Well written I’m now up to speed. Sounds like the platform isn’t so decentralized after all and there are stronger ppl that shift the power here.
This in essence boils down to a flawed mechanic on the platform that squeezed through a user testing phase that wasn’t predicted. And now someone has found a way to alter the platform rules by exploiting a rule set that was never intended. In video games when i worked at activision we call these SEV 1 bugs! 🐜🐜🐜 these are platform flaws that need better rulesets in a steemit update to corse correct when a mechanic becomes broken or exploited. Any hearthstone players out there? If so when they adjust certain cards in the game on an update it’s because the game mechanic is unbalanced and that is exactly what it sounds like here as well. 
This looks like a worthwhile problem I’d be willing to rework in an exploratory series for solution solving if you guys think that’s valuable
I'm glad you got up to speed... You're fast! ;)
And I'm not so sure this is a bug. It may be the intention all along. In order to keep the platform from failing, a mechanism was put in that allowed the bigger players to exert control. In theory that means that the people that got big, did so because they earned the respect of others. And in most cases this was true (ie fulltimegeek delegated all of his SP to keep from having too much power and being tempted to exert too much influence).
But one group figured out how to game that and earn their reputation not through respect, but by cheating the system. In the beginning nobody paid much attention, but eventually the problem got worse. Finally the "leaders" are ready to deal with it, and the system has the mechanics in place to handle it. If they ban together, they will have enough power together to squash the problem.
SInce it is in all their interests that this platform succeed, it was just a matter of who had the courage to be "first"... @fulltimegeek was the one who said "I'll do it" and if you learn about what he has done you will understand that wasn't surprising. He has been selfless in his time here and tried to always serve the community.
So while it may seem like a bug in the system, in fact I would argue that the system was still designed brilliantly because it enables problems like this to be dealt with. It just takes leaders to lead. And information to spread. And sooner or later, the system will fix itself!
I'm glad to see you up to speed @theuxyeti! And I knew you would be on the right side! ;)
True. We call this still an unaccounted issue. I’m sure this mechanic wasn’t intended as a rule set though as it was built. It became exploitable based on behaviors. It can be unmade
It just takes a deep exploration on how to redesign the mechanic from continuing to happen. While there may be a community way to overcome this issue by flagging reputation repeatedly while receiving the backlash of the exploiters i agree if there are greater numbers of good steemians I’d hope we prevail. It just seems an interesting mechanic in the loyalty engine of things that things like this can happen which causes a fracture in the platforms behavior on the Blockchain. It’s a fascinating flaw. And it’s metaphorical in that the ppl can respond to destroy the ring similar. Sounds so exciting...
I’m excited to join the fight!
I'm working on a plan right now to "support" the troops... Obviously we aren't every going to be on the frontlines, since we are too new and so small.. But there are good ways we can do things and I have formed a few really good ways to do so.
I will fill you in over the weekend. I think you will like it and be up for it... Add me on discord at davemccoy#2479 and we will discuss in depth the plan this weekend! ;)
My immediate plan right off the top of my head is to create an entry field "subscribe" so to speak, I can look into it today at work... I think if we had a window that was created on a website or even here or something were a user simply inserts there Steemit @name into it and we LIST the users in a post of all the contributors to show the ARMY we have to defeat these guys. This would also act as a repository for @fulltimegeek to have at his disposal so I or We or Geek could then create a post when needed with all people tagged and we could UNITE to FLAG... Hey @aggroed , @themarkymark , or @patrice does this sound like something useful for the community to have? In essence this is the same as an email blast in POST form for GEEK and for the good side... Thoughts ?
I get the point and think its worth considering, but my thoughts are that they (the whales) will do the fighting. They will need us for things like support functions, like rehabilitating in the cases where injury has happened. So while we won't be on the frontliines (we will be helping in a support role). This is just my opinion and I will certainly do as FTG wished though... I'm just giving my point of view based on several SOG members advice to me to stay back and help keep the community together and to keep the newbies going forward at this time!
And if any of the guys you tagged have other ideas, then I'm cool with that too! I think this is important, but understand that I am a very very small fish in this ocean.
I am a very small fish in this ocean too... But my BITE is powerful... I am a Scuba instructor as well. Many of the smallest things in the ocean can pack the hugest punch. I think its smart for us to account for all the people fighting this fight, large and small. For me a have a saying "its better to have it and not need it then to need it and not have it". I think its smart to get a list of our troops, large and small. Id be even open to adding a reputation weight next to it and list a big excel doc showing the wall of support for @fulltimegeek as assistance. I agree while we are small fish, its the small fish that build the pond. I understand and perhaps my mouth is bigger then my stomach in this venture but i still think i need to try. i dunno. ill research it today and see what i can find. lmk how i can assist.