and have blacklist and whitelist support. Others seem more focused on development and may have a laisse faire philosophy like users will take care of themselves.
That being said, targeting witness votes of witnesses who ignore the greater good by taking them off proxy lists or even adding this as a negative point in witness reviews is still important.
I know they are busy doing many things and may not want to take sides, but if someone has a solid suggestion that is backed by a lot of honest users, maybe they will change their ways.
It seems like a lot of people are here to maximize revenue and some are teaming up to do it better. Nothing fundementally wrong here. These people will only stop if it becomes unprofitable. Harming the greater good should be made to be unprofitable. I would support a fair approach towards this. Target the worst and keep raising the bar.
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