I have $20K sitting in BTC that I want to blocktrade into STEEM and power up. BUT I CAN'T PULL THE TRIGGER
I want to invest $20K more into STEEM, and then power up. I want the long-term price of STEEM to go to $10 and well beyond. Maybe $20. Maybe higher. Who knows how high the limit could be if steemit becomes the "go to" social media platform for the masses?
BUT .....
With the current curation/trending issues, I'm having trouble convincing myself that the platform is really at the start of a sustainable exponential expansion for the user base.
Another possibility is the platform is at the start of a cycle where new users grow exponentially every month, these new users get at most 30 days under their belt, and then 95% of the new users pack it in, abandon their account, and never come back. That is not a path for STEEM going to $10. That is a path for STEEM going to $0.10.
My specific concerns are current curation/trending issues and the part that some whales are playing in the obvious distortions.
Let's look at the recent view of trending topics.
Two posts by Dan and one about Dan. Obviously they attracted a lot of upvotes as folks chased curation rewards knowing all posts by and about Dan would float to the top in trending. Lots of code segments to read through. Genius content I'm sure. But definitely counts as "inside baseball" type of material. Will 5 million future steemit users be interested in code segments?
Two posts by Miss Delicious. At least the tenth post on the Bahamas trip, maybe the 15th post on that trip? Folks chasing curation rewards since the Delicious posts have been golden delicious in the last few weeks. They always float to the top of trending. Will 5 million future steemit users be interested in this much detail from one vacation?
One post with short update by DollarVigilante on how the meeting with RichDadPoorDad was not a love fest. Big "debate" on the difference between anarcho-capitalist and capitalist. Definitely counts as "inside baseball" type of material. DV always does well on trending, so could also be folks chasing curation rewards. Will 5 million future steemit users be interested in whether DV and RichDad reconciled and made up?
Couple posts at lower end of trending page on G20 summit and a tall observation tower.
Final post that got cut off on my screen capture. A short one paragraph update about the Vacation Rental Industry. These show up at the rate of approximately once per day. Always seem to end up in trending. These posts are always upvoted by Hendrikdegrote who is #14 on the whale list, according to steemwhales. The hendrikdegrote upvote is always first on the on the upvote list. Conclusion is Hendrik has purchased $2.5million worth of influence on steemit. This is enough to ensure that the Vacation Rental Industry posts end up on trending.
Hendrik was also the first upvoter on the DollarVigilante post above. Hendrik is a frequent upvoter on DV posts. Hendrik upvotes can often take a post onto trending. But when Hendrik is busy or unavailable, we see Thejohalfiles as an upvoter that has enough "juice" to also take a post onto trending. Thejohalfiles is #19 on the whale list, with account value estimated at $1.8million.
A whale compared to you and me, but only a mini-whale when compared to Hendrik :).
If you go back and look on the trending page, you find a large percentage of cases where posts get onto trending based on an upvote from hendrikdegrote individually or from thejohalfiles individually. But sometimes these whales work together to get a post onto trending. Many posts where you see the first two upvotes are from these two whales. Maybe one person and two different whale suits, to be able to get so many upvotes to cluster so closely? Maybe Mr. and Mrs. whale? Who knows?
So am I complaining that these two whales have bought $2.5M and $1.8M of influence and are using the influence to get posts onto trending.
No. That isn't the complaint.
Au contraire. It might actually be positive for STEEM price in the long-run if advertisers learned of the steemit platform, learned they could spend advertising dollars to get SP and upvote posts they control of prefer onto a trending page. That might turn out to be the ultimate monetization path that takes STEEM to $100. Maybe these two whales are the front end of this monetization wave that will sweep over steemit? Who knows.
My problem is the way that the trending page is currently constructed is not remotely helpful in trying to keep new users engaged on the platform through their first 30 days. Which is required to keep them on the platform for their first 60 days, and then their first 90 days, and etc.
The trending page as currently constructed provides the exact opposite result.
I think of the trending page as the "whale lottery" page. You can get onto the trending page if hendrik or thejohalfiles decide they want you on the trending page. And then everyone is going to chase those posts under the assumption they could be in line for big curation payouts, once the post makes it to trending.
How is that helpful in keeping new users engaged once they join the platform?
Ultimately I am having trouble pulling the trigger on putting $20K into steemit not because of the whale structure, that allows investors with big wallets to purchase influence. That is a good thing. That could ultimately drive the price of STEEM to the moon.
BUT, only if we have smart whales. And over the last couple of weeks the voting patterns of a couple of our whales look to be the opposite of smart. The voting patterns are generating a trending page that, in my opinion, will be certain to turn-off new users, as opposed to making new users want to stay on the platform.
Which leads to my recommendation for HF20. There should be someway for every user to customize what shows up on their own personalized trending page. I only want to look at trending posts that are of interest to me. And I assume other users would have the same opinion.
Keep the current trending algorithms and page presentation if you want. Change the name of that page to the "whale lottery page". And then let me define my own trending page that will be of interest me.
I'll put hockey on my trending page. We will eventually get some good hockey content on steemit. And I'll be hooked.
Rant off.
I am interested in your thoughts and comments on the rant above.
Please upvote and resteem if this post made you stop and think for a couple of seconds.
STEEM On!!
Dave
This is how I feel at the moment. I've purchased Steem because I think its a good investment compared to other cryptocurrencies but I haven't been able to convince myself to power up. I wrote an article about HF20 that voiced many of the same concerns as @aggroed about the new potential token system and how mining should be replaced with a better consensus system to avoid having Dan's posts always hitting the top while normal users get frustrated and just give up. We need a fair and progressive system. Hope the devs feel the same way!
Thanks for comments. I'm not worried about Dan votes. He doesn't do it often, recently not at all, and when he does it seems responsible. I can't be as positive about the motivations of @hendrikdegrote and @thejohalfiles.
STEEM On!!
It's a lot like real life really- many worthwhile, well written posts get passed over and never really have a chance but if you happen to get trendy for any reason then you can I guess post pics of cow patties and make a small fortune. A reflection of our superficial society and it's bizzaro practices.
Don't get me wrong I am grateful for the support I have received on steemit but some of the posts I see raking in hundreds of dollars are absolutely ABSURD when considering their relatively superficial content- lowest common denominator maybe?
But I agree that this current model will not build steemit as THE social media platform the way in which it could be if managed properly- but alas in comes human nature and perhaps some short sided thinking. Thanks for the great post.
Thanks for taking time to reply
Great post. I was thinking the exact same thing. @sweetsssj is milking that vacation for every dollar she can. Who cares really about 5 different posts on one trip. She could've made one post about that whole trip and made her $2,000, but no...greed strikes so she needs to post 5 posts to rake in what...$10k?! Are you kidding me?! #### like this is why Steemit will never be a top contender. It's become a joke on how it actually works. Can't see it being around in10 years if they keep the payout structure like this. They're basically paying the rich to get richer. Every day I learn more about Steemit, every day it becomes more transparent how pathetic it is
Agreed. Nothing against sweetsssj. But the $$ she is milking from that vacation are not highly motivating to any of the new users who have joined the site. It's not her fault. It is the way the site is currently functioning due to the voting behavior of @hendrikdegrote and @thejohalfiles. It is their $4.3M so they can vote any dang way they please. But their current voting behavior is going to turn their $4.3M into $43K pretty darn quick if they keep scaring new users away and user growth turns out to be a phantom. That isn't a reason for me to turn my measly $20K into $200 which will buy one nice steak dinner.
I'm thinking of dumping it all and throwing it all into gigawatt. I think that's the best idea I've heard for a while. Mining is going to big for a long time.
Agree 100%. Every day I ask myself if I should start powering down. Just don't think I believe the system works for anyone other than people who either have a ton of steempower or a ton of followers. If it doesn't change, Steem price is going to fall like a rock....or lose all users except the top 10%
This place is every one for themselves. If you dont have a following or benefactors or capital up front, tough luck. We need other avenues for building merit in one's interest groups.
Agreed. Basically a stripped down version of reddit for 99% of users. Permission to print $$ for the 1% .
stay hopeful as I found out later that "community" pages are in the works for 2017 according to steemit Roadmap 2017. I'm definitely taking a break from investing time into posting because it's really not worth it with the tag system.
Im not sure if you were aware of the fact that the generation of Steem per day is about 40,000 Steem, which now means 40,000 bucks. Do your math HOW MUCH she is actually milking the site:).
1/40th of daily production. So top 10 doing this well take 25% of daily production.
Long-term value of the site is maximized by growing to X millions of users.
Which means site structure has to keep millions of minnows engaged and returning, or else site value won't be maximized
So that's my math and thought process.
My though processing is the same. Moral story of the day that the new HF sucks and it need changes + the fact that has been addressed in other comment branches here - some of the whales are really irresponsible with their power - that can’t be solved by any HF, it can only take some of their strength out
Agreed
I believe that @sweetsssj and her benefactors are not the problem.
IMO the tag system does not allow users to build equity in their interest groups or efficiently find good content. How could steemians come together to lobby for different content organization around here? We cant expect change without putting pressure on the admin.
OK, I complained because I ASSumed that the founders hadn't already thought about all this! Silly me.
From the 2017 Roadmap:
"we intend to augment our current tag-based organizational structure for posts
with a new system called “communities”, a special group into which others can post articles.
Two types of communities will exist: communities into which anyone in the world can post
(where community founders (or their delegated moderators) can decide, post-hoc, which
posts to hide from view) or communities in which only community founders’ (or their
delegated authors’) posts will appear."
Ok that's pretty cool
It really is a no brainer, either you believe in Steem or you don't.
Jus do it, regardless of what the currency does in price, you will be able to pay yourself back everyday you post. So you will be able to get your money back and more, especially if the currency goes up.
Hope that makes since.
If those are my only two options, I have to vote don't believe at this moment.
If two stupid whales can upvote the site to uninteresting oblivion and irrelevance, I can't believe.
Need to see smarter behavior from @hendrikdegrote and @thejohalfiles before I go all in.
You got me thinking for a couple seconds, thanks!
The personal home page we have now is similar to Tumblr where you only see posts from those you follow. IMO it's too much work for minnows to build a feed full of new and interesting content without navigating to other tags and sifting through the tabs and then deciding who to follow.
Facebook and Reddit are big destinations for niche weird stuff because of groups and subreddits. I'm not a fan of reddit, but it's popular because of the content organization, comment threads, and community feel.
I really like the group feeds on Facebook. Endless feed of comments, likes, posts, and usernames on one page. IDK how that would work on Steemit because the one thing we have going is the ability to write fully formatted articles.
Just thinking out loud here.
Thanks for taking time to stop and think and reply. Much appreciated.
IMO FB and Reddit got big because they are able to attract, host and retain your so-called "niche weird stuff".
Add all the small niches together and you have many millions of users. We are tribal at heart. Everyone wants to find their own tribe.
Need better ways for tribes to self identify and congregate on steemit. And that could end up as a truly awesome experience for everyone.
STEEM On!!
The tag system as we know it on steemit really sucks. It provides no structure for coherent community.
People should be able to create and build their own groups (like Facebook or a forum format) from the ground up and build some kind of Steem equity from the work they put into their group. Merit hierarchy might be a good direction to go; otherwise the only way to build power is by getting sugar daddy whale upvotes.
All your points are excellent. steemit leaders will either address and fix your concerns, which are universal, or the platform won't go anywhere
STEEM On!!
Dave
Put in half now and the other half later when you realize you should have put it in all at once.
Or 1/4 now, 1/4 when it hits $1.25 and the rest at $1.00
It depends if our voting whales get their act together, or do they continue to make stupid votes that are going to scare off all the new users
Excellent post Dave, your thoughts mirror my own. Upvoted and resteemed, I'm still learning the ropes in my first few weeks.
Thanks for follow-up. I am obviously curious if more folks have same concerns
STEEM On!!
Nice!!Hf20!!hopefully!great thinking buddy..
Im a 2 months old steemer..i learned a lot..
Upvoted resteemed brother!
Thanks for reading
STEEM On!!
I don't know if I can totally agree with you here. I'm not surprised to see Dan, Dollar Vigilante, and Sweetj on the top of our trending page - after all, they are some of the most popular users. They get the most views and comments, as well as those giant whale upvotes.
I'd love to see a more diverse front page, ala reddit - but I think it will come with time. On the other hand, it may be a chicken and the egg problem - will more consumers help us diversify the front page? Or will the front page limit our ability to get more users?
IMO, we'll be OK. But it is definitely worth keeping an eye on and continuously asking: Is the capital all floating to the top, over centralizing? Or is it flowing throughout the entire market?
You've got the order wrong. They don't get all the views and comments; and then later also get the whale votes.
It is exactly opposite that.
They get the whale votes which puts them at the top of trending. And then there is a mass pile on to try to pick up a few curation dregs, if you are one of the earlier upvoters after the whale votes.
They weren't popular first and then whales voted. It was the opposite. They won the whale lottery.
That's my point.
Once new users figure that there is a whale lottery and it is rigged to a few users, that is likely going to chase off a lot of new users.
Hence these two whales are not really the sharpest knives in the ocean, if they want to show self interest.
If they have self interest in the platform growing and thriving, why not run a true whale lottery? Get a new set of trending blogs every day? Get a trending list that is more diverse. More compelling. More competitive to reddit. Better able to keep new users engaged.
After all. They are whales. They can do whatever they want. That is their right as whales.
But if what they want to do is keep chasing away new users with a trending list that is not diverse and is obviously stacked, then I'm not putting any more money into STEEM.
Thanks for reading and commenting.
STEEM On !!
I rarely go to the trending page it's never interesting to me. I search tags or just go to the new page and scroll through till I find something I want to read.
Same here. I'd like to go to a trending page that had content of interest to me