Evolution of Steemians – PRE and POST HF 19 brainstorm
The number of people joining this platform every day is huge. I’m still really new here, but I think I grasped the basic concept of evolution of the users from minnows to whales. I decided to present my thoughts to share the knowledge with the new confused users, or to be corrected that this is not the case.
Evolution of Steemians
Start
Who would guess that it all starts with the registration? Those who has read at least a portion of the whitepaper before joining have huge advantage. Those people have a decent image of how this site works and what it strives for. This knowledge is super important, because such users can immediately start to fully utilize their potential (it isn’t anything special but better than it used to be), therefore grow more rapidly.
After introduction post that is usually kinda overrated to drag the new users in comes the first blow. New users usually concentrate mainly on creation of their blog, even though no one really knows them, resulting in drastically lower allocated rewards. There are lucky exceptions of course, whose first real posts ever are actually “bestsellers”. This is most of the times not the case.
Such user is also very likely to hit a follow button. Browsing through all the new posts is too time consuming, therefore the user tries to make his feed existent.
Proclamation of existence
That is the time, when user realizes that he has to spend much more time reading other blogs to be recognized by the community. Those who fail to undergo this very first evolutionary step perish. Most people here are mainly interested in community interaction, not in hone-self-blog-only.
User has to also finalize the first “draft” about the issue of “what kind of information am I going to seek here?” Every person has different “content interests”, therefore (if he wants to be recognized rather sooner than later) the new user has to strategically select blogs that share similar interests.
Pre HF 19
Before the HF 19 it was vital to be recognized basically by any whale in order to have any real pay out on the post. Uniting with 150 meant almost nothing reward-vise. When any whale was posting with at least some % on a post, not only it gave the user real rewards, but it also motivated less valuable users to vote on the post too before the whale next time.
Post HF 19
What HF 19 tries to establish here is bigger equality. While technically the strong ones have even bigger potential power, suddenly it makes more sense to unite with 150 minnows, because they alone can now bring the post to at least few bucks, which was total utopia before the HF.
While it is still true that users have to acquire acknowledgment of highly valuable user in order to gain rewards and visibility (understand have a possibility to make Steemit your dream job), cooperating with a lot of minnows, while more time-consuming, can actually lead to potentially higher income later on.
Those that fail to realize, that what I described above can never be obtained by comments like “Nice posts” are condemned to be stuck in the 2nd evolutionary stage, until they will perish too if they try their luck with @berniesanders. Also one would need to be a master level lickspittle to attract a whale without any informative value shared with it.
Existence recognized
The Steemit’s cycle is easy. Less valuable user wants to present himself to more valuable user. When the user is recognized it means that he is now considered as more valuable by other minnows that try to present themselves to him, thus creating the cyclical rule.
This is also time when a user can be added to a curator’s trail. This is gigantic milestone. If a trail follows a user, he instantly gains some serious rewards. This is the time when the user has to choose, whether he will start to abuse the auto vote and start spamming one article after another, resulting in being dropped out of the trail, or produce even better content and seals the stable income.
Pre HF 19
Recognized existence meant that the user was finally getting at least some whale up votes regularly. Because of that his posts attracted even bigger audience and the true growth finally began.
Post HF 19
It’s still too early to call it and true outcome of the HF is still to be determined by gathering of the data over time. The first glance is convincing me though, that it really matters whether one gets to be supported even by minnows now. There’s no way how to guess the exact number, but receiving a lot of stable minnows votes now also pushes the account onto new evolutionary level.
Domesticated user
The longer the user has been around the pickier he is about who’s he going to follow. The time of making the feed existent is long gone and is substituted by the time of feed regulation. It is normal that lot of bad follow choices occur throughout the journey. As the idea of what user really wants from the site grows, so changes the perception of what is informative and what is spam. The feed is accordingly readjusted. Also user at this state is less likely to hit a follow button, and if he really does so, its huge win. That means the less valuable user, the bigger motivation to seek new users that could provide some rewards. When one already gets some, the motivation to seek new users is greatly reduced. Domesticated users are usually dolphins+. This is the penultimate step in order to achieve the highest evolutionary rank. Whale status follows.
Let me know what you think about that. If you can relate, where do you find yourselves now?
![curation](https://steemitimages.com/DQmaED7VQH5xChPFXxzzjGRftoxuua7oy22tJ1qV5MR1WcP/Curation%201000%2B.png)
![REP](https://steemitimages.com/640x0/https://steemitimages.com/DQmSdWcWv7ubt5TFmArymRhP3Vpya7exk9fateoP1QCpny6/Rep%2050%2B.png)
![SP](https://steemitimages.com/DQmeXcrwJAoDNo2v86ZUwQU6Q9Tp3qBi8h6mXyPQuTx62tJ/SP%20250%2B.png)
![followers](https://steemitimages.com/640x0/https://steemitimages.com/DQmZLYjNQfVyyWJfReBqygsJFqcqFSr8TqYWNvXovx38YLG/Follow%20200%2B.png)
![](https://steemitimages.com/DQmepuByrineEbHhenpyMDiN5WiyWVXqfUnbUFgeyKpKLgs/U5dscK5CsreseBirn9cbpc3KRzobNJS.gif)
The only thing in this update is that, we need to carefully choose articles worthy of our upvotes. With its power increased 4 times than the original, minnows are given the chance to gain some money.
It’s too easy to call it “the only difference”. It is seemingly a clear thing but the possible impact it can have is very hard to judge. It is not yet clear whether the outcome will meet the plans goal.
I see. There is a big change of how Steemians will behave. Yeah, the impact is very hard to judge, yet predicted by the top users of steemit. No matter what happen, it is surely for the betterment of the community they think.
Yes on that I agree so far!
I'm still a minnow and I think most of my followers are as well. I have seen a good increase in rewards since the HF, and at the same time I have gradually increased my posts and comments.
It is VERY rare that I will upvote without commenting, and I will almost never write a comment that's less than a few lines related to the post.
If I become a whale, or even a dolphin, I will likely follow similar strategies to the ones I have now; Encourage new users, contribute to discussion, upvote things of interest.
That’s good to hear. Maybe you could then share whether you feel like you’re seeking the new users more or whether they are the ones that seek you. :)
Currently I browse the "new" posts for 4-6 hours a day looking for things that I know about, reading them and replying. Another 30 minutes to 2 hours is spent on creating my own content to attract readers.
Right now the payouts are long-averaging to $5ish a day, yesterday I made a potential $20, I hope as reputation and followers increase so will payouts.
That is real commitment! Keep it up! What I claim is though you simply can’t keep this up because the motivation to do so will decrease when you acquire what you seek. This is not an universal truth of course but rather my assumption.
It appears I'm still in the start phase, but I have noticed that my votes are now worth something. Without everyone else seeming so far out of reach (a $0.01 upvote is much better encouragement than a $0.00) I think I'm more likely to stick around and try to evolve.
Yes I have worked hard for a month and something to climb to a +0,01 bucks per up vote. Then HF19 came :D. Also now I have time to spend my votes manually and I don’t have to rely on trails. It’s still too early to call it a great success though. More time is needed to gather the needed data.
I have a feeling this HF19 will have massive impact on how things are going here. Its true: even a few minnow votes can give you a few cent already, or even a dollar or two.
But on the other hand, look at the voting behaviour. Your own, and that in the feeds. Well, the Home and New feed. One has to be really carful now what to upvote, or else your voting power falls off a cliff. And it takes days to recover.
That will change the voting habits of the "normal" users drastically. I see it on myself - I`m fairly new, so I cannot set my voting power myself. And only ten 100% votes exhaust my daily budget.
All this might slow down participation and interaction a lot, which is not a good thing.
I wrote a post of my idea of a voting system today. In case you have missed it, you can see it here: https://steemit.com/steemit/@beatminister/evolution-through-revolution-a-proposal-for-a-future-steemit-upvoting-system
And look at the votes and turnout. But may be its just because my post sucks.
I agree with the comment. I would probably highlight “I`m fairly new, so I cannot set my voting power myself. And only ten 100% votes exhaust my daily budget.“ Same here. I have read your post though and have to disagree. What you’re proposing is total equality. That is not possible…never-ever in nothing :). (Nothing that you want to work lol). Also the ration of down-votes you’re proposing is absolutely off. Everything is in a way advertisement and post that doesn’t deserve this would survive the “flag-war” because trails like steemcleaners wouldn’t have enough power, if only the user who has wrote it would indoctrinate but a a few users (that wouldn’t probably have any power now, or very little).
Thank you for your comment, and for reading my post. I wasn't aware that anybody did.
I do think equality is possible. If its wanted, thats a different question. I am aware of the consequences of my model, trust me.
But I agree, the downvote system is in need of discussion, regarding the details. It is meant as a first step away from the current flagging system, which I regard as a critical tool. As I said in my post, my ideas are intended for a future better Steemit experience. Also in view of a much larger user base.