Steemit Psychology | Incredible Insights into Human Behavior!steemCreated with Sketch.

in #psychology7 years ago

One of the unintended consequences -- or benefits, depending upon your perspective -- of Steemit is that the network is a microcosm of the human condition. How people interact and engage Steemit broadly reflects psychological and sociological phenomenon in the "real world."

A key insight engendered by the Steemit platform is how humans deploy wealth and power. Clearly, a difference of behavior is evident between those who have "nothing to lose" against those who routinely leverage their wealth and power to generate increasingly greater rewards.

The Road to Hell is Paved with Good Intentions

Originally, Steemit was created as a means by which content creators could holistically support one another. However, in this decentralized system, the aim was for only the best content to rise to the top, while that which required little to no effort -- such as spamming -- would fall by the wayside.

Is that how Steemit turned out? More and more, it's becoming evident that rather than catalyzing a social utopia, Steem has become, again, a microcosm of the underlying world. While people are not getting killed in the network per say, we still find the same vitriol and corruption that eventually fails all human societies.

Rather than chart a new way forward, Steemit instead became a reflection of our broader selves. Money and power find ways of corrupting even the most well-intentioned. While a few elites, or whales, live up to the Steemit ideology, the majority simply use the network for their own personal gain.

Is Decentralization Really the Answer?

I believe Steemit has taught us the futility of mankind. Though we intend and strive for perfection, it's simply not attainable. Like a festering wound, man is perhaps destined to destroy himself.

Centralized authority was forwarded to address and control this sin of humanity. As history shows, centralization leads to the corruption of a few. But decentralization may in fact lead to the corruption of the many.

Indeed, Steemit has demonstrably proven that decentralization is not the answer! If it were, Steem users would not be unfairly demonized and downvoted out of the system. If man was fair, we would have open and reasonable dialogue, not warfare simply on the basis of a difference of opinion.

Profound Insights

While people approach Steem as a revenue source or an alternative social media network, it is so much more. This is a reflection of human dynamism, and we can learn so much about our collective condition, if we would only listen.

Unfortunately, some viewers may take this post as a criticism of the Steemit network. No! In fact, the problem is not with Steemit, but with humanity itself. Steem only forces us to the mirror.

Whether we choose to look and learn is entirely up to us.

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I understand your critical remarks; I wish you would point specifically to what you are concerned about; rather than asking me to guess!

I don't really see you point to specific problems; we imagine mankind is not perfect; we look for the first problem to expect in our steemit community, but what would you point to first?

I find your comments somewhat ironic because I never asked anyone to guess about what I'm concerned! :)

I'm making a point that Steemit reflects humanity, and that the centralization/decentralization issues are superficial to the core catalyst of the human condition. In this post, I have no questions, nor am I inviting people to a guessing game. I'm proposing a thesis, and people are free to agree or disagree with it.

well, the assumption here is that human is incorruptable. Even in a centralized system, the people who holds the power at the top routinely fail. It just happens that in a decentralized system there is no pretension to be "righteous."

Is the decentralized system worse off than a centralized system? I don't believe so.

But is a centralized system necessarily worse than a decentralized system?

My argument is that this centralized-decentralized debate is a false, binary paradigm that detracts us from the greater point -- the system is only as good as its operators. Otherwise, the same problems we find in traditional centralized systems (of governance) will make their way into decentralized systems, with the only difference being the specific channeling of the problems.

Exactly. In a centralized system, those who wield the power would definitely be a strong advocate for their own benefit. Likewise for a decentralized system for people who are systematically marginalized.

At the end of the day, people are not really inherently corrupt. It's human to look after their own self-interest. Unless there's a better to way to so-called "level" the playing field, I feel that Steemit gives such marginalized community a better way to earn a living.

I think you will find that over the course of time, a decentralized platform doesn't really help people who are systematically marginalized if the leveraged operators within the system abuse their power.

Steemit does give the minnows a voice, but this is only based on what I would term as "relative allocation." When I have more time, I'd love to expound on this point.

As an aside, what I can recommend is to use Steemit for a few more months. I think your opinion about the network may evolve over time! :)

At fundamental level, there is matter and antimatter. There is slight edge or difference in some very insignificant level, that is how the Universe is formed or even existed of "matter". Humans have both positive virtues (kindness) and negative ones (greed). Positive virtues may have slight edge, that's why the societies exist in peaceful ways in most cases. Without darkness there is no light.

Yes, and working with that analogy, I will argue that if a system is comprised overwhelmingly of darkness, then it doesn't matter if that system is centralized or decentralized ... the end result will more than likely be darkness. That was one of my points in this post/video I wanted to get across. Thanks for your comments -- I love the description that you used! :)

I'm on this platform for only a week and the thing that stuck out the most is the "whale circle jerk". People tend to associate, its tribe mentality and it si to be expected. They were here first and/or invested a lot of their assets into becoming ones. The only hope is that minnows can create their own tribes that can circlejerk each other and after a while they will start merging with other tribes and finally achieve a more equal (but never totally) userbase.

It seems that Steem is just a bridge between Facebooks and Reddits and the social media we all think we deserve. Steem manages to eliminate the company, so the content is decentralised and you don't need to worry about funding servers, removes the advertising companies from the equation by building a reward system in its own economy. I'd say they took care of quite a few problems.
That's step one, the next step is figuring out how to diminish the ugly side of humanity by encouraging users to act in their and other peoples best interests.

Keep putting out well thought out and argumented posts that make you think.

Certainly, Steemit offers tremendous reward potential...I especially like your description of the internal economy. Definitely, I am not criticizing that aspect.

What I am forwarding is that penal powers, so to speak, are just as corruptible in either a centralized or decentralized platform. Decentralization is probably much more likely to be corrupted simply because no penal standardization exists -- everyone can downvote for any or even NO reason whatsoever!

My initial idea is to have upvotes levered to wealth, but downvotes levered to consensus only. Meaning that at least a minimum number of downvotes have to be registered before a post can incur a financial or reputation penalty.

or let dovnvotes penalize a percentage of earnings which then goes up the more people penalize the post but without the votes carrying the same power as upvotes?

Brave of you @bullishmoney to speak up for the minnows while becoming a dolphin. I TRULY believe you WILL lead ONE day a Pack of CARING WHALES which WILL build a more positive UTOPIAN STEEMIT COMMUNITY.

Nice of you to commend @kevinwong (caring whale)

I also want to commend the silent (shadow whales) ones and they know who they are...

We ALL doing our part for the Steemit Community.

Including YOU Josh!

Keep STEEM N ON,
Frank

Thanks Frank! I also wanted to give a shout-out to @thejohalfiles for his incredible support -- I believe you would call him a shadow whale as well. And there are so many others...it's just hard to name drop when you're "live" on video because your brain is working a million miles a second.

That said, I feel that I am doing my part, especially watching out for watermark violators! :)

Quick learner!

Some also comeback and Upvote during the last 24hours before payout, comments too!

I shall NOT mention thy name...

This is turning into a late night comedy Jimmy Kimmel with the constant mention of Matt Damon towards the end, which I don't mind...

We Good @bullishmoney

:D

Yup, even when STEEM is priced at $1,400, I'll still find great humor in watermark violations, or whatever other trouble you get yourself into! :)

.... Steemit is that the network is a microcosm of the human condition..... those who have "nothing to lose" against those who routinely leverage their wealth and power to generate increasingly greater rewards....

Beautifully said! The whole course of psychology in one post!! :)
Love it!! Upvoted 100% and resteemed

I don't know if I got the whole course of psychology in one post, but I thank you for your kind words! I'm just trying to spark a broader discussion, or at least have people think about the insights that Steemit provides!

Looking forward for more such post!!

I've got a ton more coming! :)

good for me hehe :))

Yes! It sure is a study and manifest of the power of thought in action...definitely worth getting paid for! A participation of /how our intentions and thoughts connect us...

Yup...don't get me wrong...I love the benefits of using Steemit, but I also can't ignore that it's a reflection of our underlying societies.

So true...and for those ( like I get a sense from you) watching how these social currents affect markets... it's quite an advantage to see where people are at ...in their social structures and thoughts. On that note and kind of a side note... I can see how different you and I are... but I really appreciate something about how you implement your personality in your work. I can tell this is a passIon for you that you are hungry for learning more about! I'm guessing you're a Taurus with wooden ox or something similar...just a guess! And I can relate to your steadfastness as well as curiousity in how you can implement your skills and wills.

It's funny that I produced a video yesterday which discussed how to generate success quicker on the Steemit network, and one of the tips was to "implement your personality in your work," as you state!

Lol! Oh steemit and synchronicity! Too funny! Thanks for sharing that and making me smile : D

Steemit is far from perfect, but it's still miles ahead of Facebook, Reddit and other centralized social media platforms which deliver mediocre content at best, without any incentives. I am convinced decentralization is a huge step ahead, but of course, it's not going to solve ALL problems in NO time.

Also, I believe it's not accurate to say that "centralization leads to to the corruption of a few". Those few are perhaps absolutely corrupted (due to absolute power), but the disenfranchised majority also gets corrupted over time, because getting scraps from the Big Central and emulating their corrupt ways becomes one's whole perspective, with all kinds of negative effects for the mind, imaginaton and intellect.

I also used to think it's miles away from Facebook, but now, I realize it depends upon what you're referring. In terms of monetary gain, absolutely, no question. But in terms of censorship, I have to say that both FB and Steemit live in glass houses.

FB censors people based on the centralized corruption of the few (elites). Steemit, on the other hand, facilitates censorship based on the decentralized corruption of the collective. In other words, anyone is free to penalize for whatever arbitrary reason.

Honestly, if I had to choose, Facebook has the better censorship protocol because they at least attempt transparency of their rules, and an appeals process exists to forward concerns to a "qualified" agency.

With Steemit, you could just be dealing with a racist asshole -- by way of example -- who is unwilling to change their animus.

I believe in Facebook protocols as much I believe in Reddit protocols. That means zero or nearly so. Reddit's CEO himself deleted and edited comments which he deemed unsatisfactory or too critical of Reddit or himself and I don't have one shred of evidence that Facebook 'protocols' are any better.

That may be true, but it doesn't take away from the glass house argument. On Steemit, anyone with wealth and power can downvote you practically out of the system. Imagine if the alt-right or religious-fascist groups came aboard Steemit, and played nice until they became whales. I highly doubt that I, through NO fault of my own, would last a single second.

Love it...amazing pic! :)

I'm too new to steemit to judge the validity of the claim, but your understanding and insights into human psycology are quite profound and perhaps correct. Thanks for the post. I like it.

I don't recommend it at all, but you can validate my claims yourself by downvoting your own content, or asking a higher reputation person to downvote you. Again, I do NOT recommend it simply on the basis of proving something! :) But you can do that if you wanted to...

Also, I'm confident that if you take a look around, engage the Steemit network for a few months, you'll come to the same conclusion, or at least understand from where I'm coming.

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