The centralization of Steem, and how it is killing off Pevo [UPDATE]
UPDATE: The anonymous whale @pumpkin saved Pevo. Thank you!
//old:
Nobody said politics was easy...
What a joy it was when I managed to get the witness position back last week, after several days of lobbying and looking out for accounts that could make a change. I can do it without the whales, I have all the community on my side!
Turned out, I hallooed without being out of the wood yet. Some people just don't want me to be a witness.
All talks with the whales lead to the point that it's not my fault, but I'm just a pawn in a game of power between them and @dan. I was even advised to ask him to remove his votes to receive a chance to get back in.
...but wasn't the disregard for power plays in politics one reason for me to turn to crypto in the first place?
Now I'm way out of the list by missing support from the top 5 whales, while by numbers of votes I am on position 6. Can you imagine the frustration, when 5 people block your projects while over 100 others support them? When 5 people make the difference between position 22 and position 1 on the list?
I have spent more time working on Steem than most others, completely ignoring and finally quitting my day job for it. I support users on Steemit and Slack, I'm manually curating small posts and spam, running an anti-spam bot, produced several open source scripts, a library and a game for Steem. And of course Pevo (https://steemit.com/steem/@pharesim/publishing-scientific-papers-on-steem). This is not enough, because I disagreed with the wrong persons once and thus ended up on the wrong side of their stupid game.
I joined this project because I loved the idea of a decentralized community, rewarding contributors. I'm devastated that it's turned out to be a game for the biggest fish, not the revolution I wanted to be part of.
They do this to show their power to @dan. I post here to show it to you. Make your own decisions from that information.
This is exactly why you got down-voted, so by asking DAN to remove his vote what exactly does this accomplish? whoever gave you that advice, are they voting for witnesses themselves? First it was @dan then @blocktrades and so on... why is dan not allowed to vote on his own project?, why they want blocktrades to stop voting?, so what they ask for is not to be centralized one way, but centralized in another. This sort of arm twisting started early on, and most agreed to it unfortunately as long as they get in. I would certainly not accept you or anyone else getting a bribe from the whales in return for pressuring dan to remove his votes, and nobody else should. On the contrary, this BS has to end. You should be on the witness list, Yes, but how is the issue here.
Steemit won't be the revolution I want to be a part of unless more is done to promote an egalitarian atmosphere. This post is a glimpse into how toxic the unequal distribution of power can be on the inside. The nature of the trending content is probably the easiest way to see it in action.
I don't see thing on Steem as being toxic. I see Steem as being the best technology there is with the most potential to bring the best out of humanity. Time will tell. What we are seeing right now is leftovers from the old model.
I understand the move of some legends and I don't see them necessarily as toxic. I don't know each witnesses and I can't pose a judgement on everything that exist as I don't know everything.
I upvoted all the comments of this post that will make me some money and that weren't in direct opposition to what I know is right and I took the time to clarify my point of view like for your comment as I don't necessarily agree with you a 100% but I understand your point.
I vote for 30 witnesses. @pharesim is one of them and has always had my vote. I could potentially make @pharesim one of the 19 witnesses if I vote only for him. Now I could inevitably make @pharesim a more powerful witnesses by only for him but I won't because I would penalize myself, ostracizing myself by the other witnesses and their voters.
On the long run, what is good for me is good for the network and is good for everyone.
I appreciate your point of view, and thanks for taking the time to explain where you're coming from. I'm not trying to be critical of any individuals, and I can only assume everyone is acting in good faith unless I have reason to believe otherwise. Disagreements are inevitable.
What I'm worried about is what you called "leftovers from the old model" might act as a contagion, and spread throughout the system. It's very common for people to replicate dysfunction even when consciously trying to transcend it. And as with anything else potentially revolutionary, there will be fierce resistance to it. Often coming from unexpected places...
Do what you want, I saw your justification (what is good for me is good for the network and is good for everyone) but I'm still drawing attention to it. And maybe I misunderstood what you mean.
Number 1 right now with over $12k
Steemit Facebook Page Insights From the Guy Who is Managing it
Simple distribution of weighted votes
Even with BTS, I never really understood the limited witness pool. I guess I understand that idea of a minimum statistically viable count but also having a cap at some level to keep hard forks easier to manage. Thanks for relaying the info. Always curious to hear @xeroc take on these matters since I feel like he generally has a pretty level head.
I don't really have an opinion on this but I can tell you that I do not run a witness node for multiple different reasons and instead try to fund my work through coding and regular posts about what has been done.
But I understand the OPs frustration. Reaching out to dan, ned and other wales is frustrating at times.
@pharesim you have my support and i'm pretty sure the situation will change. I'm sure that "whales" will soon understand they need people like you that spent time and curate the content if they want to see this platform somewhere. I'm a nobody right now here but if is any way that i can help count on me! :(
Thanks :) You can vote (https://steemit.com/~witnesses) and grow! The stake weighted system depends on distribution, which is pretty much broken right now imo. Will take time, I do what I can to make it happen as fast as possible ;-)
you have my ovte , in a publication I put a flag but really was a noobster, sorry
Man, I know how you feel. I recently spent some time on this steemit post about a new marijuana study, and it was great that the post got 29 votes, but those votes were worth about $2.70. The whales didn't give me any luv. :( Still, better than nothing I suppose.
Nice work, didn't see that before.
Maaaaan i got 39 votes and only got $0.49 with this post here thats just bizarre.
https://steemit.com/trending/@ph111p/5jvnhk-yes-you-can-spend-money-from-steemit-it-is-real-we-have-paid-our-trip-to-disney-usa-part-1-the-big-countdown
Hmmm this is good stuff. Thanks for the post. I find all crypto communities run into these types of issues as of late..
It is posts like this and (as important, if not more) participation of other steemians that will eventually lead to a stable and honest platform. Without transparency Steem and steemit are doomed.
For Steem a huge future,I can smell it on his butt))
It seems pretty unfair very centralised !
As you mention in your post its just a game i was thinking there is nothing stopping these guys creating noob accounts and posts to shill bid themselves and then powering down i have been thinking just the same last 2 days very frustrating, i also joined crypto because i hate centralisation and if guys like you leave there is no chance for people like me here.
i just noticed you are powering down and tbh i don't blame you , you might as well if your not in the power club anymore no doubt others will leave and there will be all sorts of paste bin conversations start flying around lets see !
I powered down before, because Pevo will need a lot of money. It's not possible to realize it without the funding, that's why I'm so down now. Months of work for the bin.
I wonder if your post will get down voted getting popcorn.
Votes are stake-weighted so creating more accounts with stake divided between does not help at all.
thanks for the good read pharesim, i was wondering what you think of my plan to live on steem alone for 30 days straight? i'll document it in blogs daily to share the experience, hopefully raise some publicity. https://steemit.com/steemit/@ma3/i-m-going-to-live-off-only-steem-for-30-days-and-see-how-it-goes-advice
I also voted for you as a witness, i hope it helps!