Buying votes on Steemit: is it all bad?
The difficulty of hitting the trending pages without voting bots
I think it is next to impossible to hit the trending pages without "boosting" your own post right now, at least for 99% of everyone who blogs here. A year back getting to the trending pages happened relatively frequently because some whale came by to grant me a powerful vote. But this is just not the case anymore and in my opinion, somewhat for the better?
Either you BUY some Steem or power down some of your beloved steempower.
Either way, SP(steempower) is not enough anymore, you also need liquid Steem if you want to promote yourself. If we objectively take away the "ethical" question "if it is alright to boost your own post", what does this actually mean for Steem as a currency? I am not an expert in economics. But vote bots do seem to create value for Steem in some way. Since it creates more reasons to both hold Steempower AND Steem.
It is worth noting we are talking about the trending page here, I also know there are so many other ways to get success than hitting trending pages. By focusing on Creating your own "smaller" network between you and your followers(or those you follow) can prove to be just as efficient.
Maybe voting bots could be a solid part of STEEM, if we could get it under control?
I know I speak in an idealistic way now, but for those new people joining the platform who might be great at writing articles. They often just cannot get the exposure to keep going. Surely if they work enough they can get through, a lot of us have done that. But it would also make sense to make investing in Steem an attractive option as well? Instead of the impossible mission of investing like 40k SP that few can afford. Now there is the possibility for people just start out investing 100 or 200 in Steem and go from there by promoting their posts? In my opinion this post promotion creates a space where everyone can get their articles seen if they really wish and with a much smaller investment. (at least for the moment) I would even go as far as saying those who do promote "trash" posts to the top, creates some sort of awareness this is a problem that has to be dealt with and if we wish bots do be part of the platform, it should be done right.
There's most likely some perspectives I don't include that could fight this argument but to me, it could seem solid if we could create the "right space" for it to happen. Having liquid Steem that people can trade back and forth is no bad thing at all, in fact we need the volume badly. To allow people making smaller investments and still having good reasons to make larger, could be quite healthy for Steem? Maybe some people with better knowledge could answer this question. But to me it makes sense. Voting bots gives another reason for people to aquire Steem.
Voting bots might just be another era on Steem and we might find better ways, but..
Something in me truly hopes we either find a solution for voting bots where they can be integrated into Steemit in a proper way. Or we move in a completely different direction and I am honestly open for both at this point.
But sometimes we also just have to adapt to what the current situation is while we wait for these things to happen. I know a lot of people are fighting for this platform for the better and I trust in those people, that is what we call "witnesses". But some us such as myself just wanna write and read. Basically just being the consumers and not too much interaction with the "politics" of this platform.
A few last words before we start fighting
I know I have no authority or special knowledge besides being a blogger on Steemit for one year. My opinion is shaped based on the rest of the community and what I experience through my daily usage of Steemit. This does not mean I am right in what I am saying here, in fact, I might be entirely wrong.
But for my part, voting bots do have a good impact on my own work. Since I make sure it at least will meet a certain standard before I fire it up. I might even use it more in the future for this reason, since I feel I am in control of my own work.
Having multiple paths for "success" here on Steemit don't seem too bad maybe.
So with that said I would love to hear your opinion regarding voting bots?
-holm
You are free to do so. There is no rule stating we cannot buy vote, though I have never purchased voting.
and there is also no rule stating that anybody has to do a bailout if the whole steemit project will hit the wall because of those destructive bots...
either new rules will be implemented or the community finds an alternative way to get rid of the vampire bots...
STEEM is an eyeball economy like the Internet is. People and companies always pay for an attention and exposure. Businesses but ads to reach their audience bloggers often come to promotion botnets on Instagram and Twitter.
In STEEM we do it blockchain-way, more simple and transparent. And you're right, it builds incentive to own and invest in STEEM. Also you invest in liquid STEEM/SBD and get part of your money back in long-term SP - that's a brilliant idea actually. And on the other side of the equation you could invest directly into SP and rent your voting power.
Thus we have a functional economy providing we have enough active eyeballs to "sell".
P.S. subscribed
P.P.S. voted for visibility
I see no problem with voting bots. It is a way of marketing your own work and very necessary to minnows who want to be seen and give a boost to their position on Steemit.
Yep, it was a much-needed tool addition. Now the question is how it will evolve from now.
You got a 26.81% upvote from @whalecreator courtesy of @discernente! Delegate your Steem Power to earn 100% payouts.
I would argue is that these vote bots, which many Steemians have rabidly attacked for various reasons, are the only reasons why Steem is not trading at 5 cents today.
A lot of people seem to believe that "quality content" somehow translates to higher Steem price, and/or more liquidity on the order books, but there is no empirical evidence to back that up.
For investors, locking up Steem and investing in voting bots, which yield 15-25% ROI per year makes a lot of financial sense.
The ethical bots like Smartsteem are an even better deal as they filter out the trash content, and allow the content creators to gain exposure and build an audience at a much quicker pace.
Sure, we have A LOT of cargo-cults in crypto world.
could please someone explain to me the economical benefit of a voting bot?
Voting bot and ROI for passive investors? In this respect it is just a ponzi sceme...
Voting bots are posting and upvoting useless things and steemit creates steem out of thin air and pays people with those... there is no economic sense behind all of this...
I have said that before, Smartsteem is my personal favourite simply because of the concept and how well made it is. I completely agree if your argument. Steem as a currency goes way beyond Steemit as a platform.
Interesting questions raised again @holm. I am fine with people who promote their posts through voting bots as long as the posts are original and of some value (like yours yesterday, for example). Like you said, it is the only way to get on the trending page these days, afterall. However, I am not sure whether being on the trending page makes any significant difference for the author of the post.
Personally, I have been more focusing on networking and creating bonds and relations with my active followers/people I follow. I would also recommend this strategy to newbies as breaking through here on Steemit via writing great articles "only" is not possible anymore I am afraid.
Yes! I also mentioned that in my post focusing on expanding your network person by person might be even more beneficial. But the question is if doing both also could be possible?
I think if people truly want to be active on steemit, building relations is the number one priority.
I think a combination of both of these approaches can work of course. But like you (and me) said, networking and making relations should be the number one priority. You can clearly see that on the number of followers. As of now, I officially have 1425 of them. But maybe up to 1400 are what I call "dead fish" - accounts that never interact with me. Most of them probably never even read my blog. On the other hand, the more I value the little bunch of my real Steemit friends (I prefer the word "friends" here) as these people actively read, comment and support my work. So making one new real Steemit friend is more important for me than gaining 100 dead fish followers or being on the trending page.
Voting bots are bad and destructive - that's it.
The only aim of steemit should be to encourage steemians to write great content AND then to enable other steemians to find and consume this content.
And this is where steemit fails completely...
How much did you spend and how high did you get?
I spend about 130 steem to hit the top of the trending page. But maybe I was lucky with some good bids on the bots
As you say buying votes is just the only way forward at the moment so I don't believe it should be looked down upon. Looking at ways to improve the system for all of us though should be an ongoing focus.
"Be Original and post OC and people will upvote you and you will get a better exposure"
This was the stuff i used to hear before i signed up here. But the reality is totally different , yes Bots are necessary now . Otherwise no one gives a rat ass about anybody's content
My guess is that although the practice doesn't exactly seem super ethical. It still benefits the economy of Steem. The fact that it forces you to use Steem in a creative way to promote your content actually benefits the platform in an uncommon way....or is it common now?
It is common by now and I also see people accepting it more and more. I truly believe it has a place on this platform, but it is still in its early stage of finding the right spot.