Hello, to all Hivers all around the globe! Today I decided to write a few thoughts about quality and Hive. Looks like I am a veteran here on Hive, and I think I should say a few words about this topic. Actually, I got the idea for this post after I got into a conversation about quality in some other post. Just to fast recap what happened...
I checked a post from an old pal (we are talking Steem times here) and see the quality of posts didn't develop at all. Photography is very bad and I am talking about Food photography, something I am quite familiar with. The rewards were quite high but OK... Then I saw the comment where someone is praising how high-quality photos are in this post and just couldn't stop myself to asking for a definition of what a high-quality photo is. Because, if this is considered HIQ, then people like me are doing something out of this dimension. Let's just recalibrate our criteria, shall we? After my explanation of quality, I got some backfires. The comment I got back has 818 words, and the original post has 357. Just sink into this. Now, here I would like to talk about this - Quality and HIVE.
Does HIVE need to evolve?
Hive is an ecosystem and every ecosystem evolves. Forward! Never backward. Rewards must be distributed fair. And the only way this fairness can be presented is through hard work. Show some respect, put out a quality post, try to make things better and respect the community. That is why I am getting sick when I see low-quality posts rewarded high.
Please, don't get me wrong, I do support rewards for minnows! "Here is your reward, good job my friend, a few things you can make better, now, fly... But not some old veterans who are thriving only due to the connections, that's another thing. Everyone can evolve, why not you? It is like mocking up someone who is trying their best and getting lower rewards. And on top of that, there are people praising this, probably because they know you have connections and this might get you a curation reward... And that is making me sad.
Yes, HIVE needs to evolve the same as any ecosystem. Just try to remember Youtube at an early start. Funny cats, a compilation of people who fell, and clips. Now it is comparable to the biggest production houses. People who were making quality content from the early start are almost like celebrities. Do you see where I am aiming? HIVE should also follow this route and quality content should be true celebrities. Now, how exactly this quality content on Youtube got this status? Through rewards! There are Ads and here on Hive are users. Maybe one day also ads, it is just a question of time. Rewards are making content better! The formula is easy. Make something people like and you will be rewarded. And if we try to present this formula here on HIVE we find a problem. There is a lack of reward distribution. OCD, CURANGEL, CURIE, APPRECIATOR, and similar curation trails are a true God bless, and probably a reason many people are here on Hive, but HIVE is getting bigger and bigger. To manually curate all the quality posts will be a truly hard task. Hmmm, do we need quality police?
Do we need Quality watchers?
Probably we all know about HIVEWATCHERS who are here to make sure there is no plagiarizing, maybe we should have another service like this that would take care of the quality of posts. Not in terms of downvoting and upvoting but rather in terms of pinning and showing curators where the quality is. Wait a minute, you are talking about this quality all the time. What is quality for you?
What is quality
The dictionary defines it as " a characteristic or feature of someone or something", for me quality is a measure to orientate what is good and what is bad. It is not hard to find the best quality, especially when it comes to photography. Just google out rewarded photos, the best photographers in this niche, after only one hour of exploration you will know what is good and what is bad. And here I don't talk only about pixels, but also about colors, depth, compositions, shadows etc. Please understand, that I am talking about PHOTOGRAPHY, this is my thing. When it comes to posts there are other measurements, but I bet one of them is the length, another is meaning, depth, and so on. In the end, if you got your information, if you were looking for this what you received, that means the post was good. Now let's get back to photography.
Everyone has a choice
To put quality here on Hive is our choice. I can make quick photos of food in restaurants with my phone and use this as the main source for my review post. But I rather draw my 12Kg bag with me and scare people with a tripod. I rather try compositions, angles, fix things etc. I am for the best. Why? Because I respect readers, I respect Hivers and I wanna show them the best, not blurry stuff. And at the end of the day, I get a reward for this. I didn't learn photography for anything. I wanna be a better self not only for myself but for others. And at the end, also for HIVE itself. When someone might check food reviews here, he might land on my post and the quality of photos and text will keep him or her here. Huzzah, a new Hive user, what can be better than this?
So, I need an expensive camera to make better quality photography
NO. no no and again NO! It is not about the gear, it is about your willingness to learn something new, to fix some stuff to get your skills higher. No one can be TOP from the start. Here on Hive, we have many phone photographers and their work is just outstanding. Just look at some examples. And they don't even use high-end phones, we are talking POCOs here. Amazing, isn't it?
And these are Macro shoots, one of the most challenging photography niches. I can see there was a lot of postproduction and a lot of energy used to make this. It is not about the tool, but about the user. Try your best, use a tripod, get into settings, and learn photography. That's why you choose Hive. Either to share your wisdom, thoughts, or skills. isn't it? If you are here just to present yourself as an open bag to collect rewards, I am sorry for you. And yes, I know there are people who are thriving in this and guess what not only people.
Conclusion
It is on us if we will support quality or rather those who are here long and have maybe some connections which could help us to get curation attention. If you ask me, I recommend quality over anything. This is your work guys, you have the power, and remember, blockchain doesn't forget. Sure you can always make new account and forget about the old one. But why not rather build something good, and aim for the stars?
All Photography is from Wnfdiary if not cited differently.
It is hilarious.
I am also tired seeing this. It doesn't happen to those who come here without connections but to those who are here with connections and merely cashing out those connections without putting any efforts.
How you presented the two comparable photographs made the difference very clear what quality is and what is not.
The idea of quality watchers is also a nice one
Well since you put it like that :)
It's pretty incredible to see the this or that shots.
You're clearly good at what you do!
👍
Okay then. Game on 😁
Hi, I am glad you took the challenge:). Remember we all carry good inside, we just need to express it out. "I am not good with something" is only an excuse. I wish you all best
Thanks :)
I tell my son, "You're not good at it YET." when he says he can't do something.
It's like that. I'll make sure I get better each day 👍
Thank you very much and a lot, you have included some pictures of my work, This is an honor for me
Oh please all the honor is mine. You are making amazing photos! Keep up with good work.
Yay! 🤗
Your content has been boosted with Ecency Points, by @wnfdiary.
Use Ecency daily to boost your growth on platform!
Support Ecency
Vote for new Proposal
Delegate HP and earn more
As far as am concerned, it should be quality or nothing at all as well as quality over quantity.
Words with 105 words with meaning and knowledgeable content better than 509 words with no core meaning just blabbing.
I love your post, as a newbie I have seen a lot of meaningless post with high rewards. I believe things will get better with time as Hivers will see to quality as a core value.
Hive is a social media platform, with the emphasis on social. After participating in HiveFest, I think there's a lot of value in connecting with web3 pioneers.
I don't think quality is going to improve until we start seeing Hive as a place to read or watch rather than post. In fact, I expect image quality will get worse once bloggers discover AI image generation. The results are more fun than stock photos, but glitchy and vague.
Are YouTube's quality standards good or bad for its market share and its future? Young people prefer TikTok or Twitch where they can get started immediately without investing in hardware or training. And at least on TikTok they can get pretty creative.
The future of humanity will be interesting for sure. You are right, maybe in the future only robots will create and curate as well. TikTok surely encourages some creativity, I am not sure how it is rewarded there. I am afraid algorithms are pushing totally wrong stuff in front. At least what I can read in the news about TikTok.
Well, I think curations should be more friendly toward quality than "well-known users", just imagine sports. There would be NO ADVANCE if only the legends would get rewards. Ahhh great Mr. Tiger Woods, your score is 25th out of 30 and guess what you are getting a huge reward and first place is yours since you are a legend here. Nope, there are newcomers and they should take the place of past champions. Let the numbers and quality speak.
Quality is subjective.
Some people ramble through a post. Some readers read the ramble and think it's great and I'll read it and think 'what's the author's point here?".
Some can write a short post and express themself well and others need a long post to do so.
The curation projects try to find and support good content. Sometimes they tend to start to drift toward favoured authors, they're human. Some put controls in place to offset that issue.
I'm a tad biased but I'd say DreemPort is the project that gives people exposure and encourages engagement while denying anyone opportunity to give their friends traction.
As for photography, it has to be one of the most spammed forms of posts on Hive. A good photographer showing some contrast between what is good and poor quality makes for an interesting post.
A mediocre photographer who adds some interesting context in text to their images also makes for an interesting post.
Reading experience matters a lot and contributes toward building a following.
I totally agree that there is a fine line between interesting content, length of post and context. However, some things do have some structure. If we take as an example review of a video game, there should be a short description of what is it about, some game experience and useful data (system requirements, etc) and of course good summary with maybe some pointing system or recommendations - pros/cons, etc. It is much easier to make a few screenshots and write sure short "review" or rather just summarize other's people's reviews and wait for the reward. And if you ask me there is not much experience if the post has 350 words. I love to get some decent information from the post. Tell me something I didn't know, show me something beautiful... Give me some weight.
I look forward to Hive and I will do my best,
Cheers
Quality is 100000% subjective.
And what you may feel as 'low quality' others may find of value.
I personally think Hive needs to get away from the 'quality content police'. Take a look at the bigger picture on the web and you'll find the majority of the content out there isn't winning a Pulitzer Prize anytime soon...But still generates tons of engagement and interest.
There is a market and audience for high quality photography, and there is a market and audience for pictures of cats on your iPhone.
If we want Hive to grow, we need to embrace it all. Doesn't mean you need to upvote or even look at the stuff that doesn't interest you, but it should not be looked down upon.
I see and totally agree with you. I am always thinking what are the main keys for the Hive community to grow. Probably when there will be more people on the platform, there will be more taxonomies. Or so-called communities. It is on communities to filter good posts and keep curators just to confirm it not find new "stars".
Maybe the main problems lay in my view of Hive. I embraced it as a good quality source of independent news. I have even ideas about apps for this but sadly no knowledge nor time, to be honest.