As a lot of you already know and have probably noticed yourselves, over the past 2 months or so some of my posts have been massively downvoted from the account of @curangel. Over the time, I have wondered why was this happening because, as of today, the 12th of June, I am yet to receive a single answer about the reasoning behind this. Some people have suggested that I should go to the discord channel and practically beg for it to stop - but as I firmly believe that I have done nothing wrong, I will not do such a thing.
Instead, I want to write about the concept of gatekeeping - and why is it such a detrimental factor to a site like Ecency?
In light of today's post, I will be using a comparation between Ecency and Instagram, probably the most successful social media app out there alongside Twitter and Facebook.
A very good question that I want to put out there:
How did these three apps become the most popular apps worldwide?
And yeah, first answer will always be: thanks to the awesome programming team behind them!
Yeah.. wrong. Incorrect. Of course they had an awesome team behind them - but it is the USERS that brought worldwide fame to them.
And which kind of users? Well, if take a look at the top 10 most followed Instagram accounts worldwide, we will see a very interesting thing:
1Instagram - 642 million followers
2cristianoCristiano Ronaldo - 589 million followers
3leomessiLionel Messi - 470 million followers
4selenagomezSelena Gomez - 420 million followers
5kyliejennerKylie Jenner - 392 million followers
6therock Dwayne Johnson - 382 million followers
7arianagrandeAriana Grande - 372 million followers
8kimkardashianKim Kardashian - 358 million followers
9beyonceBeyoncé - 310 million followers
10khloekardashianKhloé Kardashian - 308 million followers
Notice anything? Yeah. The popularity contest is without any single reason of a doubt won thanks to successful footballers (2 of the top 10), an actor (1 of the top 10) - and yeah, you guessed it - beautiful girls (6 of the top 10).
Because to me, the 6 from the top 10 most followed instagram accounts are not only followed thanks to the fact that these girls have successful careers - they all are outstandingly tallented - but they are followed also thanks to the fact that they are pretty.
What is the reason for their massive following on Instagram? And why cannot we have the same thing here at Ecency?
Simple reason - and yes, we slowly got to my intro-point: Gatekeeping.
Do not misunderstand what I am trying to make a point of here: I love Ecency. And I love HIVE. I have found so many extremely talented people that blog on this platform that I can surely without a shred of a doubt say that I am in love with this platform.
But is it problem-free? No. And gatekeeping is proving to be a HUGE problem to the whole platform.
Why on Earth are accounts that post daily pics (and I have noticed that it is not just me here, a lot of other girl accounts are receiving downvotes too) downvoted just because they do not contain words? Are words the ONLY metric for which a post deserves an upvote or a downvote? Isn't a picture worth a thousand words?
And yeah, apologets will reign supreme - as @freebornsociety once wisely remarked: You do not ask why anyone is upvoting you, why are you so upset for a downvote? Why are you questioning it?
I am not questioning the downvote. I am questioning the GATEKEEPING. Because it is unbelievably frustrating. I want for this whole thing to be fair. Credit where credit is due.
This is my post from 4 days ago. I posted a pic of me and my friend enjoying a drink: https://ecency.com/beauty/@goddesseva/enjoy-the-silence
It instantly got downvoted. WHY? Is there any legitimate reason why this has been downvoted? Instead of trying to get people to join the platform and expose more and more beautiful people on the platform - and no, I am not limiting the 'beautiful' part only on physical appearance, but also beautiful souls, capable people, intellectual minds that can contribute to grow this platform and for it to become a mainstream space that all of us will enjoy - we have accounts that hold gazzilion HIVE power and act as gatekeepers.
This is not the way forward. This is not how Ecency will outgrow its competitors.
Upvotes are such a beautiful system that Ecency has and it can prove to be an invaluable tool in the fight vs Instagram, Twitter, Facebook. Why? Because people there post stuff on a daily basis FOR FREE. Who reaps the rewards there? Zuckerberg and mr. Elon Musk.
On Ecency, WE THE USERS reap the benefits. A very easy decision then, for anyone sane out there that will have a choice to make on which platform they should devout themselves too.
But no. We have curangel out there. A single account, doing everything it its power to gatekeep millions of people out of our beautiful platform. Disgusting.
Rant over. And yeah - PLEASE, try downvoting this as well.
Kiss for everyone else, wish you all a magnificent Monday and week ahead of you.
As for you curangel.. I do not wish to spend any more words. You are not worthy of my words. :)
I’m not a fan of just pictures either, and I think it just goes to the “low effort” type of post. Ya sex sells, beautiful women get attention but I wouldn’t base too much faith on those “followers” on IG. 75% of them or more are bot accounts. There also isn’t a financial element to IG so it’s a different playing field.
I do get your frustration with the down votes and I agree in some of the instances. I don’t disagree in others though, and for me just posting a picture with no text, no words of what you’re doing, where you are or anything else is really foolish in my opinion and I may down vote it as well. If you put a little more effort into the post, it could go differently! Or if you don’t want to get down votes, you can decline rewards and it would likely go just fine.
what about the random posts I get downvotes on that have 100 words and more? is that also a reason to be downvoted?
https://ecency.com/beauty/@goddesseva/everydip-everywhere-all-at-once
@cmplxty so, why is this post of mine downvoted?
Rewards adjustment
It's not gatekeeping. You can use the platform in whichever way you want.
But: Your pictures aren't even stored on the blockchain. We're lowering your rewards, because we think the limited reward pool should be spread further to people who put more effort in their posts.
It's not your money until payout, nobody cares about your entitlement.
I am very sorry, but I do not agree on your statement right there.
Just to be clear: Crypto (so not just Ecency, but crypto in general) is a beautiful place BECAUSE of the fact that it is not regulated. If we wanted regulation, we would go to the bank and we would be the same as the majority of the world population.
Entitlement? I do not feel entitled. I do not want anything that is not mine. It's true, the payout system of Ecency is a wonderful thing to have - but let's be clear about one thing.
If you LOWER the rewards thanks to some OWN conviction of yours, you are not making an injustice towards me - but also to the person who rewarded me the lowered amount in the first place.
Let's be clear here: if @vortac or @dalz or @tarazkp decided to upvote some post of mine - who the hell says that it is okay for that amount of a reward to be taken away? If the limited reward pool should be spread further to people who put more effort in their posts, then why don't they do the same thing I did? Post on a daily basis for two straight years, stick on the blockchain through thick and thin, always look at the positive side of things, always share useful tips about the numerous wonderful communities on it. No? Surely you can see the logic behind my way of thinking?
See, this is the beauty of crypto. We can disagree, and the only rules given are in the code. And downvotes are a part of it, there are no regulations on how we can use them.
When you don't provide valuable content, don't post daily. Or don't expect a huge monetary return for them. Easy.
You are aware that random downvotes from some weirdos and the systematic downvotes received from a "curating group" organized by a witness are two very different things?
I mean, imagine discovering that a member of Facebook's top management had flagged your posts and photos on the platform. It would undoubtedly raise concerns, wouldn't it? Well, that's precisely how newbies feel here when they continuously receive downvotes from curangel and when they find out it's backed by a witness.
The very fact that you are downplaying your reponsibilites and acting like curangel continual downvotes are "the beauty of crypto" is absurd and concerning.
She is not a newbie. She knows what she's doing with these posts - farming rewards, nothing else.
A downvote is not a flag. A downvote is a reward adjustment. That's how the distribution algorithm works, did you read the whitepaper?
Why should I as a witness not use the blockchain in the way it was intended? Being a witness is about running a node for the chain, being independent and reliable. Caring about anyone's rewards is not part of the job description.
Well, if you can use the blockchain in the way it was intended why can't she farm rewards then? Obviously, farming rewards is also one of the intended uses. That's how algorithm works. Or is this another case of "rules for thee, but not for me"?
She can, of course, and I will always support her right to post whatever she wants.
She's not entitled to be successful monetizing it though.
In an ideal world, all farmers and circlejerkers and botposters would be downvoted and really good content rise to the top. We're not in an ideal world, but that doesn't stop me from doing my part.
Personally, I think it will be a missed opportunity if HIVE does not capture the "instagram photos with minimal words" potential.
Arguably speaking, getting a really good photo shot and the amount of post processing takes a lot more effort than just mindlessly typing out words. God knows how many shots I've taken of an object and still wasn't happy with it.
Is anyone stopping this content from being here, though? So what if someone posting a photo gets $3 instead of $5 after 7 days? It's the feeling of entitlement to the $5 that's the real problem here.
do they get money for their food and selfie posts on insta?
If we could get a pushback on the top 20 accounts controlling 50% of the pool, that would be great.
IF we could get newbs to power up what they are given, that would be great, too.
This is the only way to break the grip on power that those 20 accounts have.
Tell your friends.
even old users are cashing out
I should have too, maybe would never have become homeless :P
but wanted to compound
instead of cashing out
we will see where itll go
I have a hard time finding folks to vote that haven't cashed out.
I don't think they realize what a blessing it is to be here this early in the adoption.
The level of power being distributed will only dilute from here, in a few years it will be nearly impossible to become a dolphin through posting.
The more the price rises the more that will be true.
haha so you think I did it right after all
well, truly has been quite some struggle
and I'm still not safe, if shit hits the fan I gotta power down everything again
I'm wiggle through just so it works somehow, I survive and stake a little
I'd like to say it is just a matter of time, but I remember sony betamax.
It was better tech, but the masses wanted vhs.
I blame the marketing people.
Luckily, hive only produces blogs and gaming.
No danger of those going the way of video cassette tapes.
Aren't you also a member of the downvote trail?
Yes.
In the early days node bloat was a thing.
Now, not so much.
Still, fraud is not welcome, ergo, we still flag plagiarism.
So, yes, I still flag.
If you see something that isn't fraud, or spam, that I have flagged, speak up.
Not the dust 2% flags, but an actual flag.
The dust flags are for tracking purposes and I have no other way to follow along.
What is node bloat, for those unaware?
The more data uploaded to the chain the more space the chain takes in memory.
The nodes need more memory to hold it all.
That was a real problem before @blocktrades and crew reduced the footprint of the data, exponentially.
In the beginning, nodes were very expensive, now, not so much.
So, the need to punish spam, and 'low effort' posts was based on the costs associated with them, ie, bigger nodes, more expense to keep the chain functioning.
Those days are gone, but control freaks are gonna continue to control.
Some compulsively.
Fraud is something different.
Presenting work as your own and profiting from that is questionable behavior in polite company and currently not allowed rewards in the hive by 'the community'.
I don't imagine folks will ever stop flagging that.
You are absolutely right, I had the same thoughts. Also regarding the pretty girls who post just one picture. Those pretty girls have the potential to move this platform forward. I also like to give out upvotes for posts like that. Hive could be a good alternative for Instagram. And I also get annoyed when Hivewatcher or similar accounts give out such high downvotes. The problem is not a single small downvote, but the downvotes from large accounts with large voting trails. And I think it's pretty bad to ask for forgiveness on Discord. Sure, there may be cases where hivewatchers are right to intervene, but in your case, for example, I really don't think it's justified. I am thinking about adding these accounts and their followers to my downvote trail. Then there are just again these downvote wars. Stupid thing.
!LUV
👄
Have you ever asked a user why they have upvoted? If you say yes I'll not believe you.
Why don't you simply get on with what you're doing rather than worrying about what others are doing?
I'm sure you have things in your life that are more important and more worthy of your time than whining about a downvote that, in the grand scheme of your life, means absolutely nothing.
You can do as you like here, it's a free forum, however others also have that same right. Spending your time whinging about it isn't going to be productive for you; you can't change others so focus on what you do rather than complaining.
I'm trying to offer you some advice here.
Back a while I was receiving downvotes to the tune of $10-$12 on every post, for some 4-5 months. I never said a word. Those downvotes were coming to me because I was friends with someone else that downvoter didn't like, my brother in fact, who also received the downvotes. Not everyone is going to agree with everyone else and that's the way of the world. Try just getting on with your own life, draw a line beneath it: #cowgirl up and move on.
It's your choice though, as it is other people's choice to do as they choose.
it's not whining - it is just stating the obvious: justice should prevail, and I am sorry but I cannot help but feel bad when treated unjust (in my opinion).
Then you're in for a terrible life I think; if you do not have the ability to move on from things that really don't affect you all that much. I think that some day you will look back and agree with me, if not now.
In life, people are going to disagree with you. In your life bad things will happen that are not within your ability to control. In your life your looks will fade, things will sag, no matter what you do. In your life, you will die. That's a fact. That's why I suggest it's better to move on and just be you...letting others be them. Control the controllable things and let the rest drift away, you'll be happier.
You're not special, we all feel that way Eva, maybe one day you'll come to learn my story and that may put your little downvotes into perspective...I hope someday you realise that it's you who are allowing negative things to enshroud you, that you have the ability to move forward and you have the ability to stop attaching stories to the things that happen and making them the reason you don't move forward...that only you have the ability to be you.
Eva, (if that's even your name), you're not an idiot, I know that much. You can post well, I've seen it. Just move on and do that if you can. If not...well, I don't think posts whining about being downvoted deserve the rewards they get and may act on it.
As I said earlier, it is your right to do as you please, just as it is mine, hence me taking the time to comment here or upvote/downvote as I choose.
Schooled 🤣
Whining about downvotes on Hive...seems unproductive to me.
I don't mean to stereotype but people like her do tend to whine about everything that doesn't suit them.
Yep, I'd agree with that. The shame of it is that they can often do much better, but choose not to preferring to rely on other attributes...until they're not around anymore I guess.
giving out that deep free philosophy
Cat is out from box 😄🤦 ... fanny woman 🤦
Schrodinger's cat? :")
Voting power is a limited resource for everyone and it would make far more sense if curangel spent their voting power on upvotes. You are curating content? Rewarding good stuff? So reward them.
The fact that they are spending so much of their voting power and time on downvotes suggest that their activities are motivated by frustration, not curation. I have removed my vote for @pharesim witness (who is apparently behind the curangel project).
What's really limited is the amount of rewards that can be distributed. By downvoting low effort posts like hers, anyone else who may have put more work into their posts will get more.
And just because you don't look at the upvotes, doesn't mean they don't exist.
We have seperate teams actually, and only use the free downvote power to downvote. Which it seems you don't even know exists - or why it does. Complaining is easier than learning, I know.
And that you try to use your witness voting power to influence how we use our votes says more about you than it does about my qualifications as a witness.
@pharesim, I must admit I wasn't sure if removing my vote for your witness was the right thing to do, considering that I don't follow your work closely. However, this whiny post of yours has convinced me that I absolutely made the right decision.
What I find particularly funny is that you talk about "low effort posts," yet your own post is written in elementary school syntax and contains a typo (and that's after editing, apparently). I am afraid to even think about the competence level of your "seperate teams."
Oh seriously, a typo? Damn. You got me good. Let's switch to my native language and see how that goes for you.
I don't post to monetize, so you'll have to live with the amount of effort I put.
I also didn't reply to get your witness vote back, I don't do these games.
I was only here to explain a few things to you which you clearly didn't know yet.
This isn't a popularity contest for me. I don't care what you vote for, and I use my votes as I want.
It's actually funny that you come to this realization now. Curangel is nearly 4 years old, and has been operating this way since its inception. I have been a proponent of using downvotes more since forever, and especially since they do not cost voting power. If that's a concern to you and something that influences your decision to vote on a witness, you should've never voted for me in the first place.
Well, downvotes certainly have its use against plagiarism, spam, threats etc. However, we apparently disagree about the use of continuous systemic unexplained uncommented downvotes because the posts are perceived as "not high quality" (whatever that means, it's obviously wildly subjective, making it pretty much pointless to argue about).
👏👄
I see @curangel is not 100% downvoting your pictures. So what they are doing is merely adjusting your payout to be more in line with the effort you put in.
Curangel is all about finding high quality content and making sure it gets a good share of the rewards pool. In order to spread the rewards to good content from authors that don’t have a big following they also reduce the rewards from those that have a big following, but create lower quality content.
If they really don’t like what you do, they will reduce your rewards to $0,00. Since they let you have those $4-ish, they are merely adjusting for perceived quality.
$4ish for a single photo +/-100 words is pretty damn good! I'd be grateful to receive half of that on one of my posts with many more words and pictures...
Yeah, I would be very happy with that as well
Finally proper explanation.
Over 4 months ago I started getting my #Index4INDEX posts @ LikeTu downvoted by Hivewatchers because it was considered plagiarism. The concept behind Index4INDEX was to post quotes w found inspirational. By their very nature they are other people's words. The post featured a quote, the name of the person being quoted, and a "fake" index card graphic I made showing the quote. Quotes are essentially public domain content, so no one was being fooled into thinking the quotes originated with me.
As a result of this unwanted attention, I began to include other content (namely commentary about quote and history of the person being quoted). This was over 100 "cards" ago.
The only reason I continue posting for Index4INDEX is to power up HIVE every day for the Power Up Month badge. The earnings aren't anything to brag about, but they help me qualify for the HPUM badge as long as I don't miss a day.
LikeTu should be a place for images unaccompanied by text, or with minimal clarifications. Then again, Hivewatchers are all over the place. I stated my case, and it wasn't accepted. So I am where I am, and we are where we are.
yeah.. same story all around. 'hey, I dont like this - enjoy getting downvoted to oblivion'.
With great power comes great responsibility - not just the right to downvote whatever the hell you dont like or are annoyed by.
nice to meet you miss
There is also an additional, less well-known factor, which explains the popularity of the Web2 platforms you mentioned: at the down of the social media era in the 2000s, winners and losers were picked. These sites were nothing to brag about while other means of social communications (forums, message boards, and journaling sites) were dominating the landscape. The WWW part of the Internet was still very decentralized in those days.
The more successful of the newer platforms received infusions of venture capital cash, but even among these platforms winners were chosen by non-market forces. After all, why do we only see API plugins or social media widgets for these platforms (and to a lesser extent a few more) but not for all the platforms out there?
Then there is the promotion factor-- not of the users of these platforms, but of the platforms themselves. If we see any sort of news program, they all promote the big social media platforms. How did these platforms win the free advertising, free promotion lottery?
It's like how most people who know about the Top 1% cryptocurrencies know about BTC and ETH, yet they neglect LTC and HIVE. Just as there are gatekeepers in cryptocurrency, there are gatekeepers in social media. They decide who gets the attention and who languishes in the shadows.
The marketing and promotion that the giant (now) web 2 platforms received, globally during their ascendancy through the ~2010s was unparalleled. All those Silicon Valley giants were darlings of the capitalist world for the better part of a decade. Possibly only the money poured into TikTok marketing by China in the last few years would compare, but only slightly. The social media platform arms race is well and truly over in the public consciousness. It's old news...
Not sure where I was going with all this but hey it's nice to see someone else acknowledge what newer and objectively superior web 3 platforms are up against in terms of achieving mass adoption.
People need to stop comparing Web2 to Web3 x)
Its different, different rules, different how it works and different how the money flows.
Vortac clearly likes the stuff you post since he upvotes you and Curangel clearly dislike the stuff you post since they downvote it.
Have you asked why Vortac upvotes you?
Curangle might just adjust "your" rewards. (Not really yours before they are paid out x))
They are not really gatekeeping since you can still be here and anybody can still join xD
Curangel is downvoting you with 2% or so of they HP, so you still earn rewards, they could easily zero your posts, but they dont.
They might just adjust your rewards. Thats it.
Gatekeeping?
Guuuuuurl.
You're making more money from your posting than ~90% of the people on Ecency. I just made that statistic up, but the sentiment reflects the reality. You're still killing it with author rewards, but you're upset because you made slightly less money than you would have had you not got downvoted...
Big difference
Many people would be happy to have such "problem!"
I completely see your point. As long as it is verified that the (beautiful) person is truly the one who is posting and no impersonator the big accounts should consider upvoting this content (instead of downvoting) in order to establish some „Stars“ here on the chain, that eventually bring more people to HIVE trying to make a living from this kind of web3.0 business.
very true!
I am against arbitrary downvote and I always say it on HIVE. However, a simple photo shouldn't be rewarded here as it is blog based platform, not ego satisfication platforms such as IG, FB so on. As in our real life, we earn because we produce. Thus, it is the same mentality on HIVE as well, at least to me.
I would suggest that you accompany your pictures with some text, 100 words maybe or more, and see what happens. Seeing that Hive is not just a social media platform but a blogging platform, writing something would be nice. Just a suggestion. Your followers will also appreciate details of your pictures. Sorry about the downvotes, I hope it gets sorted soon
already have been doing that - and downvotes follow also my 100+ words posts. disgusting behaviour.
Although some of your posts got downvotes they still paid some rewards. This post got no DVs. You are making more than a lot of people do due to some big accounts supporting you, so is it really that bad? There are various opinions on what content has value and some big accounts will use their DV on what they don't like. As a DV is more expensive than an upvote they cannot remove all rewards.
Getting into a war with a whale tends to end badly and I have seen people driven away. That is unfortunate. We should be able to voice our concerns, but try to avoid it getting too personal.
Hive is an imperfect anarchy. Most of us would make nothing on other sites, so we have to make the best of it. I find most people are friendly, but there is the freedom to be nasty too.
This already paid-out post was just upvoted by @trezzahn.
This post was created to allow this voter the oportunity to still upvote this content IF (s)he deems this content to be high quality.
Please don't use this post to self-upvote. You will get blacklisted if you do. And don't use it to upvote low quality content
This is a hive-archeology proxy comment meant as a proxy for upvoting good content that is past it's initial pay-out window.
Pay-out for this comment is configured as followed:
You looking soo cute with the cool outfits.
hope you have great day.
Shouldn't be comparing followers with followers rather than followers with downvotes?
You're comparing different metrics.
@goddesseva I think maybe if your stile is to post just pictures, you should try Liketu which is another front end for Hive and it is mainly focused on images and pictures.
appearances are deceptive
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