RE: The following bot owners support promoting scammy trash on Steemit.
You gotta have a bit of faith in people man! There are more smart people than dumbasses out here. Unless by giving them a slot you mean, exposing people to the fakery and who is supportive of that fake content.
I like what @sneaky-ninja and probably a few other bid-bots are doing to monitor the content they upvote whether after the fact or by having blacklistings that are also reviewed.
i AM a bit surprised to see @appreciator and @smartsteem listed as well. both these operations claim to have whitelists and blacklists and even a degree of manual curation efforts. Come to think of it, going through the smartsteem whitelisted accounts, I found the ratings a bit strange. Some dead accounts and so many with 3 stars that I really can't sell my votes to. After sifting through the whitelist, I think I have left just 20 out of 118 checked.
Don’t have faith in anyone unless proven otherwise. And frankly all the complaining about bid bots on here is ironic considering that literally 100% of the people who use this site do it because contributors are rewarded financially.
Furthermore, there is no such thing as bad publicity. Anyone who skimmed homeboy’s post about his udemy course (an overt advertisement) might read this one because the tone is completely different. Yet the thumbnail is a screenshot of the post. And now there are literally hundreds of comments discussing him, his business and his udemy course. Is this better than his post disappearing into obscurity in a few days? Absolutely.
I doubt old Bernie is a paid shill, but this is a common and extremely effective way to market a company. Happens all the time on Reddit. A company will post a funny picture and there will be a can of Pepsi in the background, for example. Has nothing to do with the content, but just the fact that it’s there reminds people that it exists.
That said, why is everyone jumping down this guy’s throat for advertising his course? I agree that he probably could have put a little more effort into his post. Maybe given a better explanation of how he made the money, or what specifically we would learn in the course.
But the guy is offering to teach you how to make money which is literally the reason everyone uses this fucking stupid website in the first place. $250k in two years is pretty amazing if true. Why is the reaction so negative?
Why is this automatically considered a scam just because he guy is out here trying to promote his business? Do you know how hard it is to create a course for udemy, let alone get thousands of people to purchase it and leave a review? Do you think that shit just magically happens overnight?
I think what Steemit really suffers from is a lack of hustle. People are so lazy and entitled over here and feel they deserve to be rewarded for their subpar content that no publisher would even pay $20 for. Aside from a few developers and authors, few people on here think big enough to use the steemit system to their advantage. Say what you want about @jerrybanfield for example, but the guy has a popular YouTube channel, is a steemit personality, has his own vote bot and probably makes money in a dozen other ways as well.
That in and of itself is admirable because it is not an easy thing to do. It takes massive amounts of time and work to get to that level. And yes I understand that most of the content on here is not @yallapapi levels of amazing, but whose fault is that? Jerry’s? This udemy guy’s?
No. It’s ultimate all of your fault. The trending page is just one page on this entire website. There are thousands to choose from. The best content does not go there, the most heavily promoted does. I find it ironic that Bernie even used vote bots to promote this post as well, but honestly I’m not surprised by anything on steemit anymore.
Instead of looking at what others have and saying it’s not fair, why not learn from them and copy what they do? There is a reason why you see the same people over and over on Trending: because they understand how the system works and are using it to their advantage. Nothing is stopping you or anyone else from doing the same.
If it’s an issue of money, then you need to think of other ways to solve your problem. Promote off steemit. Reach out to whales/personalities and work out a deal where they promote one of your posts in exchange for something you do for them. Create an engagement group where everyone upvotes each other’s posts for better visibility. Start a fund that curates the best content. Something.
This culture of entitlement and anti-entrepreneurship in here is just downright pathetic. People expect things to be easy for them, they want to be handed everything. The second someone establishes an advantage it’s all of a sudden “abusing the system.” No it’s not.
Commercials on tv are not abusing the system. Ads in a newspaper are not abuse. Sponsorships for sports teams are not abuse. This is how business is done. This is how you have a computer to read my stupid comment and electricity to power your house.
Jerry banfield is subpar trash.
@nonameslefttouse you're the hero we need right now.
@yallapapi, No, bid botting is not the same as an advertisement. We've been through this before. Bit botting is more subtle and deceptive. You know when you are watching a fucking commercial.
I thougt we have been through this before with you discussion with him. Why do you continue to exume the same dead talking points.
You are just another devious marketer that hopes to exploit people's psychology while offering little value.
Please, stop trying to take advantage of people. I would be glad to support you if you stop using a methodology based on hype (smoke and mirrors).
I think you take an assumption and run too far away with it. I am here to read good content, create good content, and curate so as to keep the place nice and clean. If I don't like or want hustle, I don't support it. Bid-bots who are doing that, should be called out for doing so and we can all see who is who. Then we get to choose. If an newspaper publishes nonsense, I don't buy it. I am ENTITLED to choose.
Of course you're entitled to choose. But like I said before, we are all on Steemit to make money. All of us. 100%. Nobody is here because the technology is superior or because it's the only game in town. There are other platforms that are more established with bigger audiences, more features, etc. We are here for the money.
So if you're already here to make money, why not make the most of it? That's what I don't understand. How are people having trouble making this connection?
I'm not saying we're ONLY here for the money. But if all of a sudden we switched to a Reddit-like system of "karma" for rating content instead of crypto, how many people do you think would stick around?
If people want to advertise the fact that they are using bid bots, that's up to them. I've been very up front about my use of bots from the beginning. In fact, I would even say that my first set of of posts that hit the Trending page and colorfully explained this phenomenon is what inspired this recent outrage.
You can buy whatever newspaper you want. And you don't have to read the ads if you don't want. You can skim right over them if that's your thing. But sometimes you see an ad for something that interests you or that you actually need. And you didn't even know you needed it.
Take this guy's course for example. Before today I never even considered signing up for a Udemy course on how to make money... from making Udemy courses? But after all this I'll probably at least go over there and see what this guy's about. It's not the end of the world. And of all the posts on there I find it strange that Mr Bernie decided to go after this guy. He is at least advertising a service that could potentially help people improve their financial situation (which is, once again, the main reason all of us use Steemit and not another platform).
Plenty of other targets to go after. In fact, why is nobody saying anything about @berniesanders using paid bots to promote his articles? He's making a profit from this post as well. I can't imagine that it took him very long to write. But because it presses a certain button that triggers a lot of the users on here, people either forget about that or choose to ignore it.
Not hating on the guy. We all have to get our name out there some how. And that's exactly what we're doing on here. For example, this is not a private message between you and I. We are talking on a forum where we both have an audience to argue our points. Some people will agree with me and vice versa. We build our cred slowly over time and solidify any supporters we already have.
Why does nobody like to talk about this openly when it's obvious that everyone does it? Using the bots is the same. You want people to put a disclaimer in their posts that say they're using bid bots? Do you think that's going to change anything?
The only reason people care is that the people who have money are making more money, ostensibly at the expense of people who "choose" not to use bid bots when in all likelihood it's just because they don't have the expendable income to do so. In the past I've said that in a not-so-nice way, but let's call it what it is.
If you have an ecommerce store that sells something and you put an ad on Facebook, are you now a bad person because your ad gets more visibility than a random post by someone that didn't pay to advertise their content? I don't get it.
"So if you're already here to make money, why not make the most of it? That's what I don't understand. How are people having trouble making this connection?"
You will go crazy trying to answer this question.
It's like everyone here is autistic about game theory.
Or maybe they are thinking that if you you can starve a lion long enough, it'll start eating grass. I also notice that these people who are "Autistic" about game theory tend to be communist leaning.
Most of these people aren't even honest with themselves. Won't admit they are here for money but happily kiss whale ass for upvotes then look down their noses at you for being upfront and paying for your upvote. Smh
I don't have the exact same opinion about bid-bots as many of those here. I believe there are good and bad bots. I want to support and use those bid-bot owners who don't promote poor content. This means, i wish to see a transparent process in place to place hustlers, spammers, scam artists etc, on a black list. Why? Not because i begrudge them a right to scam people. It is because I want to use a platform which also has longevity for me to make money perhaps or for me to reach an audience, -well into the furture. Scammy trash content serves only those unscrupulous scammers and the bid-bots who supplied them a means to get rich scamming people. There are other places to scam people. They can even stay here, but the community will eventually clean things up. Important thing is, it must be done transparently and everyone ought to have power to do it.
I don't disagree. But a professional marketer advertising his Udemy course is not "scammy trash." He's not scamming anyone. A scam is where he takes the money and disappears. He is marketing his course. A very successful course by the looks of it.
Maybe not scammy. Definitely spammy. It's unsolicited marketing, the kind of thing I setup filters to throw out before it arrives in my email box. And if he's successful, he wouldn't be the first marketer of that sort of thing to become successful. There will be bid-bots happy to take a portion of his profits, I just like to know which of them is doing so - so i can avoid ever supporting them.
One man's professional marketer is another man's professional bull-shitter.
A core tenet of sales is that you never know who is going to be interested in what you're selling. This isn't your email box, this is a public website where anyone can post whatever they want. If you don't like the post, just scroll down the page to the next one. In reality there are very very few individuals out there who have the money to promote their business on here. Business yes, individuals no.
I still don't understand the animosity towards someone who is just trying to promote his business. I think that if the post was maybe a little more polished, then he wouldn't be catching so much flak. Or if he had made even the slightest effort to make a post or two that contributed to the community before promoting his business. That's not good taste, that's just good marketing.
"Everyone" does not do it. There are some - like me - who think using bots to buy popularity and votes is outright bribery that ends in theft of the rewards pool, diversion of attention, and adding totally useless clutter to the daily traffic. Thieves always justify their malfeasance so they can continue ripping the system off. Create a bot-killer and see how many people surprise you with the amount of money they suddenly have available to fund it.
Yes.
I wrote something similar below. Yours is better.
The world is to varied, diverse....what interest one doesn't interest another. You are right about that. I may pass up ten, fifteen articles in my feed or on trending until I hit on something that interest me. We have to respect everyone's contribution to grow as a community and be inclusive. I can see being a little more concerning towards people who would try and make big bucks by repeatedly posting nonsense just for the sake of posting something. Like someone who would go online to find memes to post without at least trying to create their own, or similar things along that line.
wow! and this is how you get advertised man. Seriously this post is a good way of advertising the Udemy guy like you said.
Sadly most people will not think of that. lol
You know how else business is done?....when they are inclusive to all levels of intellect. This is why Steemit will never reach the status FB has achieved in life. I find it incredibly insulting that one who simple has a learning disability but tries his best could find themselves shunned and alienated simply for trying. It makes my blood boil knowing someone would label a learning handicap as being lazy and expecting things to come easy.
I love your viewpoint and it was worth a "follow".
Thank you, I have a son who had a unspecified learning disability. I always told him trying was better than not trying at all, if you spend your time worrying about what other people are going to think you will only hold yourself back.
I am more a blogger then content producer. Been blogging for three years now, sort of addicted to it, it's something I enjoy doing. Putting time right now into writing and creating just isn't worth the payout for the time involved. I do try and find something to write about once a week but it's varied with a simply format....at least until it's a little more worth it. Thank you for the follow.
Couldn't have said it better. You earned a follow.
Nice to see others who believe in this philosophy.
100%.
that's like saying
or
daem....folks really easily impress by #guppyschool
I didn't even know you could do that! Now I've got to figure out how to manage my upvotes on smarsteem more granularly. Right now I have it set to 3 starts (excellent quality, I think) and just assumed that was a reliable filter for at least filtering out spam. If you happen to see this, can you tell me where you were able to pick and choose who your upvotes are going to (or aren't going to) one by one?
Hi - yes. I advise that you DO do that. The stars system seems pretty broke, with many of the 3 star accounts being dead or publishing low quality content imo. I am not sure the ratings are even updated at all, and if so - it certainly appears it hasn't happened for the 2 weeks or so that I have been logging in there.
You do it by selecting whitelist, then save it after going through the list of about 150 users on the whitelist. Be sure to select my @trumanity account ;-) around Page number 50+ or so - my @oneazania account is not whitelisted (close unashamed self-promo).
You can also find it by going directly to the SELL YOUR VOTES section, Choose Users (middle selection) - see the link with this text
Make sure you save everything (bottom right hand side button).
If all goes well, you see a tiny confirmation message at the top of the page - I often get errors - try different browsers - rinse and repeat ;-)
EDIT: it took me a good hour to go through the list. Also, found your account on page 8 - your comment here drew my attention to the need to uncheck the one below yours and check yours ;-)
Sadly, simply being a smart person doesn't make them good. It's often relatively smart people who scam others en-masse. It's often relatively smart people who hack others.
Though they may be smart, that could only work against us.