Why the Trending Page gets too much attention
Let's start with what the trending page is. It is just a report displayed on a UI. A UI is a User Interface. Which means it is a simplified way to interact with the blockchain. It can input information in the blockchain or pull information out of the blockchain and display it.
Maybe we should talk about that first.
This is not intended to be a technical document, it is just providing a concept level understanding of what you are viewing as you surf on SteemIt.com. Most of us just need an idea of how it works.
The blockchain is something like a database, but more. It stores the data, signs the transactions and creates the next blocks. For most of us including me, working directly with the blockchain would be too difficult. To get information in and out of the blockchain, developers have developed UIs to simplify the process. One of those UIs is SteemIt., there are others including Busy.org, dMania, dLive etc. We tend to call them front-ends or sites. They are all just UIs people built to put information into the blockchain and extract and display the information already stored in the Blockchain.
When you click on the trending link on SteemIt, you are basically just viewing a report. Someone has written code that says, look in the blockchain and retrive the following information and display it like this.
The code pulls out data that matches the search, and displays it according to the code. I don't write code, but it is just a language to pull information out of the blockchain.
find the posts that were written from this date to that date with the highest rewards and sort them by some criteria
Someone who can write code could add another link that is programed to pull the busiest posts from the blockchain and display them.
find the posts from this date to that date that have the most upvotes and comments and display them by some criteria
There is no reason we couldn't have both reports, except it hasn't been written and implemented yet. Maybe someone could write that report and see if SteemIt Inc drops it?
*a mock up of adding a link to steemit.com, I was lazy and didn't use photoshop. But updating a UI is just a matter of writing some code and it doesn't impact the blockchain at all. Notice by the promoted a link could be added to see posts with a lot of activity.
To be clear, I realize most of the complaining about the trending page is actually debate about the "Rewards", but I think sometimes the 2 issues of "displaying information" and changing how the blockchain works are two different things that some do not understand.
New UIs for Steem can be built that simply ignore or do not display the trending page or included a different set of data to display. If your concern is about "What New Users See", what you are advocating is a change in the UI vs. the blockchain. If your concern is the rewards and how they are distributed that has nothing to do with the trending page link on SteemIt.com.
As I wrote this post, I got attached to the idea what we add a link for the most active posts, which would provide additional visibility. Without making the site too busy, I like the idea of providing more access to more posts!
(Yes, I know it could/would be gamed, everything we have can and is being gamed. That is just part of an economy)
Honestly I used to think it was about rewards but I'm reconsidering that attitude.
I think they complain about the trending page because they want to feel like their content is simply the best content out there. Unfortunately that's not how the trending page works right now.
I'm not sure if it ever worked that way. I remember when the trending page used to be all food posts.
There were some restaurant posts in there that included several pictures. Were they the best content out there? I didn't think so but I thought they were okay.
At this point I don't pay much attention to the trending page but I know that a lot of people get really upset that their content doesn't make it out there.
I'd love to get my stuff on the trending page but right now I'm kind of more focused on just getting a few people to actually upvote it. I feel like I'm getting less and less upvotes lately as the price of Steem falls in sympathy with the market and people are simply wandering away from the platform.
Those of us who have been around keep saying, the Trending page was never about quality. It has always been about value of votes. The whales didn't sit around reading content prior to the bidbots.
They either didn't vote or they setup their accounts on Autovoters.
The reason I defend the bots so much and so hard is they gave us a way to promote our posts if we want to.
I get what you are saying about getting less votes, I also think as we grow the end-users are forced to support more new Authors.
I've been spending less time on the site, but it has nothing to do with the price, I am just sick of all the fighting. (I think I need a break after nearly 2 years)
Well I actually had an idea for an auto voter that I think is a really great idea. I wish I was a programmer because I would love to implement it.
Instead of setting your auto voter up to choose people that you like we could simply set them up to randomly upvote people.
Using this method we could kill the nepotism which I feel is much more rampant than any problem created by the bid bots. As long as the auto voters are pushing votes on the same people again and again the minnows will never be able to feel their content gets the recognition that it's worth.
An auto voter that randomly spreads votes would still be able to give good curation rates. We could tweak it so that it doesn't vote spam by looking for certain parameters. I'm certain an auto voting randomizer is a great idea.
At one point Smooth was going to give random votes and Blocktrades actually gave random votes on photography. I agree it is an interesting idea.
One pitfall, on the off chance it upvotes something someone doesn't like there will be an upset emotional reaction, hit pieces written about it, etc.
And it is that factor that I am growing weary of on SteemIt.
Good read - I appreciate your perspective on the subject - glad I've been hanging around the discord server as well and get to see you guys talking about topics discussed therein on the platform itself.
Side question but also related ish - do you see adding the ability to comment while resteeming a benefit ? Like if I want to resteem something but also want to give my opinion on the content / recommendation. Just a thought. All the best. E.
I absolutely wish for the ability to explain why I am resteeming something. Literally every day!!
I wish it worked like twitter or something close.
I always just share stuff within my posts. I'm not a fan of the resteems. I normally find the resteems are not as good as the resteemer.
It would really be a game changer - giving users more control over interactions. You might be more willing to resteem if you could give your feelings first.
it would also essentially offer another vertical or skew for bot owners - another service if you will.
"Upvote / resteem and vouch" - something like that.
Seems like a no brainer.
"I wish it worked like twitter or something close." - Read - kind of like sharing on Facebook - but nothing like Facebook. 😂😂
Personally, I never look at the Trending, Hot or Promoted "reports" because I don't find them particularly useful. I take the occasional glance at "New" and pay attention to what those I follow are reblogging or commenting on as well as to those who comment on my posts to find new people to follow. Or search for specific tags.
It would be cool to be able to tweak various criteria for the trending page we each want to see. There's some extra processing in that, but the data is available to do it.
That would be cool, but of course, I have no idea what the "expense" in processing would be.
In my former company where we stored a lot of information, we built a "Reports Lab" area, which allowed users to fairly easily create and save their own reports with a limited amount of knowledge. If we stored it and they know the database fieldname they could pull and sort it. Many of our slightly more technical end-users loved it and it was better than having to select from 100s of premade reports!
i think that we should differentiate between readers and upvoters. it is very important to allow writers to know how many people read the article.
i just get the feeling that people are only reading articles that they feel they can either upvote or comment on
that may change the entire tone of the trending page. yes it will not be tied into rewards and hence is against the spirit of steemit, but it probably does not make much of a difference now
I don't think anything happening on the Trending Page currently, "Hurts the spirit of SteemIt. I think some are focusing on details that make their SteemIt Spirit Hurt, and that is an entirely different thing and it is controlled by each user.
Trending page itself is not the issue but it amplifies it. People who abuse system for reward are punished by getting more visibility on trending page where they are lashed with even more reward.
https://steemit.com/active
It looks broken, now.
This work is really appreciable and it can clear many doubts which are hold by newbies and you nicely explained how the trending issue can be changed through just creating an new User Interface/Front End/Website. For now absolutely the trending page is coded with, most upvotes and comments possibly and if developers can create new Front End with different coding then possibly majority of people can use the new Front End and some trending wars can be lessen because in my opinion trending wars are worthless because most of the trending post are reached their through Bid Bot upvotes, but we have to understand one thing that for now Bid Bots are part of Economy and people are spending their own money in Strategies towards Bid Bot so instead blaming something, it's better that an new frontend with new coding and updates and which can be proven effective too. Thanks for sharing this post with us and wishing you an great day. Stay blessed. 🙂
i like you writing style...
thank you bro for you nice explanation for everything to us .....God bless you
I second that idea. I think a UI for upvotes, comments and rewards all in one should be what displays compared to what we have now.
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