RE: How Whales are Prevented from Curating - views on vote weighting
I didn't read that deeply, because it's quite repetitive.
You don't understand the mathematics of democracy, in elections, the voters who have already decided long beforehand, make no difference. It's the swing voters who matter. They are generally a pretty small part of the population because most people believe you should hold a posittion.
If the voters votes were weighted by their tax bill, the section of the population that would thus see the greatest power is the ones who pay the most taxes - the middle class. They would vote instead to strip the benefits from the poor and the corporate welfare from the rich. This is the real reason for the disappearance of the middle class, along with ever escalating taxes and regulations on business that are simply theatre for racketeers while they rifle the pockets of society's most productive people.
Nobody trusts someone who claims to be something without that opinion being reflected by their peers, and even then, it comes off looking arrogant. Sure, I say sometimes 'I know I am very intelligent' but that's mainly because I have been tested many times and every time I go into a new thing, with zero knowledge or mistaken ideas beforehand, I absorb the new information faster than most people do, sometimes I have felt a little bad for those of my peers in these situation who simply cannot print that much stuff into their brain.
But intelligence is measurable. The value of your work to the world dictates what you get paid for it.
Does it really get any more complex than this?
Let's look at science. Does a claim count for anything in science? Maybe if you are making the claim to ignorant people. But scientists know that no theory is worth anything without corroboration, and the person, like a curator here, who publishes it first, even if they ruffle a lot of feathers, will eventually be the one who gets kudos.
What about medicine? Would you trust someone claiming to be able to cure your disease without third party verification?
Why do you have to carry around identity documents? Because you could say anything about who you are. Just go into a bank and insist that you are someone else, and see how far that goes. Nope, they also require third party verification, even if this could be forged, as an absolute minimum.
The same goes for evidence in a court. Where the facts are producible, there can be no question. But if all you have is statements from witnesses, you have to look a lot deeper, you have to compare their stories (this is why police split up groups of criminals when they arrest them, and put them into remand centres, so they can't get their stories consistent, if they did not prepare their story). Even then, they seek to attempt to cause the offenders to slip up and incriminate themselves. In law, testimony is the weakest evidence, and a vote is testimony. Courts are also often called 'forums' for the reason that the primary activity in them is about a dialogue between different parties.
"I didn't read that deeply, because it's quite repetitive. You don't understand the mathematics of democracy..." I submit you may not know, as you state you failed to read 'deeply'. You haven't pointed out even one example of repetition, and, since I didn't repeat myself even once, stating I was repetitive is wildly inaccurate, and simply dismisses all of the various points I made.
Apparently, the moment you noted disagreement, you simply ignored everything I said. You can't learn a damn thing from doing that.
"in elections, the voters who have already decided long beforehand, make no difference. It's the swing voters who matter. "
There are no swing voters on Steemit. The only reason there are swing voters in a democratic election is because they are forced to submit to whoever wins the election. I submit you are addressing elephants not only in a different room, but on a different continent, which I tried to point out, not repetitively, but through different aspects of the two regimes which are illustrated by various mechanisms - and you have here pointed out another.
You're making points about governance at the point of a gun that have zero relevance to Steemit, which is why I addressed the question so carefully to begin with.
Taking the time to address each point I make, as I do your posts, will prevent that problem. While I will admit that does take time (I spent the wee hours of the night doing exactly that) it is the only way to have a conversation, rather than opposing monologues.
In fact, nothing else of your 'reply' here even addresses what I did say, but simply goes off on a tangent - how governments having the power of violence to compel their subjects to comply are affected by elections.
I had hoped to gain insight into the points I raised from your thoughts regarding them. Since you don't address any point I make - not even one - you have left me completely without the benefit of your views on those points.
Your reply isn't a response to anything I said, but rather a monologue on democratic government, which you seem to misunderstand to be what Steemit is. That misunderstanding may well explain why you could claim that simple addition is more complex than the present vote weighting scheme Steemit employs, for example.
Edit: while I appreciate your actually coming to the post and making a comment, since you have prevented us from having a conversation (which consists of point and counterpoint, rather than monologues without reference to one another) I am left with nothing else but disappointment.
Nothing you have said in this comment applies to Steemit, and does not further this discussion whatsoever.
No, I did not simply 'read one bit' and then decide. I read, skimmed, read, skimmed, read, then I got bored because I didn't see something new, and you failed to understand the relevance of the quotes from me that you posted, which is what I was addressing.
I have been dedicating a lot of mental energy and the at times unsettling emotions that come from conflict, far too intensively today, and I just got done with the most part of a very comprehensive debate with @davidnx on the announcement post for the bot. It is 1am in the morning.
Oh, as I read back and forth I see something I am compelled to respond to.
I perhaps was not clear enough on this point, and I think this is the most important comment in your comment. I hope that I am seeing that correctly. This is the answer I will give:
In fact, I did not approach the issue of the involuntary nature of participation in the society in which these elections occur, though I discussed how the outcome of the election is about deciding which politicians may make such rules.
I do not hold with the false use of involuntary membership as an imperative for conformity, I railed against this for all of my time in school, and afterwards, as it came to be later in my life, in regards to my decision to use psychotropic drugs, that was motivated by a desire for relief and self healing.
However, it is a fact that humans have to share at least some things, such as footpaths and roads, and thus the doing of our daily business requires us to consider other people, and this is not voluntary, although you can attempt to rebel against this by simply barging through people, it will ultimately back fire on you, no matter how sophisticated your cloak over it is.
Despite the fact that the need for some level of consensus to allow peace and prosperity exists, my point about stake weighted voting, which governs the influence of our votes, which comes originally from corporate democracies, which only operates in a voluntary context, despite the unavoidable need to share, the process of deciding the rules should be regulated by stake, and the participation in the decision making process must be voluntary, even if nature says it really isn't.
It must be determined by stake, because whatever one has put into the pool (in this case, tax money) is still my money, and what is done with it, I am still responsible for, not only that, because I make that sacrifice, I should also be the rightful recipient of the benefits of this money being applied to ostensible social good.
I hope that clarifies that point. I too am continuing this debating because I want to be sure that my argument is watertight before I stick my neck on the chopping block putting little red flags on self voted comments.
While I appreciate that there are examples of things that must unavoidably be commonly born, voting in a democratic system is rather an example of how some may be forced by others to have no say in how those things are born, rather than an example of how to rationally and fairly decide such matters.
Your inference that democratic government has relevance to Steemit is incorrect. You haven't much discussed stake weighted voting that I have seen, and the problem with comparing corporate boards with Steemit is that corporate boards are concerned with FINANCIAL matters - it is their purpose to maximize their profit.
Steemit votes are specifically intended NOT to do that. "In the real world, algorithms must be designed in such a manner that they are resistant to intentional manipulation for profit.
Any widespread abuse of the scoring system could cause community members to lose faith in the perceived fairness of the economic system." from the Steemit white paper.
"... you failed to understand the relevance of the quotes from me that you posted..."
You're wrong, and you haven't shown one example of it. You are not replying to any points I have made, but rather just making claims about them, and disregarding the substance of my words.
I don't think you understood what I said, because you didn't read it. It would be easy to show that I am wrong. Please do.
If the abstract principle is correct, it is reflected in the concrete. You misinterpret my discussion about democratic processes and stakes because you are only looking at the involuntary side of it, and not paying attention to the democracy that takes place every day in corporate shareholders meetings and elections.
As I am pointing out, voluntary membership is muddied by the fact that there is unavoidable need to arbitrate the use of commons. I am contra all forms of commons, in fact, however, even if the road is privately owned, its use is communal. Thus the need for rules and etiquette.
My personal beliefs about law is they should be short, simple, and understood by everyone. Like the Ten Commandments in their simplicity and congruency (well, maybe the comparison falls in respect of congruency).
Your quote from the Whitepaper is in relation to the justification for the pre-HF19 vote reward calculation, I believe. Are you arguing against HF19's levelling of the playing field?
Self votes made no impact on rewards for the majority of users pre HF19, with the exception of whales, who were then put under a spotlight and I forget how many times I read posts where people published the data of their investigations of this mischief. It is in this respect that Dan's original theory for how to distribute rewards was functional. However, after a year operating, the outcome was it failed in the central goal of promoting quality, by granting too much power to too small a group, to VOTE ON OTHER PEOPLE. This led to homogenisation and all kinds of groups formed defensive cliques against this power granted to the Whales by this accelerating vote calculation.
In fact, the community lost faith in the system BECAUSE of this ruleset. I know I did.
Now, anyone can upvote themselves, but unlike the Whales pre HF 19, not being a small and visible minority, everyone is constructing justifications for their greed.
If it wasn't ok for whales to do it before, then it shouldn't be ok for everyone else to do it now, either.
lastly:
The ability to self vote was part of the pre HF19 system. Its uses are to give a sense of self-empowerment in little things like being able to push a comment up the thread, which by the way, has a setting that defaults to 'trending' and can be changed to other options. Viz: