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RE: Steemit News: DMCA Claim for Copyright Infringement
I go back to they are allowed to use their stake for whatever they want. You can try to talk to them and convince them to do otherwise, but they are under no obligation to do what you say.
I think you and others make it too easy here. If I flag you once, indeed, I am under no obligation to justify that, but if I automatically flag every of your comments and posts, until you leave STEEM, then I think I should have a good reason for doing so and be able to justify my behaviour, because otherwise one might think all I do is damaging the platform.
I don't know if the flags in the case above are justified or not ... just saying ...
Steem is a decentralized self governing system. Other people are going to act in ways that differ from your personal value system of what is right and wrong, and they are allowed to do so provided the blockchain rules allow it. Self governing does not mean complete anarchy - but it does mean that users / the community are responsible for dealing with their issues with each other. There is no central party to step in and tell anyone they are right or wrong.
In theory it is, yes. But there was ninja minining, and there is a concentration of 93 % of all Steem in about 100 accounts (or something like that). :)
But yes, the ideal of a decentralised system/community is quite fascinating.
To flag in an automated way without even knowing the content of the flagged posts or bother the replies of the 'victim' has nothing to do with 'values' anyway. It's a completely mechanic process.
And yes ...
... for me what happens here is partly pure anarchy respectively "Wild West". Transferred into real life it would mean somebody can kill you in case he doesn't like your face or your way of life, just because he has the power to do it. If you complain people will advice you to smply buy a bigger gun (more SP) to defend yourself.
This kind of anarachy, where people like @haejin or @sweetsssj exploited the reward pool and whales harassed users with different opinions (or just for fun), led to many frustrated people who left STEEM, a very low STEEM price and next to a collapse of the community. You should be aware of that, even if there is some hope again now.
Parties like @steemcleaners with very much STEEM power should use it wisely, carefully and put communication (also directly under the posts) above punishment, whenever possible.
Again, the community is very fragile, and the ones with power should act responsible.
Your ideal of decentralization (I am well aware of how you imagine it to work in theory) will only lead anywhere, if in practice the system is able to attract and retain enough satisfied users instead to frustrate them.
^ My point is this is how you feel is appropriate to behave on the system. You want others to behave the way you feel is 'right'. Other people are going to have a different view on how it is appropriate to behave, and they get to decide that for themselves. That's what's happening here. Whether they are "right" or "wrong" in their actions is a matter of opinion.
If they have stake in the system, they get to use it how they want. If others disagree with it, they can use their stake to counter it. It's not a perfect system by any stretch of the imagination, but those are the rules we live under.
In a fonctioning society people respect other opinions and lifestyles than their own to a certain degree (otherwise I call it dictatorship). Of course I also see many opinions here which I don't like, but that is normally no reason for me to flag anybody or even flag every of his posts without reading them (and I am sure more than 90 % of the people here would agree with that).
You can refer to the right of the stronger one to do whatever he likes, but of course people can (and do!) vote with their feet and just leave and withdraw their stake. Again you are right then, if you reply that nobody can force stake holders to care about that and care about the STEEM price, it's their right not to care. :)
Nobody can force anybody to justify his actions here, but as long as the 'stronger ones' insist on their right to do whatever they like, instead to communicate and listen to the 'weaker ones', I think we won't grow as a community.
And that's the only reason why I am discussing here at all: I cannot force anybody to do anything but I can try to convince them to justify their actions and also think more before they act ...
It seems to be somewhat 'lazy' to say that other people have other opinions and can do whatever they want. Yes, maybe, but what is your opinion, how do you evaluate a certain behaviour? Would you try to help people (after checking if you agree with their matter) - for example by upvoting them - or would you simply tell them "Sorry, that's STEEM, the Wild West, nobody can help you here (go back to facebook, please), because everybody can do whatever he wants."? Yes, laziness hidden behind the ideal of decentralization! :-)))
Sorry for the long discussion, that was not my initial intention. Also I am talking in general and didn't mean to evaluate the case of @joeyarnoldvn.
The original reason why I found your comment and replied was that I was curious if you had written a new post again and thus checked your blog. :)
There is a large group of people in the community who do do this, and I would say that after the last HF things have been improving a lot in this regard. We are certainly not in a perfect state where all the 'good' actors are completely countering all the efforts from the 'bad' actors - but there is a growing sentiment that that is what needs to be done, and people are following through on it.
There are some good and valid points being made here, but I will bring up the context. This person came to my blog and complained to me about the behavior of one of the stakeholders on the platform. Even as a witness, I am not responsible for looking into every disagreement that the users on the platform have with each other. My response was basically "well, they are allowed to do it" and "go try to work it out with them".
In terms of the suggestions that are specific to SC (or any other large stakeholder) if you think these are beneficial changes that should be made - my recommendation is that you try to build a relationship with them and talk to them about the improvements you think they could make, and help them see why they are beneficial to both them and the platform as a whole.
Awareness:
It is good to respond to those types of actions. That is what I'm trying to promote. I want people to be aware of how subjective it can be.
50 Shades of Oatmeal
In other words, sometimes, things are not as black and white as we may want them to be. Perhaps, there are different sides, perspectives, to situations, stories.
Art & Beauty
Spam can be hard to define. Many things can be when defined subjectively as opposed to objectively.
Tyranny vs Free Markets
Now, a fake version of objectivity can be bad too and it can lead to bad tyrannical centralization. Now, to some extent, decentralized blockchains like Steem are promoting the freedom for individual to make choices concerning upvoting and downvoting based from a decentralized and subjective point of view, on the other hand, and that might be like an aspect of the free market.
The Meaning to Life
So, I believe in promoting the freedoms for people to do what they want. So, it comes down to private property rights.
Is My Comment a Form of Private Property?
So, by the way, hypothetically, if my comment was my private property, and if people downvoted that alleged private property comment, then did that flag (downvote) damage my alleged private property? Good question. I would say yes. But I don't know if a comment is private property or not. So, that is another can of worms that we can open in these types of debates, etc.
I agree with that.