Steemit Post Promotion's and self promotion in particular is becoming more and more controversial. I have seen several posts and comment threads over the last couple weeks being filled with different opinions about promotion on threads, even some really strict positions such as "if I see a randowhale vote, I will no longer vote"
I am only new though in my opinion, we are kinda all new, the platform is evolving and no one really knows where it's headed or what it will look like when it gets there. I believe forming these kind of "disagree's with one of my idea's" prejudice is not good for the platform, nor has it ever been good in any situation in history ever. If you can think of a situation where prejudice was a good idea, please let me know in the comments
Here are some of the reasons why i think you should continue to judge on a case by case basis
Every Poster is different
Every Poster has a different level of comprehension and language, for some posters, it takes alot of work to formulate all their ideas and put together a post, their upvote or promotion can be out of fear of not being seen in the wave of posts that are produced every minute. An expression of desperation out of Fear is no reason to shun someone, is it? granted that's a bit of a straw-man, though the point is, how much does that single action really tell you about who they are, why they're here and what they've written?
Every Style is different and has different requirements
Just as every person is unique so is every topic and posting style, some topics are dealt with in a couple lines whereas some posts are a years work for someone, maybe not the writing itself, but the idea's and concept's, Photography and art can be like this too, you might have an artist, who will only post once every 6 months because of self perception and perceived value, you know, the perfectionist who doesn't get stuff done within reasonable time-frames, etc
The Nature of Steemit Posts
I will definitely get some disagreement here but give it a chance. I believe the steemit post is in a sense designed to disappear/become redundant. Though it keeps the information online, the way the revenue works you usually get all your worth in the first couple days and then it slowly starts to drop away, if you come across an old post, the only way to reward them(if they arent affiliate marketing in some way) is to look for a recent post and add an upvote. Ofcourse that's not a big deal, plus there are also different interfaces on the horizon that will cause different behaviours too(zappl with its character count, chainbb and its forum structure, etc)
"Closing the gap" and Adding Value through choice
there are currently several different promotion platforms on steemit. I can think of Curie, the trails, Randowhale, PAL, Team australia, Whaleshares and Booster. Many users of these platforms are desperately looking for ways to get some traction but they are also avenues for potential advertisers or agencies to get involved with the steemit community and platform with much greater accessibility, ultimately adding overall value to Steem
"Creating Liquid and retaining value through opportunities
Someone with a significant stake in Steem Power may need access to their fund's, instead of needing to power-down their account, they can instead choose to create a token for their vote power and essentially create and sell upvote tokens, these are called Whaleshares and they also have an implicit value of boosting BTS and the Graphene blockchain. If a concensus starts to forms around these polarizing idea's and we start to alienate people purely for using the vote then we could start to derail the value of these tools so they essentially become a spammers only pursuit and are forcefully scrapped
How much do they make anyway?
The Voting services
Randowhale asks for 2 SBD or 2 STEEM which is roughly 3SBD to give you back a vote between 0-5%, which at the time of writing this post is between 0 and around $6. If using Whaleshares, they are about 6 bts (around 0.22USD) and each yield a 1% vote for upto $3. PAL would net you approx 50 votes and about $3~
The Shameless self promoter
Who are these promoters anyway?
in my view self promotion comes in 2 camps,
camp 1: "I'm really worried nobody will see my work, maybe this is a good way to do it? since there are incentives for people to upvote purely for financial incentive, maybe I can hint at a financial incentive, plus even though all my friends already upvoted, it would be nice to see more than .20 cents for a change, am i even doing this right?"
and then there is
camp 2: "If I upvote my spam comment('nice post') with randowhale + Whaleshares + Pal + MinnowBuster+ TeamAustralia, I can lambo by thursday
look at these prime examples conveniently curated for us by tarazkp
possible response 1
upon seeing an interesting thumbnail, title or opening sentence we can scroll down immediately and "qualify" our author and then read the post if were satisfied or read the post and then ultimately decide only if they haven't used any form of promotion
possible response 2
we can exploit every possible voting opportunity and play a numbers game by trying to add $10 to a post or completely ignore that people are doing it with the idea of "when I have more Steem power i will self vote and lambos, therefore its fine let them do whatever they want"
The Real Issue: This is Anarchy, the community defines itself
These promotion platform's are a tool, similar to a curation trail or vote bot that give a kind of "power-up" to the post or a flag, yes a flag, I havent used one yet, but its a tool like any other, and there are scenarios where it is better for the community as a whole to flag
Curating the platform is just as important as posting. The value of the platform is our compounded community value, essentially, what we offer to the world. lets be a community that is accepting, loving, kind and wanting to help. We are human and have an array of motivations, but we are human and understand. so we understand when someone is struggling and can use a leg up, give a kind comment, im sure there is something good, maybe if nothing else "you seem to be very enthusiastic about success" or maybe give a 1%er, because you want to, because you will feel better for helping, because your a nice person, and it will help them, because if i get a glimpse of validation I know what to aim for
And for the rest of us sometimes partaking in a little shameless self promotion, we should always consider the overall outcome and impact of our action, a reputation is hard to build but is more valuable than a quick double. Flags, this is a great place for flags, instead of flagging for topics we disagree with, we can flag people screwing us all over by trying to exploit the system
I have my fair share of bad table manners but I try to make up for it in honest intention and the Value that I am hopefully providing. I think many of the biggest stars are yet to light and there is immense opportunity here for all of us. The power is truly in our hands, if we are sensible we can sustain this beautiful place and only see it flourish more
what if we asked those awesome people at Curie to create a similar anti-Curie service?
I worked up a headache trying to think,
hopefully it wasnt too much nonsense, thanks for reading my post
please feel free to continue the dialogue in the comments
I still believe, maybe falsely, that by posting good content you can grind your way up and gain followers slowly. It is very hard to produce that much stuff with no eyes on you though.
This post is fantastic, good job sols, good to see you making it work!
yeah me too man, I also believe your much better off trying to add value but right on, it can definitely play on your motivations not being sure if anyones going to see it or not, especially when you have been preparing one for a while xD
I'm still split on the issue. I tried using the Minnow Support, because it doesn't seem like I was gaining any traction with my posts. I'm still not sure if it is useful. But, I say, if the tools are there, then use them.
yeah right on, though the problem I think many have is these are communities, but they are being abused for the bot upvote, but the people in the communities will give you real value, either friendship, mentorship or inspiration
I have seen these services used as gifts or for contests. Can't say it's all shameless self promotion
I was using "shameless self promotion" as funny clickbait, i find exaggerating the situation helps isolate a concept, but tbh i cant say im too fussed about it, the site was intended to have promotion aswell, or imo its difficult to create a value for anyone who isn't heavily invested from the beginning
I get ya, some people might call that shameless...I make much more on comments as opposed to posts, some people might call me shameless
I see your points , and you :
1 . miss the new minnowbuster project
they are good services and ultimately help build community, especially when it's much easier to chat in those quick windows rather than having it etched into internet stone, I think we need to utilize these communities and maybe do some workshops and a little weed management xD
p.s I added the minnowBuster :) thanks, I'll get myself upto scratch and write more about it but atleast its mentioned for now ^_^
I dont know how will works minnow boster i just start use it , and ok somehow i like the community idea until it das not put us in a cages :)
Good post @sols! There definitely seems to be trouble in paradise right now! Sadly I don't think peer pressure is going to change the actions of some of the worst abusers of the system. It would appear that despite all of the well intentioned, honest members of our wee community, it is no different at all from the wider community of the'real world' with those in positions of power and influence in general using it for their own means and own self fulfillment, whilst at the same time encouraging the rest of us to do likewise so that it can be used as a justification for them doing it in the first place. On a platform that is supposed to be largely represented by critical thinkers, most are just 'followers'. It's a shame to see!
Hope your day is going well my friend and thanks again for sharing your thoughts and trying to affect positive change! :)
thanks for dropping in @tonyr I always appreciate seeing your comments,
I completely agree and I think the dev's did too, I think its just out of reach for most people to stand up against much of it since they completely shred us in ratio and you wouldnt exaclty want to piss off a whale as a red fish or minnow, I think we need to create a couple anti-curation trailers with a curie style post submission, maybe give out a couple warnings and then start to discipline
i think in that way, similar to curation trails, minnows can unite and help sensible whales control abusers and exploiters
I can't agree with the discipline part but the rest sounds like a good idea. I've already come across a good post concerning the matter of naming and shaming those who are upvoting their own comments purely for financial gain.
https://steemit.com/steemit/@ethical-ai/one-sixth-of-author-reward-pool-diverted-anatomy-of-a-culprit
I don't think it's right to force anyone to do anything but while those at the top end of the steemit platform have an influence in one way, the rest of us have a different kind of influence that we can choose to put to use whenever we feel it is necessary.
I fully understand where you are coming from tbh, it doesnt feel right to enforce to get the desired behaviour but if we keep commenting on the system there are appropriate tools within the system to deal with it too. Still feels a little wrong to me, I kinda wish i could just sit there and upvote myself all day with a bit of money to back it up too, but I know its just not sustainable
thanks for sharing that post by the way, I like that its being talked about a fair bit, I think it will be resolved soon enough with all the great minds on it xD
No problem buddy! I hope so too. Tbh though, I think we have to accept that there will always be someone trying to abuse the system, whatever that system may be.
Take it easy @sols!
I've decided to use these promotion tools regularly - I hope in conjunction with detailed, comprehensive and entertaining content - but I'm sure some will read it and disagree.
But the truth is, without those tools, I would have left already. Part of the lure of this for me is the compulsive, gamified nature of the experience - and that requires a dopamine payoff to remain tenable.
I like this more than what I was doing before with all this time - which was playing heroes of the storm constantly. I've gotten rid of video games completely in my life and switched it out with a new hobby of writing about things I enjoy learning about.
If the way I maintain that, for now, until my posts regularly get significant attention, is by using randowhale or minnowbooster - then so be it. Better than stopping and doing what I was doing before.
hey bro, I think the same thing tbh, I see the promote section of the website to be basically redundant, I dont think ive ever been there, I dont know many people who have
Whaleshares, Randowhale etc, do definitely help to get some momentum and I believe its the right way to do it, i think we made a false association by grouping exploits with promotion tools, I was trying to get us to seperate the concepts, especially for things like Curie, which may otherwise give you $300 for a post
I didn't even know Curie was a thing - I wonder whether that's actually a bad thing either.
This post received a 2.9% upvote from @randowhale thanks to @bymma! For more information, click here!
I personally use randowhale, booster and minnowbooster and any tool available, in a cynical way.
I see the bot-voting mainly as a numbers game, as my example shows:
($35.23 + randowhale 2 SBD = $39.10)
If its profitable I do not see the point in not doing it. I will still only post original content, that some people may or may not find interesting.
You write excellent posts by the way!!