The agnostic Steemit curator

I'm agnostic as to all things. I don't worry about what is real and what is not, I am only concerned with what is before me.

So when I read articles on Steemit, I am agnostic as to the author. I don't worry about whether the author of any piece is my friend or foe. I don't worry if that writer follows me, has upvoted me, or has made a comment on any of my posts. I really don't.

As a writer and curator, I am on a quest for quality on Steemit, nothing more, nothing less. Whether or not I am in correspondence with anyone on Steemit is not my concern. My only concern is quality.

I look for subject matter, tone, pitch, grammar and punctuation. I also look for sincerity, another component of quality. If you have a signature at the end of your post pleading for an upvote, that doesn't serve your cause. Your content should stand up all on it's own. Good content doesn't need an appeal for an upvote.

Part of my concern here is, for lack of a better term, "nepotism". What is nepotism?

nep·o·tism
ˈnepəˌtizəm/Submit
noun
the practice among those with power or influence of favoring relatives or friends, especially by giving them jobs.
synonyms: favoritism, preferential treatment, the old boy network, looking after one's own, bias, partiality, partisanship
"hiring my daughter was not nepotism—it was just good business"

So often we see nepotism in life. In government, we see generations of the same family getting into high office because they know someone. In business, we see that "who you know is more important than what you do".

Should a person be denied an opportunity to prosper because he didn't schmooze with the right decision maker? Should one of questionable competence be seated in a position of power simply because he's related to someone of greater power?

If merit is important, treat it like it is. That's what I do. If your content is good I will vote it up. If your content is not so great, well, keep trying.

But if you confront me on Facebook or in Steemit chat with tit for tat, like "I upvoted you, so you must upvote me", in my mind, that defeats the purpose of the system set up by the architects of Steemit. Yes, we can treat Steemit as a vote trading system, but if we're only focused on the votes, then we lose sight of the quality.

I write original content. I like to read original content. Computers are made to copy content down to the 1's and 0's. I'm not a computer. I'm just a human being who finds Steemit entertaining, both as a writer and curator.

I write because I love to write. I love what writing does to my brain, so I don't worry about how much time it takes to write an article. I don't worry that I spent so much time on an article and got 4 cents after a week. That only means I should keep trying. Every "no" is one step closer to a "yes", a ding-dong dollar sign followed by additional digits.

The money is secondary. Yes, it's true I'm here because none of the other major social media networks will pay me for every like, every comment and every post. If you have anxiety about spending an hour on a post and how you didn't make that much money on it, remember that you still have your day job. You still have your day job, right? I still have my day job.

Steemit is also about reputation. A consistently positive customer experience over time builds reputation. When you have a reputation, you know people are talking about you. How do you want people to talk about you?

I defend the Steemit reputation by watching out for plagiarism, too. I look for the Cheetah account comments before I upvote. Sometimes I search for images to see if images are posted without linking to the source. I'm looking for original content that distinguishes Steemit from other sites. I want Steemit to have a reputation for original content.

I know this is going to sound cynical, but everyone on Steemit is a customer. That makes me polite, well, I'm already polite, but I don't use anonymity as a shield that permits me to be offensive. That's how I operate here. I also operate on compassion and empathy. When people suffer, I want to help them. This post is an effort towards that end.

I have a day job, a family, personal interests and I want to write for a living. I see that there are people here who are making a living writing on Steemit. I don't know how far that is away from me. It may never happen. But I'm willing to keep plugging away at it because I'm a writer and I love to write.

I can't think of a better place to put my work. Steemit is an application running on top of a public blockchain. With knowledge of the application programming interface, anyone can write a program that runs on top of that blockchain. Unlike the Ethereum blockchain, the people who designed the Steemit blockchain designed a system that doesn't get bogged down by a single "crypto-kitties" application. There are many applications running on top of the Steem blockchain.

This Steem blockchain is hosted by at least 21 nodes and as long as the blockchain is accessible over the pubic network we call "the internet", my work will still be here for you to read. In some sense, as long as there are people trading Steem, my work has a home and a place in history. Steemit is designed to give the audience and the content creators incentive to keep the Steem blockchain alive.

Steemit doesn't have some corporate interest censoring my work like in Google+ and Facebook and Twitter, to name a few. Propagation is simple on Steemit. People who follow me will see my work. People who search for terms that make my work relevant to their search effort will find my work. There is no guessing game. Everyone is on a level playing field here.

When I post and curate, I am mindful of the reputation of Steemit (and busy.org, too). I want Steemit to be known for the quality of the content, not the ease with which one can farm upvotes and money from the reward pool. I do everything I can to cast my vote based on the quality of the work, not the relationship I have to the author.

To put this relationship business in a different context, consider a popular author like J.K. Rowling. She has entertained millions of people with her Harry Potter books. I can't say that I'm a fan myself, but I can say that it is simply not possible for Rowling to maintain a personal relationship with all of her readers. This isn't to say that I want to dehumanize Steemit. This is to say that it's fine to make friends and correspond with them, but seriously, are you only going to upvote your friends and ignore good quality posts simply because you don't know them?

This is what I want to be. An agnostic curator.