Why Reddit Will Win: and what can be done
My hopes for this site when I started a month ago have been dashed. It's been promoted as a Reddit alternative, and I assure you it is not.
Why?
Curation rewards have created a gaming system.
People will not vote for what they like, they will vote for what they believe will trend.
People will not vote unless it is 30 minutes old (Who the hell takes 30 minutes to read something?)
People are voting for dollars, and nothing else.
Reddit has always had the value in the post or in the comments
Steemit, no one cares about the comments
I have had a couple comments get a good reward. I felt good about it. One I was contradictory and explained why, the other supportive with reasons why and additional content. As it turns out I suspect now that all I was, was early to comment. Look at @dollarvigalante's second post here. How I made $15,000 in 12 hours. The top comment is not really related to the post and a plug to a #payitforward (we all vote on each other's shit) post, the post he linked received no boost. I am not at all meaning to attack either of these guys, I am however tired of seeing great authors with good content being overlooked while people are looking at two things, $ and time.
Solutions?
Be interested to hear what you think on this, but my only solution is the comments. As valuable as the posts are, the comments should be equally so. With few exceptions though, the comments receive zero notice after the first few, and the post effectively abandoned shortly after 12 hours.
What would it look like if every upvote added to the post value but every upvote was hidden?
What if instead the author received only the current curation reward of 25% of that value?
The other 75%, allotted between the upvoted material by the votes both comments and post received.
I don't know if that's the solution. However it would make a site I enjoy far more. I judge a quality post by the discussions it sparks, the rebuttals it brings and passion it ignites.
Imagine how things look when you have to defend your post to protect your dollars? You can't just walk away and ignore it.
You've given a set of rules on how to use the site that aren't how people use social media sites. Your rules say, I have 4 votes per day and then I am penalized. There's more detail than that yeah I know, but who the hell is going to read that? That's what we have now.....
I love this, I just can't vote for it
Yes i agree. im noticing this problem myself.
Rubbish and meaningless drivel gets upvoted while tutorials and help posts get left behind because they are not generating much wealth.
i go on reddit to find answers to technical problems, or answers on how to do something. posts like that should be rewarded on steemit
And the answers there, they are as much in the comments as they are in the original post right? I would LOVE to see that here.
It really comes down to posting valuable content regardless of the reward. Any reward you get here is more than you'd get on Reddit, unless of course you count the value in a response that answers your question or improves it in some way. It's hard to compare karma to $$$ for sure. Thanks for the post. My hope is that long term, those who post valuable information continue to be rewarded for it monetarily.
I agree. I think long term it will pan out. It is a post expressing a bit of frustration with the early stages of the site.... and yeah, I dramatized it. I do believe in the site though..... ain't powering down.... just with there was value to the post beyond the initial window mainly
I overlooked first part so responding again :). I think the comments are part of it. Valuable content ignites response. I am 100% for the site. I love it, it was more an attempt to make it about the site and not the cryptocash
I have really mixed feelings about Steemit. For one it's a really cool experiment. I think the economics behind the platform makes it interesting. It's also one of the best portals we've had to welcome new users the the cryptosphere.
On the other hand, incentives seem to make everything look fake:
(I'm guilty of all of the above at times)
Seeing the monetary value beside each post doesn't help either, but I understand that that's exactly what brought most users to the site. Making some of those options invisible on Steemit might help, but it'll always be on the blockchain if anyone cares to dig it up. Maybe the average user would feel more human though, without that $ figure next to their score. I'm not convinced that giving more rewards to comments is the solution. If anything it'll create more spam.
I do think that if this to take off, though, content creation will get so competitive that most people won't even bother, they'll just be here to watch. Most upvotes won't be enough for a reward so they just overall won't care about the money.
Not 100% sure what's best either. I think incentivized downvotes (told you I was guilty) might help towards equality, but it won't change the monetary incentives driving everyone to act like zombies.
Good post @clevecross.
About the comments. Yeah I can see that. I was just trying to think how they might be more valuable. I guess make your own post to counter if you want to be heard. I just figured it would at least get people to put up good comments to try and draw the reward also. They're not getting looked at I don't feel and that's a shame
Really could almost become like television. Most "pay" by participating.... Few by "talent". I only use quotes because sometimes things just trend and I don't get it lol.
In case this comes off as a pissed I haven't made money post... it is not. I love the site, just think it is very very very very much still in beta lol
I like these ideas. I think hiding some of the information would be very helpful in people only voting on quality instead of the curation reward they could get from a $10k post.
I also like the idea of your payout continuing over a longer period. That would give you time to promote your article. You could spend more time on one article instead of trying to write one a day because the old ones are worthless after the first payout. And this would help with the how-to's. You never know when someone else will need the information you supplied and think it was valuable and want to vote.
Yeah. I keep thinking of all the old reddit posts I run into.... how the post started with just a question asked, and an informative debate happened!
Take a look at this, I am not insinuating anything just be careful guys
Link
yea the curation reward system is fully broken.
If you want to make money with curation, currently you have to vote for posts from well known people what will most likely trend. This leads to the effect, that the post of already well known people is upvoted. If the post then reaches trending, people will simply vote for it because they use steemit like reddit.
On top of that newcomers that vote for an already high paid pots see an big effect of their vote, which further encourages to vote for high paid posts.
Maybe we should drop curation rewards totally, currently i see no use for them.
Also we should switch to a linear payout algorithm. People should vote for what they want to give some of their money. In the end its their own money they distribute. A linear payout algorithm would be very easy to understand and could be paid out at once. If you don't vote for lets say 30 days your money could be distributed the same way like it is now.
Yeah...... It would be nice to see payout extended further to say 48 hours, with articles on trending page kept similar to how it is now. Lots of ways to fix it and I am sure they will be addressed, just a frustration now I was pointing out dramatically lol