RE: EXPOSED: Cults Running Kids Youtube Channels Containing MK Ultra Trauma Based Mind Control Programs & Triggers.
Hi, sorry to have to reach out to you this way, but Berniesanders and his bots and multiple accounts have left me no choice. He first began massive downvoting of everything I posted a couple weeks ago. These attacks were totally unprovoked, and I never even replied. Gradually, they let up. But, yesterday he started wiping out my posts again, and so I reposted them for a couple hours just to see if he would stop. Then, because he didn't stop, I eventually did, and even replied to a written threat he made to destroy my account for "spam." You've had my vote for witness for several months during which time I went months without ever downvoting anyone, or even arguing with anyone, while gradually building almost a 65 rep score without ever using bots to do it. If you look at my blog this morning you can see Bernie has followed through on his threat. If people can indeed be destroyed on Steemit simply for being conservative and posting about conservative issues, then Steemit will die. We need to hardfork away purely malicious ideologically-driven auto downvoting, and/or massive manual downvoting. Will you work to address this?
Hi, that is unfortunate - thanks for letting me know. I don't know a huge amount about his politics but it seems likely that the action is politically motivated. I can see that he has been flagging @lyndsaybowes, @fulltimegeek and @proboards. Do you have any relationship to those accounts?
Steem is designed to be anarchic in nature, allowing for such upvoting and downvoting - it is inherent to the design. I agree that if any single entity has the power to silence voices of dissent or that he/she disagrees with, then there is a problem.. However, it has been shown time and time again that resolving this is not simple. I can't see this kind of thing being resolved via a hard fork in any way that isn't extremely messy and controversial. What do you suggest?
Hi ura-soul. Thanks for writing back. I have no relationship with any of the three accounts you speak of, except that I have upvoted some of Lyndsay's content, I believe, and she may have done the same on my blog.
I would like to offer the following, just as food for thought:
One account should be limited to a certain number of downvotes against another in a given time period. TBD by the witnesses...Perhaps a maximum of five votes in a day...against any/and all of another's accounts posts, comments, etc. A person with an array of accounts like berniesanders has at his disposable might have to be dealt with differently...i.e. the "victim" may also need a daily SP or rep-score damage limit, that then kicks in, preventing further downvotes. Sort of how the stock market has downside circuit breakers.... Maybe this "circuit breaker" could be "massaged" based on the size of the victim's SP pool, so that a little pain for huge accounts that err could still have some effect, whereas less pain could be applied to smaller accounts. i.e. it hurts someone like bernie, not at all to lose a week's earnings, whereas to a minnow like me, it's a pretty stiff penalty. Alternatively to all this, maybe there should have to be some communication between assailant and victim beyond the first downvote for further downvotes to be triggered. i.e. if one person is showing no aggression (as I have done) they may not be subject to massive malicious unlimited downvoting forays (or perhaps even to a second downvote.)
I would like to see rep score worked into the equation, eventually, perhaps totally at the expense of SP, so that people can not simply "buy" the ability to be vindictive, as is the case now. But this would require eliminating bot-built rep scores somehow first, and so this is just a long-term idea.
I would like to see automated downvoting dealt with. No one should be able to downvote something they haven't even read.
I am not sure that "graying" out content is the right message for the steemit platform to be sending either. It's seems almost a blatant commendation/condoning of someone's "right" to silence another.
I think that there should be a requirement that the reason for the downvote be "clicked" by the downvoter, and that there be a method of appeal...Perhaps the site could have an arbitration process. However, if we establish the limits suggested above, this might not be necessary.
Just some ideas to kick around.
Again, thanks for your thoughtfulness and kindness in considering my current plight. I assure you I didn't get to a near 65-rep score myself by being rude, confrontational, inaccurate, etc.
OK, I understand. Thanks for the suggestions.
As you pointed out, the first option can be mostly circumvented by having multiple accounts, but in any case, there are significant stakeholders who are strong proponents of downvoting and who actually want to dramatically increase the amount of power the SP provides people to downvote. I disagree with this approach completely and I doubt it will happen - but it highights that there is a possibility that changes to this system would be highly controversial and destabilising.
In the case of malicious downvoting, in some cases communication might help - but I think that in most cases it wouldn't.
Downvotes are really the main mechanism the community has against real spam, so limiting the downvote effect on hiding posts does present a real problem in that sense.. However, it perhaps comes down to a balance of how much of a problem the spam is vs. how much of a problem malicious downvoting is.
I agree on the need to eliminate the effects of bid bots - I have presented options for that, but the larger stakeholders that did speak out tended to favour increasing the power of downvoting as a counter to bidbots. I see this mostly as an attempt to increase their own personal power, rather than as something genuinely intended to help network wide.
I am not really aware of any way to prevent automated downvoting on a technical level. Downvoting could have a longer time delay built in, but it is not possible to stop bots from downvoting currently.
I agree about the hiding of posts to some extent, yes - I have spoken about it before.
Any form of arbitration on Steem is unlikely to succeed due to lack of organisation at this point. Steem doesn't even have a marketing team, let alone anything that can be relied on for arbitration. What happens if the arbitration team is bribed? How is this checked? Such a system is inherently in opposition to the principle of anarchy, but then so too is economic hierarchy itself!
The only idea I have to offer that is straight forward and that is a definite one that can be achieved, is for dApp operators to include a downvote area in their website so that we can all see who is being downvoted. It would be useful to have a text field that records the reason too. That way, the community can monitor malicious abuse of the system and act accordingly. I suggested this over a year ago, but change is slow around here!
Thanks, u-s. I appreciate, very much, your willingness to provide me with the status of things, as of right now.
I'd do it.
I've never down voted anything in 2 years, except in response to attacks...(i've been attacked in two down voting wars - for politcal reasons - and it hurts your earnings .)
I posted this yesterday as a way to circumvent the problem, on an individual basis...
your thoughts?
(I'd do the leg work - with enough support from 'the free speech movement' .)
https://steemit.com/blog/@lucylin/a-solution-to-inappropriate-flagging-ones-based-entirely-on-ideological-differences
The simplest thing from a programming standpoint might be to include that "click" by the downvoter to describe the purpose of the downvote, and the "ideological/political,"option, when selected, simply rejects the downvote. Of course, people will abuse it, so that simple solution on the programming side, would require an appeal team on the other side...maybe tougher than the other ideas in the long run...not sure.