Dear Steemit, You're in DESPERATE Need of a Status Page! (A "Comedy of Errors")

Houston, we have a problem!

I'll be the first to admit that I am a bit of a "Steemit Evangelist," and I regularly annoy friends and relatives by telling them this is the greatest thing since sliced bread.... but as of late the Good Ship Steemit seems to have hit some pretty rough seas.

Now, I will preface the following by saying that I have no idea what it takes to build a network like Steemit on a blockchain. However, there are certain very basic things that need to be addressed... that are more psychological than anything.

I don't know what's going on with the site, but this morning I found myself-- for the nth time-- having to refresh the page several times each tried to post a comment. 

Not to mention that some pages were taking 20, 30, 60 seconds to load. And sometimes, trying to reload the page would not actually display the "current" version, as a result of which I double posted a comment. Then when I refreshed a 3rd or 4th time... it showed the first comment posted four minutes earlier.

Reminded me a bit of the good old days of surfing the web with AOL 2.5 on a 28.8k phone connection...

I don't know what's going on with the site, but what's with all the "transaction broadcast error" messages? You try to post something, you wait for 45 seconds as the activity icon spins and spins... and then "transaction broadcast error." 

It's getting a bit annoying.

Yeah, I know, "Steemit is in Beta," and all that good stuff. I GET that. 

The other day I created a new post... sent it, and it ended up... well, I'm not sure where. Not that it's a big deal, but it certainly didn't end up in the "New" posts feed... although it did end up on my blog page. So it posted, but by some glitch was never listed as "new."

For those who think that's "no big deal," think again. That post had ZERO upvotes and comments after 20 minutes... compared to usually about 15-20 votes and 3-4 comments. 

I don't know what's going on with the site, but half the time my upvotes don't actually "take" and become upvotes. So I have to redo them. Only to get a message (sometimes) "You've already made a similar vote." 

Sure there are workarounds, but should I REALLY have to sit and constantly refresh my Steemd page in order to see whether my actions on Steemit happened?

This all gets a little "scarier" when it comes to our wallets and trying to transfer Steem/SBD to another user or to one of the exchanges. Did my transfer ACTUALLY complete?

I Don't Know What's Going On With the Site, BUT...

Did anyone spot the common phrase, as I described the above issues?

I want to make it perfectly clear that I don't have an issue with Steemit being a bit buggy-- because we are in Beta, after all-- what I have a "problem" with, is not knowing what's going on.

Clearly "something" is not as it should be... but what? Another DDoS attack? New code being tested? I tried checking the Steemit "official" twitter and Facebook pages... but there is nothing there. 

Sure, there are occasional updates on @steemitblog, but that doesn't help a lot if trying to look at Steemit returns a "50x error."

So we're all pretty much in the dark. 

AGAIN... it's not the bugs that are the problem, it's the "being in the dark."

So let's look at that, and the deeper implications.

Being in the dark results in people losing confidence and enthusiasm, and eventually losing interest. And users losing confidence is the last thing a brilliant venue like Steemit can afford to have happen when it is still fresh and new and trying to grow rapidly.

The Steemit community needs to know that "Yes there are problems, and yes we're aware of these and working on them."

The Case for a Steemit Status Page

Most major web sites-- especially those that handle "financial" parts of people's lives (in this case, our Steem wallets)-- have free standing web pages or status feeds. Along with somebody(s) responsible for keeping them current, moment-to-moment-- @andrarchy, anyone in the loop who could do this?

These status pages live on completely different servers and are typically hidden behind 47 thousand layers of CloudFlare and other anti-tampering protection-- in other words, they have "100% uptime."

Those pages are where you go-- through a link on every page on the main site-- if you want updates while the site is running buggy; or it's where the front page forwards to in case of something like the recent DDoS attacks or a complete site failure. 

Some organizations simply use a dedicated WordPress or Blogger blog; or a dedicated twitter feed... that exists for NO REASON other than to report site status, problems and fixes. In many cases, there is also a "report a problem" option on these pages.

I used to make most of my living from eBay... and whenever I couldn't get anything to work, I would check the live "System Status" site and could usually find my answers: "Photo uploads are down as of 16:34; developers are working on the issue, estimated restoration time 20:00."

At least I would know what was going on.

Developers and Techies vs. the General Public

Yes, I realize there are many who will say "yeah but Steemit.chat, blah, blah, blah" and "Yeah but github, blah, blah, blah."

That's fine and true and applicable IF-- and ONLY if-- you have a fundamental understanding of programming and the tech behind web sites and coding.

For example, yes I know there are other Steemit blockchain entry points such as busy.org and steemitstage.com, etc.

But what must be remembered is that as Steemit keeps growing, the "next marginal user" will increasingly be some "Regular Joe" in the street with a smartphone... who neither knows nor cares what "a github" is; they just care about "where their stuff is." 

That's why an "Explain what's happening with the site like you're talking to a six-year old" status page is required. 

Last I checked the domain "SteemitStatus.com" was available. I sincerely hope one of the developers and/or witnesses reads this post and snaps it up with an eye towards implementing it.

And yes, I realize the developers have plenty to work on these days, but I think this really needs to be made a priority... because it would be a great shame if something as original and beautiful as Steemit fails because of poor public relations.

The Importance of Good Public Relations

Some of the greatest ideas and projects can end up dead in the water because of botched public relations and poor communication between developers (owners) and users.

Over the past 20 years, I've watched numerous projects squander their extraordinary potential by focusing exclusively on features while not placing enough importance on communication and public relations. 

Here's a lesson: It doesn't matter how brilliant your product/service might be-- if people lose confidence in you, you're sunk. 

I remember a fairly prominent provider of message boards-- around 2005-- botching a software upgrade. This was a premium service-- forum owners paying from $25-$1000 a month to have their communities hosted. 

When everybody's screens went black... instead of messaging all customers and saying "we know there's a problem, we're working on it, and dialing back to the last good edition till we fix it" NOTHING was said. All the forum owners wanted was some reassurance.

Two months later-- as a result of continued non-communication-- that company had gone from a $2m a month enterprise to having about 300 minor clients and "free" sites... all while maintaining it had just been "a minor glitch." A minor glitch that cost you 98% of your business...

Let's not have something like that happen here!

Here's the thing-- I think Steemit is a really awesome place, and that's why I throw these ideas out there for discussion. I was to see us thrive, not crash; I want to see us move towards $10.00 Steem, not $0.10 Steem!

What do YOU think? Has your approach to Steemit changed in the time you've been here? If you have been here a long time, are you as enthusiastic now, as you used to be? Do you belong to any guilds and groups? Do you buy upvotes and re-steems? Have you ever? Leave a comment - share your experience - be part of the conversation!

(As usual, all text and images by the author, unless otherwise credited. This is original content, created expressly for Steemit)
Published 20171025 16:45 PDT