RE: Reflections on my first year here + some advice for people joining.
Oh, we're all plugging along. Some days are pretty good, others not so much, but we keep keeping on.
Okay, well, then I misread where you were going with HF 19. I've heard others say it hasn't been so good for them, either, citing most of what you just did. Bot armies to bid bots. It just seems to me there are people who are not going to be interested in the social aspect of this site, but only the investing and ROI aspects. I guess that's fine, but there's no way to really educate the new users in an effective fashion as to what they're getting themselves into with the bidbots, so they jump right in because they see how it's working for the big users on the trending pages.
But I suppose trial and error is going to be the best teacher anyway, because then you're not basing it on someone's opinions. In the meantime, the bidbot owners, for the most part, are making some profit, if not a lot, and the even though things have changed, the status quo is maintained.
I've avoided the flag war for the same reason, I have less SP than would be required to really do anything, while exposing myself to immediate reprisal. However, the main reason I avoid it is because I've yet to really see the good it does. With as many folks that throw downvotes at haejin, he's still taking more out of the rewards pool a week than most of us will see in a year, at least.
I'm not really saying he should be left alone (although under normal circumstances i would say, let the market decide—in this case the market says his stuff is worth less than $20 on average if you discount the big whale vote and his own and remove the downvotes). I'm saying that flagging is not an effective tool as constituted, and I'm not sure how to make it better.
Some days are good, some are not so much huh lol.. That sounds like an apt description of life!
Well hopefully Steemit find a better way to do.. Or some other platform. I feel like it is holding Steem back. If for no other reason but Haejin gets to sell 1000's of Steem a week.
You are correct about new usersnot quite understanding what they are getting themselves into as well. In one sense its good because the people only here for the money will more than likely leave once they are dissatisfied, and it will leave only the people we really want here anyways.
That does seem to be the upside to all of this, doesn't it? Weeding out those who would be more inclined to maximize short term gains at the expense of the long term health and viability/sustainability of the platform? However, the newbies that fall off so quickly aren't the ones affecting the reward pool now, so how do we go about changing hearts of the larger and older SP causing all the consternation now or making them all move on? :)
Age old Steemit question, I guess.