Planning for long-term success of Steemit: Identifying areas of improvement
As a new entrant I think Steemit has certain characteristics that are right on the money. But if it wants to succeed, we must be honest: There are other characteristics that need fixing.
What follows might be a bit "harsh" as a criticism, but it is only to wake people up from the confirmation bias of being in the upper technological tier and thinking that some things are ...normal (when they aren't).
I will be addressing these points below - with the main point being a necessary reduction in complexity:
Three currencies: JUST NO. I can’t emphasize this enough. The currency should be one.
The complexity of the design should not be of interest to the user. The user does not want to read a 40+ page whitepaper or hear why he must juggle 3 currencies in a "for noobz" guide - which really understands that this is absurd but tries to convince the user that it isn't. The complexity should not be a concern for the user. Dealing with complexity should be a ‘background’ process while the user only has to face a ‘foreground’ interface that is easy and intuitive. For example three currencies mentioned above. Make it one currency and just use a button like “Steems locked” or something for “locking” them – and even there, have a (i)nformational mouse-over that the user can click to learn why it’s good to do so and what this will do. The Permissions screen is equally problematic. No explanations whatsoever, unintuitive functionality even for cryptocurrency experts (who are already familiarized with complexity). I understand the system is “beta” but this is not good in terms of user interface. I can't even find what some things do, even after googling, reading the whitepaper, or reading bitcointalk.
The system as it is right now has a heavy confirmation bias from the crypto-world complexity. Devs, being cryptocurrency-experts, apparently think that this kind of complexity is “normal” for everyday use. It isn’t. The system is not ready for “prime-time”. If the system is targeting just cryptoguys, well, ok, it might capture some small segment of the market, or work for pump & dump purposes, but is this what we are here for? Social platforms are successful because they are extremely easy to use. Even the "necessity" of having to read 5-10-20 minutes of theory before using a platform is an excessive demand. Let alone if the content is complex in itself.
Why is there no proper content editor where the user can use bold, italic etc? I clicked on something it said it supported Markdown and then it said it is...Github syntax. Frickin' Github? Seriously? I tried to move a document from word to the platform, it kept no bold/italics etc… it was like pasting from notepad. Should I be an “expert” to post a ...nice looking text? Why? I don’t want explanations like “but, but, if you just do two ** you’ll get bold”. Yes, and if I write [b] in a forum I get bold, but I just click a button to bold stuff. It’s the way it should be done.
The user economy (poster-reader-voter etc), per the whitepaper which says that advertising is replaced by users etc etc, is a closed loop. Targeted advertising revenue could be used to tap into external revenue streams. Viewing ads should be optional (per user preferences). Those who want to view ads might get paid more or good content creators might get a chunk out of the ad revenue generated by their posts viewership.
Online guides, help buttons, “what’s this” buttons etc are needed to deal with current complexity levels but a lot of this should ultimately be changed. Anything that your mother can’t figure out should be taken to “background complexity” with a nice easy front-ending simplicity.
Inability or lack of flexibility to cure problems will lead to replacement. The above suggestions are critical for success. If the design is problematic, another one will come along, clone the design, fix the problems, make it more profitable by integrating external revenue streams and then say “See? We are like Steemit but unlike them we are better in these areas – so now we are 10 times more usable and more attractive to users, ensuring that we will be way more successful.” At that point Steemit is DOA because it had a good idea that it did not manage to convert to a practical design.
The above is just my brutally honest criticism to make the idea work properly. Patting on the back is appropriate for the idea of rewarding content creators and merging cryptocurrency but criticism is due if this is not done in a simple, efficient and seamless way.
Mmhm. Entrepreneur rule 1.
Let the users know what they can do not what your product can do.
UI please.
I 100% disagree with this. The long-term vesting structure of this system (which I think is critical to making this thing whole thing work) necessitates at least two tokens. The third token (SMD) is to the users' benefit because it allows them to avoid the price volatility of typical cryptocurrencies.
The typical user must only be concerned with two numbers. The amount of Steem Dollars (SMD) they have, and the percentage fraction of the total Steem Power (SP) they own. STEEM is something that the typical user shouldn't be too concerned about. I do think that there might need to be blockchain support in the future to flag SP withdrawals to automatically convert the withdrawn SP into SMD (via the best price available in the internal market), as well as a way to automatically convert (via the internal market) from SMD to vesting SP. That way, the typical user never needs to worry about or hold STEEM, and from their perspective there is only liquid Steem Dollars (SMD) and vested Steem Power (SP fraction).
I more or less agree with your points 2, 3 and 6. And regular users aren't (or at least shouldn't be) expected to read the whitepaper.
Regarding point 4, I believe the editor is planned. Remember, this website is still in beta. So it will come eventually.
To steemit.com devs: please still provide the option for us more advanced users to use raw Markdown even after enabling the WYSIWYG editor.
Regarding point 5 about advertisement:
I think you are mixing up steemit.com, the frontend, with Steem, the blockchain. Steemit, the company, does not pay any users for their content. Any tokens of monetary value being received currently are being issued directly by the blockchain.
Any money made from advertisements on steemit.com would be going to Steemit the company. I suppose they could use that money to pay users based on the statistics from the blockchain (and maybe their own internal page view statistics), but I do not think that they should. If they need the advertising money that badly, they should just use all that revenue to continue providing a great free client experience. Hopefully, they can find other monetization strategies (e.g. clearly marked promotional content like reddit does) other than regular advertising, so that the user continues to have a nice browsing experience.
Currencies can, by their nature, serve a lot of different uses. The USD is being used for everything that can be done on the planet. Money can be locked in bank deposit accounts for months at certain rates, or they can be freely accessible at lower rates. If the USD can do that, then why can't programmable money not be able to do something similar? We have the edge here by a long shot in terms of what a digital programmable token can do and there should not be a necessity for more than one token. The design should be reconfigured to make the token act in multiple roles - and do so in a way that is easy.
Imagine you are Canadian, Russian, Japanese etc. As the design is right now, it might involve up to ...6 currencies.
3 currencies from STEEM,
1 where you go to cash out (BTC) - supposing Steem dollars aren't as accepted as BTC
1 where BTC is converted to the #1 fiat (USD)
1 where you get the USDs to your local fiat is (CAD, RUB, JPY, etc)
It isn't even reasonable in the last 3 steps for most people who have no idea how to use exchanges etc (don't look at the crypto crowd for "hey it's easy" comments - we are talking about going large here and having success as a widely used social platform, where people don't even bother if something takes more than a few seconds of their time) so let's not make it any more unreasonable with the first three.
Nobody forces anybody to do something here. I'm just pointing out that if it's not done, the market itself will surpass the design by offering something simpler (1 token) and even streamlining of the next steps, something like an integrated "exchange" or integrated btc conversion or btc/fiat gateway in a all-in-one-stop.
As for advertising revenue, well, they (the company) can keep some percentage for sure, but the point I'm making is how to turn a closed-loop economy to something that can have "cash injections" from the external market and thus add value to the economy instead of it being based on the inflationary effect. To achieve that (a portion of) the money must be distributed to the user base. These cash injections might be in the form of fiat deals or even the form of purchasing steem tokens that can then be spent for ads through the platform itself. There are various possibilities. Ads may be universally hated but they are not a problem if they are optional. You don't want ads? They are gone. You want ads? You make more money. It's as simple as a click of the button.
I agree the user need not be concerned with Steem, so the best thing is to get it out of the UI. Presumably Steemit has control over your account as the frontend and the blockchain supports converting Steem to Steem dollars, so surely as the frontend it can just always convert from Steem to Steem dollars for you without any need to change the blockchain?
Did Steemit create the Steem currency? My assumption was that they had. If that is the case then I think its fine to mix them up since their fates are very much linked. If Steem bombs then Steemit isn't going anywhere. If Steemit fails then probably nobody is going to pick up the Steem baton and keep running. I think Steemit probably should assume their role will be the primary reddit-like website using Steem as the backend and consider how they can grow Steem just as much as Steemit since the authors contributing content are relying on Steem's continuing value.
If Steemit gets popular there will be a massive pot of advertiser money waiting to be had (through whatever means - ads, promotional content, whatever) and distributed to Steemit and its users one way or another. I don't see why you would want to ignore it when it could support both Steem and content creators. I also think it would be a mistake for Steemit to monetize the content and keep it all without feeding anything back to the creators.
Maybe I'm missing something here but if there are no external revenue sources being fed into it then there is no source of growth for Steem's value other than new investment?
If Steemit bought Steem with ad revenue and transferred it to their users based on page views it would support the price of Steem (making their business more viable and valuable), provide ongoing revenue for their operations, provide additional income for their users and would even help cement their position as the dominant reddit-like Steem based website which would help avoid fragmentation and confusion. Alternatively if its a problem for legal reasons for them to pay users directly they could at least feed the money back into all Steem users by buying it.
Great insight! Namaste~!
Confirmed.
I have to agree with almost everything in this post. Simplicity is the key. I would argue that complexity is the number one reason why BitShares never really took off.
People who join Steem come here because of the financial incentive - thus they want to know exactly how the income mechanism works and what determines the amount. So they are forced to read the whitepaper as for now it is the only official "tutorial" on the site. If they fail to comprehend how the system works - they will not feel in control and might decide it is not worth their time.
I read the whitepaper twice. Some parts were really clear. Some parts, like the anti-gaming mechanisms of the system, overly complex. Having more than one currency also confuses me and I've tried about 20 different cryptocurrencies in the past.
My suggestion is to make a really clear FAQ, a flowchart or info-graphics that describes what benefits the poster and the voter most. If it is overly complex to produce a simple visual tutorial - the system will be too complex to gain traction outside the cryptocurrency community.
Another point I want to make is that the user must also grasp intuitively where the money comes from and what gives it the value. Right now I still don't understand how exactly how is the STEEM created, at what rate and how much will be available when there are millions of active users in the blockchain. It should all be visually presentable on a graph.
I would also suggest to implement a feedback feature that gives user a potential gain prediction for every action (voting, posting) it makes. People crave for instant feedback.
Thank heaven that we have the blockchain and people just like yourselves who see all this as myself. I have been trying to teach people, while also learning myself, about these but you can see where the confusion comes into play. The questions that run through my head darts like this:
I think time will tell the tale with an ending.
Revelation 13:15-18
15 And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.
16 And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:
17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2013&version=KJV
Could not agree more with 1-3 and it is something I've been harping on since the launch. In some ways the presentation has been improved, but it still has a ways to go. I'm pretty sure that #4 is already in progress.
Good writeup and excellent points. Thanks for risking the thousand dollar downvote for us all!
Pushing the complexity into the background is definitely the most important thing to help gain more supporters, normal users don't read whitepapers just to surf a board...
I think point 4, adding a decent embedded HTML editor, would have the biggest positive effect. WYSIWYG editing is everywhere, there is no reason to make people learn markdown language. There has got to be some cut and paste code to add that. Maybe a bounty should be posted for that feature.
Thank you. Your comment made me realize a very interesting dimension of the voting dynamics. Although I'm new here and I do not understand the "risk" of a "thousand dollar downvote" - perhaps because I have nothing to lose (?) by sharing my honest opinion, I suspect what you are saying is that I could have lost money if my opinion was not "liked" / upvoted... If this is so, then the design may need some kind of tweaking in the direction where bad content is downvoted differently from an opinion that is simply not accepted by most.
If people are afraid to say their opinion because they might lose money, then that creates a group-think effect and further confirmation bias inside the group dynamic. Some times the "contrarian" might be the right one, even when most people don't want to see it. Historically people have been ...crucified or killed for their contrarian beliefs after upsetting the status quo. So we need some type of mechanism that ensures that all opinions can be presented in a way that does not imply financial harm to those who have different opinions (but are not bad-quality posters). This is perhaps worthy of a thread of its own - or it could have been discussed already, I don't really know - I just came onboard... so.... Out of the top of my head it seems that upvoting and downvoting could have qualitative points for "quality" and "opinion". One may have a high-quality content post that is thought provoking but arrives at a conclusion that is not shared by others. So at that point a downvote for this would be equated with a downvote for a "spam" message - which would be unfair. I haven't figured this through though - it definitely needs more thought and brainstorming to see how the system can be improved to "tolerate" less popular opinions.
Rewards are a net of stake weighted up votes and down votes. Once rewards have been distributed by the blockchain (beginning July 4th and approximately ~24 hrs after a post) they cannot be taken away. Even if you had been down voted to oblivion (which I am glad you were not because this post is high value user feedback) you could not lose any thing you own on the blockchain because rewards aren't distributed until later and they're not owned until then. There have been very few cases of down votes, however, and thankfully we are so far seeing a very positive level of engagement regardless of perspective.
I agree with #1. I'm still trying to get my brain around the different currencies - I looked into buying some steem on bittrex, but got confused with the withdrawal - what on earth is the "memo address" and "registered account"? Am none the wiser, so have left my steem there till I figure it out.
P.S. #4 markdown is exactly the same as on reddit. So for italics put a star around the words, for bold, two stars around the words, etc.
I had similar reactions when clicking on "Permissions". It wouldn't hurt to have a description next to each one of these so that we can understand what they are for. Then things got even more complicated after I changed my password and it was showing something else (hashes?) instead of what I entered. I was thinking "what the...?".
Everything within Steemit's platform is still being integrated and debugged. Hash is a number generated through a string of text.
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/hash
You are absolutely right that user experience should be as easy as possible. But that doesn't mean it would be wise to change the system to a simplier one.
Designing a blockchain that has just the right incentives for everybody is really difficult task. If the incentives are bad, project will fail eventually. The Steem blockchain is maybe the best one currently, if we look at what kind of long term incentives it has.
And the blockchain is just the backend side. It doesn't need to be shown for users. The frontend can be made easy and intuitive. This version of Steemit is first version that's pretty much just a direct frontend for blockchain without much UI design. I'm sure they will do lots of UI development in the future.
Are three currencies really that difficult to understand?
Steem Dollar is basically a dollar that has same features as other cryptocurrencies. If person is used to use internet banking, SMD shouldn't be that hard to grasp.
Steem Power has similarities to some games. There are different kind of "powers" that decrease when they are used and they will be replenished automatically after certain period of time.
Steem is the only currency that you can use to buy more Steem Power.
If you think this from the perspective of gamification, players would probably complain that Steem is too simple because it has only three things that can be collected.
We are using "programmable money" (blockchain currencies). Why would we even need 3 tokens and the extra complexity? If you are aiming for social-platform level success, then it must be brain-dead simple. I am not in the lower 99% of the IQ range of the planet, and while I might subconsciously pride myself for my intelligence, I understand the pitfalls of elitist behavior all-too-well. If you make an elitist system then you are aiming for a very small target market. Do we want a reddit for the bitcointalk crowd or do we want a reddit for the millions of users that actually shares the revenue with the users? That's the question here. If you want mass appeal you need to aim for ease of use and simplicity. If you want to be in an elite circle among other elitists who can deal with complexity that most people can't, then you simply won't reach mainstream potential - ever.
I wouldn't say that the complexity is because of elitism. It's because the system needs to have certain incentives in place to function well. If we want to have a blockchain that works without users having to pay fees, we need to have at least two currencies. The system is also highly inflationary which means that there is also very big need for a price stable currency.
I just don't see how it would be possible to design a blockchain that could function as a backend for social media platform with only one currency. We need to have free transactions because users don't want to pay for posting, commenting and voting.
A blockchain with one currency would be certainly more simpler but if it means that system will fail in the long run, it's kinda useless to ponder about it.
It is actually a bit inaccurate to describe it as three tokens. Steem Power can't be transferred so it isn't a token at all. It is just locked Steem. There are other blockchains that allow locking and no one calls those locked coins a different token. Some aspects of how this is being presented could probably be improved but if you look at the web site today, in no sense that I see is the user presented with three tokens.
Well a "share" or "token" is stake in a "company" or "blockchain". So doesn't merkle root come into play with 3 transactions?
You're referring to the 99% aka sheeple.. 1% are making fishers of men.
Just pressed downvote by accident. There seems to be no way to undo this, even couple of seconds after the click.
One more suggestion for fixing then...
After the next hard fork in a few days it will be possible to change votes