RE: Definition of a Whale and a whale-like group and the Math Behind
Thank you for the adding, that's really interesting!! I hadn't seen this post yet.
I guess whatever features developers may plan to implement, they have to be kept simple, easy to understand and to handle. We always have to bear in mind that the great majority of users won't have much time neither will to study an algorithm.
Instead of resteeming the content (since resteeming is also a feature used by minnows), whales may select their favorite pieces by giving them "points", like we use when evaluating services and products. A highly recommended article may reach a maximum of 5 points (stars) which could be indicated close to the payout and vote counter. That would simply indicate high quality to minnows and dolphins. The decision to upvote would be still on them.
Furthermore, besides a trending page we would have a recommendation page (or however we may call it), where whale picks would be listed.
Like that, rewards distribution and curation would be perfectly separated and both - the most powerful and those who want to become powerful - would have a relevant influence on the overall performance and distribution of wealth.
Thanks for your thoughts in reply!
I get your point on keeping things simple, but for me, I love the technical and complex aspect of steem and steemit! Would it be so bad if steemit was a place with a high concentration of techy folks who also enjoy up seeing and up voting non-tech content? Do the non-tech people really need to understand how things work here, to post and enjoy recognition and feedback? How many of us have a clue as to how our computer of phone works? :-) Yet we use them all the time.
Also, regarding simplicity, some people would like a simple reward system - you get a lot of votes, you get a lot of reward. Personally, I like the randomness of the rewards! I love poker too, and a great hand does not always get a great reward. The variable nature of it can be addicting, see any casino for example. Yet, there IS a formula! So us techy people can and have figured it out to some degree. We like solving puzzles like this and find steemit to be intellectually challenging just from the perspective of figuring out how it works.
On YouTube, they initially had a 5 star rating system. Most people gave one or 5 stars, so they went to thumbs up and down. I think if a whale, or anyone, resteems a post here, it is the ultimate way to select it as a favorite. If they further make it known that they will be up voting it in the near future, then they are in affect giving an easy opportunity to get a curation reward which redistributes the SP in a way that gives everyone a chance to haave more power here in the future.
It says "beta" under "steemit" in the upper lefthand corner of the page, so let the experiments and the games continue!