When Your Posts Are "Super Good" - People Will Upvote Without Actually Reading Them
A Quick Little Rant For you.
Ok. I've wrestled with posting something like this for a while now - And I'll probably get some flack for it. It's talked about pretty openly and often. And those that do seem to get hammered rather hard. But FUCK IT! Here we GOOOO!
I've been actively posting on Steemit for about a month now. I've learned a ton about how this eco system works. I've also been here long enough to realize its brutal truths. It's finally become clear to me. I get it. All my delusions have been shattered. It's essentially a giant dutch rudder session.
My fellow Minnows and Steemit newcomers. Know this. There is a 99% chance you will never earn more than $1.50 on a post without taking part in a "vote ring" or paid promotion via vote bots. I'm sure there's people that can make it here by putting forth 100% honest efforts. But for the majority - regardless of the level of post / content quality you're never going to get anywhere. That's just that. B-B-B-But.........
No! Stop it. Listen. Let me say it more clearly - Without some form of orchestrated promotion - Almost nothing is possible on Steemit.
Would ya look at that. This post is so god dammed good this user has gotten 213 votes - Earning him over $20 - While only having 22 views. Thats amazing. Have these up-voters developed the skill of reading posts through osmosis via Cursor-hovering? It's been about 45 minutes since I took that screenshot lets check back in.
It's not like this person cant write - they have a good command of the english language. The topics they discuss aren't total bullshit. And they are arguably one of the most notable Steemit users. My issue is that with their activity. Number of followers. Content quality and REP they shouldn't need to be paying for promotion.
I'm at a loss. The fact that Trending is saturated with posts that have received paid voting - And yet there is still a "Promoted" section is fucking ridiculous (as other users have pointed out). Why have both? Having people like this user dominate because they have capital defeats the purpose of Steemit.
What's my incentive to write & produce HQ original content if no one will ever see it. Don't even get me started on the fact that a meme that took all of 3 min to make can bring in 100 - 1000x the money something which took me 4 or 5 hours to produce.
Trending should be organic. Or there needs to be a limit on how much a post on trending can be assisted by accounts known for promotion / paid voting. I've used paid voting - it works - That's the problem. For this reason alone Steemit is not what I thought it would be.
Any way - Rant over. I'm off to drink my self stupid and write another post. because regardless of how I feel about the way things seem to work around here - It's not about the money. It's about sticking with something. And that's what I'm going to do.
E.
You make some valid points.
Thanks for noticing / checking out my post.
I'm starting to see this as true...
It's not the whole platform but seems to be the majority of the driving forces behind it.
Welcome to the real steemit !! step of being a social network has a sale and paid bots ... the truth is sad to see that, so many good things that are lost by the system that is forming on the platform, apart from people who get tired of publishing things good without receiving visits, if this does not stop, steemit will be left behind
Wow I'm super sorry it took me so long to respond - I upvoted your comment and then got distracted - totally forgot to reply. "The real Steemit" is a phrase that I'm seeing for too much. But as with most things it takes a while to see behind the curtain. I'm glad it only took me 2 months to get a grasp on it .
Sad but true. The nature of the steem platform makes it so that many people just focus on the financial aspect and don't care how they get to fill their wallets. While others still try to build a community and get their posts read. Unfortunately the first group largely drowns out the second group.
Totally agree - Money always messes things up. Ive been spending time the last few weeks - tracking certain accounts and - building a database about their votes/ followers - so much scummy stuff going on here - And by accounts you would never expect - they think they are hiding it by transferring stuff out of steemit and then back in - some even just write a memo - "Payment 001-10" and send the money to the master accout. I'm all about building communities - Need this place to stay "Not like facebook"
I hope you'll post about your findings. I'm curious to see what schemes are being played here. In many ways it's quite literally a game, and people try to figure out how best to game the system.
I thinks it's our world, not just steemit. Some people have built a media with try hard or chance or whatever and after that no one else can do the same without paying them (maybe few with much more effort) and the people just follow the big guy and don't care about authors who try to creat good, original content.
The fact that you're trying to do something about it, (at least notifying other users), is somethingeaningful. Maybe you (we?) could start finding those authors that produce good, original content and promot them. (Just a random idea)
Hey - thanks for getting involved here - You're so right! It's just so toxic. Ver sad. Like i said - I always have to call bullshit when i see it. When i have more steem power i will be picking a handful of users to form curation groups with. Ill publish a post about it soon.
I'm so with you.
Get this - I've been actively writing on here for 17 days. I've had limited views, as I quickly knew I would until I entered a Sndbox quest. And I will continue to have limited views, I'm sure. But the short story I submitted for Sndbox did make it to Trending on views alone.
I also quickly decided that I wasn't going to game anything here, I wasn't going to buy votes. If I couldn't get anywhere on the strength of my words then I couldn't be arsed putting in the required effort.
Except now that the views have been removed on posts, who the fuck would know that I didn't buy upvotes? Nobody.
This platform is full of people just trying to game the system ... and then mixed in there are people who actually have some conscientiousness, who want to see this platform grow instead of it being the embarrassment it currently is when new people come to visit.
I guess it was always going to be like this. It's what is messing with my head a little about being on here though - the vibe here amongst creatives is great. It feels inspiring and like how blogging used to feel for me a decade ago, just now with added money. But the pigs snorting at the trough are the disappointing soundtrack to all this. And there doesn't seem to be any will to rein them in (from my admittedly limited understanding of the elite workings here).
IS it too late to do the Sandbox stuff - I only just found out about it? let me know if you have any favorite writing groups / challenges on here - or accounts i should be following - I love challengers - especially writing ones. I've had a huge influx of followers - Forgive me if you have been one from the beginning - but may i ask how you came across my page - what post brought you in . - I'm trying to get an idea of how people end up on my content so i can track titles fo articles to traffic and see how tags help or not.
I've paid for votes - no shame in it - Hell i did it on this post - with intended irony - Ive got a budget of less than 1SBD per post / day - Ive not put money into to the platform out of pocket - all funds / account value have been generated on the platform. - I don't think that is the same as people pumping money in to promote their- shitty content - Like blurry pictures of a fences taken with a fucking ipods from 2011 - that end up being worth - $400 -
Thank you for reading my content and engaging - I hope you stick around - I've got some big plans for the future - Waiting on post pay outs then I'll be announcing a writing challenge of my own / and an art contest. All the best @sue-stevenson
Unfortunately the @Sndbox writing quest is finished but I think they will have more before their summer camp starts in June. There was a photography and filmmaking quest as well a month or so ago. I think they run the camp twice a year? You can see details here.
I can't remember how I came across you now, sorry :) But I'm pretty sure it was in the last week. I've only actively been on here for three weeks so I'm still finding my way around re discovering good contests and people to follow.
I love the level of creativity and collaboration on here though and am keeping my mind open to good ideas for running a contest of my own too.
You got a 1.64% upvote from @upmewhale courtesy of @emwalker!
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