Can steem(it) survive its problems
Let me be clear from the start: I do not want to bash steem(it). We all use steem(it) and thus are all biased to love it. I’m a quite new member and after two months there becomes a pattern in reoccurring issues that I notice. IMHO the future of steem depends on how these issues will be handled in the future as well as when they will be handled. Let's dig in, what are the issues.
Just an obligatory image to draw attention to this article, an issue in itself
Limited decentralization
As @vortac told me once. It’s not perfect but it’s the most decentralized social media I know of. He is correct. But will that be enough? As time passes by I start to notice that the development of the blockchain is fully centralized around steemit. Steemit is a private company and thus will take decisions that fit their (profit) needs best. Those needs are not necessarily equal to what we as a community think the platform needs. I see several signs of this centralization of power. Source code is opensource but under the control of steemit as I understand it. Capital and voting power is also largely centralized. The top 10 accounts own about 60% of all value, expand that to the top 20 and that only increases to 65%. I think it would be naïve to think those accounts belong to distinct people. And they surely are in close contact with each other, they control the future of the platform. I have no issues with this. To me it’s perfectly fine that big investors control their investment. But one should be aware of it.
Voting
The voting system has improved but to me is still lacking. I find it illogical that voting power is related only to steem power. Steem power is something one can buy. Think of the fake news fuzz lately. How hard would it be to spread fake news here and let it appear in the trending section? Just throw some money at it to have it done. Some good friend with money can make you, some bad enemy with money can break you. Regardless of the content of what you post. Reputation on the platform is not related at all but would be a much better metric. Again, I agree that investors should have a say in the future of the platform. But also being this influential on the content again centralizes power and opens up to abuse. Pick your enemies carefully.
Illegal content
Illegal content might become a big issue if the platform grows. At the moment the platform is probably too small and the type of copyright infringements do not cost enough to the industry. But I think the whitepaper minimizes the reality. I’m no law expert but if content in the blockchain is deemed illegal that probably would mean the complete chain is deemed illegal. Since this is a public network it wouldn’t be too hard to get a hold of all witnesses and force them to shut down or move. We have seen many examples in the past of P2P networks falling apart though the same excuse was used to claim they are solid. Can a witness host an illegal blockchain from a country that doesn’t intervene? I know I wouldn’t want to bet on it. Might the day come illegal movies are hosted on the blockchain similar to the way they are posted on usenet? I don’t think looking the other way is the solution here.
Censorship
From the whitepaper
Steem is a decentralized network that is operated by witnesses in jurisdictions around the world. All user actions are publicly recorded on the blockchain, and can be publicly verified. This means that there is no single entity that can censor content that is valued by STEEM holders. Individual websites such as steemit.com may censor content on their particular site, but content published on the blockchain is inherently broadcast traffic and mirrors all around the world may continue to make it available.
Also section 20 clearly states that content of the blockchain might be censored on the steemit.com website. It seems their way of handling abuse: wash their hands in innocence. This only works to a certain limit. The site might censor and the blockchain might be illegal. Certainly not the way it is advertised. We also have no idea to what extend this is happening. I also have no idea on how they present the content. If I compare trending pages on several blockchain interfaces they all look different. We have no idea on how they manage content.
####Social media platform
I find it difficult to call it a social media platform. I’d rather call it a blogging platform. It’s virtually impossible to interact with other users. If I want to interact with someone I mostly have to reside to something else. Steemit.chat and discord seem popular, but not in every subcommunity.
Steemit.com links
Steemit.com is quite important to the blockchain. The blockchain can exist without it but many users were left in the dark a couple of days ago when steemit.com was experiencing issues. If steemit.com cannot deliver something else might take over, or maybe several parties. That would be good I think. The problem I see is the links which are used in the articles. They almost all link to steemit.com. Suppose steemit.com disappears all those links become invalid. There should be a way of linking to content in the blockchain without referring to steemit.com. The same holds true for lots of images hosted by https://steemitimages.com. What will happen with them if steemit.com goes down? There are blockchain cloud solutions by now.
7 days limit
Why are editing and rewards limited to 7 days? As if content becomes less valuable after 7 days. IMHO it’s only an easy solution to get to trending topics and limit the technological complexity. I often see the argument that an article cannot be edited because it is in the blockchain. The blockchain is immutable and making editing possible would turn it into a database. I do not agree to this. Just think of versioning systems. They track changes incrementally. The blockchain could store changes as well and a website could show the last version as well as a history. That would for example allow us to change the steemit.com links issue mentioned before. Not allowing editing also creates quite some outdated information. Especially about the platform itself. The platform changes, the content becomes outdated but there is no way to hide it or change it. And to make matters worse search engines value is more.
Conclusion
This seems like a very negative opinion but don’t be fooled. I like the concept and will continue with it. As a proof I will use 100% power up on this article. There’s no better alternative at the moment. But that doesn’t mean it’s perfect. These are some key points that need attention for the platform to survive. If not something else will eventually pop up and take over. Feel free to see this as a starting point of a discussion and not the end. I'm looking forward to your opinions.
One main advantage of Steemit that outweighs all others. "It is a social blogging platform that pays out money." Nuff said. That right there makes it unique to any other social media platform in existence.
One or two areas you mentioned may need some tweaking for the purpose of refinement. But that one fundamental concept alone I outlined above will lift this thing into the stratosphere one day.
Facebook, Instagram, reddit, none of them have ever given out even one cent. Instead they push advertising onto us for their own financial gain. Blockchain technology is the game-changer here. So really speaking, even if someone's post makes a single cent, you're still better off.
Let the pieces of the jigsaw fall into place as they are doing now. A little patience is all that's required. Steemit is only just beginning.
That's the 'everybody is happy version' and is not completely doing reality justice. It pays out tokens. The moment nobody sees value in it our tokens are worthless. There is no such thing as free money. The system thrives on its uniqueness and the fact that we are forgiving its flaws. And so are investors. Why do our tokens have value? Because there are people willing to pay for them. Why are they willing to pay? Investment, speculation on the value, to power up, ... What will happen if the platform when people get frustrated with shortcomings? The word will spread, something else might take over, investors start doubting, ... I also wonder how steemit inc makes money. Certainly not from blogging. Someone has to pay for their servers and maintenance staff.
It's only the beginning, I agree. I especially noted that I'm pointing only at flaws and not focusing on the many good points. But we should not be blind either. It can still go either way, stratosphere or bottom.
We are blogging which equates to work in the social media context. We are all contributing to anything earned. That's the difference between a "pre-blockchain" and "post-blockchain" era.
The same concept applies to Bitcoin (as well as a host of other major cryptos) and we all know how well that's turned out so far.
With people flocking to Steemit in their droves and the system working as intended (which is more than I can say for the majority of other cryptos right now in their present state), it does what it says "right out of the box". Given what I see at present, there aren't even any warning signs of it failing. Just some impressive growth and development. When Steemit went down, people used busy.org. Simple, easy fix. Things should only get better from hereon in (unless the actual blockchain dies, which I doubt will happen).
Don't get me wrong. I like your article and the discussion it creates. I love to see other perspectives to this subject, but how I see it, we had Steemit. Then esteem, then dtube, then dsound, now SMT's. As well as a slew of other projects that have been gone and are on their way. The future for Steemit is exceptionally bright and at this conjucture, it is clearly succeeding.
The chances of it failing right now, are minute, at best.
Well put. I agree almost completely with what you say. Again, I didn't meant to say it's going to end. Maybe it all sounded a bit doomsday like which was not the intention. I merely want to point at the issues I think I see. I certainly didn't mean to say that the idea is going to end. But... if something is born tomorrow that does away some of the mentioned issues it might draw people away. It's still fresh and beta so obviously we will see lots of evolving.
Thanks for the positive note on a negative article ;-)
Lol, all good, bro. We're all is this together. Let's just hope things go the way we hope they do. :)
Hey Jef, I was so busy adding your post that I almost forgot to hop over and upvote :) I already responded in the other thread. A lot of things might change with the upcoming Hard Fork, from what I heard there are some big changes coming our way.
That's new to me. Do you have more info on when and what. Any articles about this?
Yeah sure, Here are a couple of links:
https://steemit.com/steemit/@velocity/steemit-hard-fork-20
https://steemit.com/steemit/@inventor16/hard-fork-20-my-thoughts
https://steemit.com/steemit/@steemitblog/proposing-hardfork-0-20-0-velocity
You made some valid points I never thought about. But I got a question about the images. Are they stored in the blockchain and steemitimages is only used as a caching proxy?
No. The blockchain only stores the links. What you see in the edit field is what gets stored. An if the image link no longer works there is no way to fix it.
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STOPall your points are totally valid. The Illegal content thing is probably the most serious and it can really be the end of steemit (at least the end of the domain "steemit.com"), especially considering how things can't be removed from the block chain.
I don't think the big issue is steemit.com. They can censor the illegal content. But censoring takes resources. The blockchain itself however. No idea actually.
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Well sure, thanks for the appreciation!
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Brilliant article and well put together @jefpatat
Your opinions are strong and they are all backed up by examples.
As a newbie of just 4 days I wasn't aware of all these teething problems.
With regards to the illegal content, you are right that it could damage the whole concept. One person could bring the whole blockchain down. The optimist in me hopes that the people that come to steemit are content creators who want an outlet to express themselves.
This is where the flagging system will be best served - as a community we must stop that happening at all costs and flag that stuff!!!
And you are also right about it being a blogging platform. To really connect with others you need discord or steemit chat.
Following you now dude youre a well informed man. I will recommend this article to other noobs like me.
Big love ❤️
IMHO the parent company’s focus is on the black chain and not on the social network. Also they are interested in the social graph to keep things going on the blockchain. The things on the blockchain and transactions of many types including comments, votes etc and with SMT it will be financial as well. Imho this is why images / media is not on the blockchain as that has no value as such ( to the parent company and blockchain)