Steemit's Got Issues!
Whales Cannot Decide Everything
Take 1
Whales Cannot Decide Everything
Take 1
This will be the start of a series designed to open up discussion about common Steemit issues. I would like this discussion to include minnows as well as whales. Thus the title of our first discussion.
There are many issues to discuss...
I will warn you that if you are offended by cursing you will have to just get over it or find another post. Personally, I will curse if I feel strongly about something as I feel it conveys the weight of the issue. There are issues that others will feel strongly about as well and I've no issue with you cursing to convey a point. On that note, I strongly advise that this is a discussion, and is not intended as a place to pick fights or throw insults at those with differing opinions than your own. Users fighting senselessly on these posts will be flagged.
There are no clear rules on this site. There is a site ediquette that is left entirely up to us to either follow or not. That being said, there are many here on the site that try to enforce this etiquette even though they are not clear rules and are not in any way mandatory to follow.
My intention with this is to get the community (as many of us as possible) to actually voice their opinions about many of the issues that the site faces.
First, let me describe how I will be organizing this series.
Post Titles
- The first part of each title will be "Steemit's Got Issues! Community Discussion".
- The second part of the title will be what issue we are discussing in this post. For instance, today's topic is "Whales Cannot Decide Everything".
- The third part of the title will show how far into that topic we have gotten. Meaning that most of these topics will require many more than one post to get to any type of resolution or potential consensus. So, As one post gets old I will re open that topic, with notes from the previous post on that topic in a fresh, new post. These notes will be similar to that of previous meeting minutes to get us started from a new place each time so we do not just keep saying the same things over and over. This will also help the issues not just get lost in feed forever.
Keeping the topics fresh, organized and preventing them from being lost in feed.
Most of these topics have been discussed and those discussions have been lost in feed and unless you specifically look for them you will not find them. In order to look for them you first have to know about the issue anyway, so that leaves many newbies and minnows out of the discussions from day one. Meaning that very few people were even able to add their two cents or see what was even being discussed. I will do my best to be sure that all sizes of fish in our community can find these posts and this is how:
- As a post gets old (as mentioned above) I will be starting a new post with the highlights from the old one as a starting point for further discussion of the same topic.
- By separating topics in different posts we can keep things topic specific and on track. Making each unique topic's discussion much more focused.
- I will be using bots (future topic lol) to boost these posts as much as I can afford to in the beginning so that they will show up in hot and trending at least for their categories. This will make them as visible as i can make them so we can get as many fish to join, or at least read, these discussions.
- I will ask all of you to please resteem any of these posts that touch on topics that you find important.
- I will ask that everyone that wishes to be part of these discussions vote with what you can spare to make these posts more visible to the masses that make up our community.
- I will provide links to previous posts on topic inside each new post for that topic.
Talk is cheap, this is how I intend to use the conclusions we, as a community, get to.
Ok, since there are no clear rules to govern most of these topics, what it has created is a lot of fighting back and forth about how to handle them. What I propose is that we, as a community, start coming together and create rules that can be agreed upon by the vast majority of users from minnow to whale. This can prevent the fighting and self dictated censorship that is happening on this site from some that have the power to do so and believe that their way is right, whether it is or not. We see many things here that seem to enforce "rules" that are really just self entitled policing. As a new user you are made to feel like that is something real when it was actually never decided on by the community. Rather a single person or small group has actually taken it upon themselves to dictate what is considered abuse and all other forms of policing you see here on steemit. My intention is to open these discussions to the many instead of allowing the few to dictate without our say.
- If we, as a community happen to come to some type of agreement or consensus on a topic, my thought is to raise that topic to the proper channel. So if it is site functionality related I may bring what we have discussed up to @ned and his team personally. I'm sure his team is hit with so much that is single voice after single voice. After a certain point I think anyone would want to just start ignoring much of that. If we were able to appeal to them from a unified voice I believe it would speak louder and have much better chance of getting worthwhile response.
- If the consensus is on a topic outside of the realm of what @ned and his team do, we could then decide together how to implement a strategy to see it through. Again, I don't want to dictate or be dictated to. It is imperative that our world community decide topics so that if they happen to be enforced there is something irrefutable behind that enforcement.
- If we find that things that are being enforced currently are really not in line with how the community feels we can band together to be sure that is changed to something more fitting. No one can argue with a couple hundred thousand voices. :)
Ok, i'm sure I've left plenty out but that is of course the nature of discussion.
Onto the topic for today,
Whales Cannot Decide Everything
Onto the topic for today,
Whales Cannot Decide Everything
First, let me say that how to handle said consensuses we come up with can also be it's own topic and will likely need to be. Feel free to leave comments about that for further discussion on this post.
Ok, so most of what is considered etiquette here, that is also being enforced as rules, was decided upon by whales without the bulk of the community involved in the decision.
Now, while sp does determine voting power, it should in no way give a user (or small group of users) the right to dictate rules to us that have never actually been set as rules in the first place. That is just hierarchy rearing it's ugly head.
There are many things that of course need to be decided for our community to flourish, however they need to be decided from the ground up so that it is actually fair to all here.
No matter how much sp you have, you have a voice. That individual voice should be part of what is being decided on this platform.
The purpose of the topic today and this series in general is to give us all that voice and be sure it is heard.
I'm not diving into this one very deeply because it is pretty self explanatory.
If we do not decide how steemit is governed, on our own as a community, then we will be putting that power into the hands of the few. Currently that is the whales that have these discussions without us. Honestly, I feel that most of them are stand up people and would appreciate the input from the community as a whole anyway.
So, with all of that said...
Let's Get This Discussion Started!
Please leave your thoughts below.
Also, to avoid clutter and make it easier for us to get somewhere with this, if your opinion is directly in line with one that has already been stated in a comment below please simply upvote that persons comment rather than making a comment saying the same thing. This will make it so much easier to see how many of us think what about what.
Please use your best judgement in commenting as I intend for these discussions to be meaningful and be used to create much needed change throughout the platform.
I have a large list of issues to discuss already but if you feel the need to leave one in comment for future discussion please do.
Thank you, each and every one of you, for taking part in this discussion. I truly believe that you are all the beginning of a beautiful and inspiring change that is bound to sweep the platform and alter it for the better. :)
@michaeldavid
There needs to be a better formular for distributing posting rewards. The current linear reward curve is clearly discouraging quality content. N^2 at least encouraged more effort on posts. But maybe a new reward curve needs to be developed for better distribution, encouraging more quality content
Right, the way it works now, if you have large sp, you will gravitate only toward posts you think will get you higher curation rewards. Absolutely no incentive to vote on good content. Someone has to want to make less to no curation to want to vote on you. This is also another topic on my list that I will be making another post about as well.
Exactly. And also with the high SBD price,it is tempting to just use voting power on yourself. Whereas with n^2 or a non-linear reward curve this wouldn’t be the case.
On a related note, the change for a limit of 4 posts per day to unlimited In my opinion has magnified this problem.
I see. Well, if someone posts more than ten times and votes each one they will in effect drain their vote power and not be able to recover if it is daily.
I'm a little confused about a non linear reward curve but it seems useful.
Honestly, I am not much caring about curation. For me, upvotes are a tool to promote discussions, help friends and reward good work.
I set most of my auto votes to first minute to decline curation myself and the cost of it is minimal.
Like this post had multiple big bots on it, but I still voted, effectively forfeiting my curation.
A
N log(N)curve with selectable amount of curation rewards would be great. That could fix many issues.That’s right, there should be more experimentation with different reward curves to find what works best. Anything but linear would be better in my opinion.
Well, I officially do not know what a N log(N) curv is lol. I'd love to know more!
When I vote a post I really never even think of the curation. It really only helps you if you have a lot of sp.
I am thankful for those with considerable sp that are not driven by the curation reward incentive. It's a shame that they are not more common. :)
I'm definitely interested in knowing what the n log(N) fix you speak of is.
As this discussion grows I believe I will be able to not use bots to get it noticed :)
There is
N
N log N
N * N (or N^2)
Basically a middle ground.
I'll take your word for it... lol
middle ground makes sense :)
Check this:
Maybe that makes more sense :)
I really have no idea about what N^2 or Nlogn systems mean.. it will be interesting to understand better..
I didn't either, @reggaemuffin just did a great job of explaining it above :)
I think that steemit is working out its growing pains. I would like to see steemit marketed out in the real world. We have the talent and the financial resources to make it happen. STEEM is one of the few or only cryptos with an actual working use case. It is processing transactions fast and cost effectively with out issues. Why is it ranked 34 in a crypto market ruled by hype. I think Steemit could benifit from some hype. Especially when its based in reality. Plus look at all the good work that steemit is doing out in the world. Seems its cryptos best kept secret
I have just messaged our Indian exchange to please include Steem. Hope I hear from them soon. Should I also contact steemit about this? Not sure whom to message though.
Sounds pretty cool!
@reggaemuffin, you have an answer for this one? Would this be someone on @ned's team or somewhere else?
Not sure, they never answered my questions and I am thinking I am not alone in that...
haha, of course not lol
wow
Wikkid awesome!
I agree!
How did you get 72 votes on a comment?
I must have had a balance in my minnowbooster account. I took me awhile to figure out how this was happening. I thought i was just lucky.Ironic on s post like this huh?
Very lol
haha, i wondered the same cause it was nearly instant... bots? I've seen a service you can pay to get like 80 from various accounts for like $2.
Can I know the service??
no idea man, it was some wallet spam I got forever ago
Nicely put. I think you are right. I also think that something that would help with that would be more ways /places to spend steem/sbd directly. This would also add to the hype you speak of.
I think the potential for steem and steemit is huge but it does need some changes i think this initiative is a great idea
Thanks man, its a work in progress but I've been mulling this one over for some time. thus the lack of posts lately lol.
Let's pull the community together and get some things moving :)
Yes thats what should
This type of discussion is what steemit needs more than anything. Resteemed hard.
I think there needs to be a better way to bridge the gap between the platform developers and decision makers, and us little people. IIRC, the last time I complained about some bug, I was basically told to go fix it myself in the condenser git. I can't code. In fact, most people on the platform can't. How do we fix this? How do we make the techs listen to authors, artists and curators?
There is unofficial support in the help channel of Steemit chat. If you run into issues, just report them there and I (or one of the other support volunteers) will do our best to help.
Okay, who would one need to beg to get some RTL alignment up in here, for us Hebrew and Arabic authors? Yes, I will keep asking for it till I get it!!! :)
P.S. Good to know there's a help channel, but what can you actually do to solve bugs or improve features to better cater to the needs of the community?
I'll discuss it with the dev team.
We can help with getting bugs solved.
Feature requests need to go through the 'standard process' of drumming up support through posts and word of mouth first. If you can get something to the trending page, that's usually enough for it to get some serious consideration.
Please do! I would offer bribe if I had any.
Hello . I wonder if you can help me with a new account. I submit all the necessary information for a new account and Steemit send me the confirmation email , but when I clicked on the link , it took me to a new page where the message was - Thankyou for your time we will review the information that you send us , we will check it and give you an answer later - Its been 2 months since that happened . Is there a way to know if im going to have a validated account ? Regards.
You already have an account. The terms of use are one account per user. You are welcome to signup for additional accounts, but you need to pay the account creation fee for them. There is info on this in the faq. (AnonSteem, SteemConnect, SteemCreate, etc.) @blocktrades also posted today about a service they are offering too.
Thanks for the information . Good day.
Great to know!
Super solid points!
I know what you mean. The learning curve is really steep here! One of the big reasons it's hard to get people here or to stay once they are here.
We definitely cannot all be coders lol.
I don't even know what the condenser git is.
Deeper even still is most of us would ask "who are the techs? who would we even point a glitch out to?".
The condenser git is the place the source code of steemit.com is developed.
There's a steemcleaners initiative. Why doesn't Steemit Inc create one for tech support, onboarding and bridging that gap to connect with the non-technical userbase in making the platform better?
I guess steemit Inc is more interested in developing their SMT.
Tech support for the condenser is very expensive, if done right, and wouldn't return anything for them in the short term.
They are sitting on tons of SP in their accounts. Making this a rewarded community effort won't cost them a penny, but instead distribute their power among trustworthy steemians. This can be run like steemcleaners and curie, who community projects that are doing what I consider holy work.
Steemoverflow as in stackoverflow would be a nice idea for someone with time(not me) to set up. And see how it goes. Blockchain based technical questions. The answer with most Upvotes is mostly right. I thought about that. Maybe one could at least please it at utopian-io?
I support this wholeheartedly.
Nice!!
Wonderful!
I think you are right. There are definitely things that could have been developed or enhanced before working on SMT.
Tech support is expensive everywhere but also a necessary and normally beginning part of a website.
I see...
This is definitely something needed lol.
Without us, Steemit wouldn't continue to exist.
wow, so many responses that I'm not even sure who you responded to lol. But, I totally agree!
thanks for the idea. Please have a look at my post . Though a user tried to explain the missing dollars, I still have not understood.
I can explain your "missing money" post.
This was very hard for me to get also.
First, as your post grows in age it can change value as the reward pool changes. There is only a certain amount that is rewarded each day and we all split that. So as more upvotes, flags or whatever come in, your value will sway up and down... normally down.
When it's time for payout, that is kind of like your striking price. That is when your price will finally solidify and become your actual reward.
Once this happens the reward begins to split. There is the curation that will take 25% of your post. That goes directly to the curators (people that have upvoted you). In this case that is the first 2.07 you see leaving your post.
The 75% that is left over (7.11 in your case) is then split 50/50 between sbd and steem power.
This is where it looks like its a glitch when in fact it is just hard to understand lol.
Ok, SBD is considered to be $1 worth of Steem (regardless the real value of sbd). The payout is measured as sbd. So the half that goes to sbd will actually be half of the total payout. In your case this will be 3.555 sbd. The reason it looks like the steem power is lower is that at the moment of payout steem was not $1. So, if we assume that sbd is $1 worth of steem and steem is valued at $2 usd today then that 3.555 (when reflected in steem power) will show as half... 1.7775. The system only sees sbd as $1 worth of steem so it is true to the payout amount. If steem was $1 then you would get an equal amount of sbd and steem power. if steem was $3 you would only get 1/3 of what the sbd would be.
Also bare in mind that those numbers do not seem to match your numbers exactly because you were collecting from that post and it seems there were also a few curation rewards there as well.
Make sense?
ah yes, thanks a lot for taking the trouble to answer this. So kind of you.
Your're welcome :)
I think steem has huge potential! It is a great gateway into crypto. Also it so much fun I think it will catch on. The ui needs work and we shouldn't have to use things like discord to communicate privately with each other.
Definitely a topic on my list! Along with the other site functionality issues lol.
This is a big one.
But... whales don’t decide a thing. DPOS doesn’t care for whales as such. Unless, of course, you mean how powerful an upvote/downvote by a whale is and how a whale benefits lack of separation of powers.
Witnesses decide on Steem and most (top 20) witnesses are generally very approachable and responsive. Sometimes it may require some digging to find where which witness hangs out most, but generally it isn’t that hard to find them and even to get a reply from them.
But this will be/is a valuable series of discussions and I look forward to the next installment. :)
Witnesses decide on steem yes. Whales decide more than you may know here on steemit. As this discussion unfolds I believe it will become more obvious.
I don’t deny they have an influence, a very large influence even, and also a very powerful sceptre they can swing. Especially when we think about a democratic principle such as separation of powers. I wrote a long post about it during the most recent downvote teacup windfalls.
Im not sure how one wants to tackle the issue though, the are literally the hands that feed us. Do they lobby? It would be weird if they didn’t benefit an extra ear.
Without whales there is no value whatsoever to both our currencies. Fact.
Whales are important, no one is refuting that. It's merely that there are many large decisions here that affect all of us that are being decided without all of us. Or, not decided at all.
I recall a recent post that was attacking @freedom for delegating to people that appear or are spammers or whatever.... Point being, in that post it was commented blatantly that some whales will get together to decide what to do. I tried to find that post to link it here. I found what I thought was that post but all it was was bernie saying "you are being watched" all creepy stalker like lol.
"Build your own dreams or someone else will hire you do build theirs."
If the majority is outside the loop, they will inevitably be caught in the snare.
I recall that post but to be honest, again, nothing on Steemit is decided by whales.
You need to build a case and present to our Governance body, the witnesses. Only they can change the structure of the chain and whether such acts are possible or not. But most witnesses aren’t too big fans of regulation, which is often also why they are active on blockchains.
As such, the social experiment, has a huge flaw highlighted: society needs structure. Structure should include protection of the those less assertive, and the weakest ones. Which in turn requires regulation because otherwise offenders can not be harmed.
You have a fan because you started this series (check my feed and you will know why you have my interest), but I fear it’s another case of us overblowing things because we see this world as too small, rather than what it actually is... a new, replicated, Internet. Complete with all the good and the bad.
Welcome to Internet 3.0. The Infrastructure Internet. The internet which is totally mimicking what we have currently, but then on the blockchain. Just because we can. And because we have whales.
As for freedom... isn’t he Top delegator to Utopian too? You may have noticed he has withdrawn lots of his active delegations which were misused. We all learn every day and even the whales (eventually) understand that focus [on quality] a necessity is.
But I’m following this series. 👊
Thanks, I appreciate that.
When I say whales are making decisions I do of course understand that the type of decisions you are speaking of is decided by witnesses. However there are decisions affecting us that are made by whales. A good example would be bernie and transistos decisions on who to downvote daily. Also whoever is behind sadkitten bot and bots like this one. Or perhaps a simple yet overlooked decision to circular vote without regard to author value. Some of these are poor examples and some decent.
Again I understand the type of decisions you speak of and that they are not held by whales strictly but by witnesses.
Checking out your stuff now :)
Check out specifically this post. It deals exactly with the matter of downvotes.
Full disclosure: Bernie and Transisto IMHO are fighting a good fight. We have other, more quiet, whales who make people leave because of their downvote wars.
Whales decide who the top witnesses are. The top witnesses decide the blockchain parameters, make the decision to hardfork, etc. Are you contending that because whales do not directly decide these things for witnesses that they don't have influence in the decisions?
They also set the distribution for the lions share of the rewards from the reward pool (directly with the voting and indirectly via curation rewards).
Steem is a capitalist society, that further reinforced by the importance of vests for witness voting. But I’m not willing to run with the title as such because if we do we may as well say that we are merely POS rather than DPOS. There is still room for non-purely whale powered witnesses.
Only if some whales abstain from voting. With the current distribution of vests, the whales will always be able to choose the top witnesses.
I agree, the "D" is important, the whales don't make the decisions directly. Still, your contention that "whales don't decide a thing" is not quite correct enough.
That's pretty much what I was getting at. Thanks :)
Well the whales are all different and I have found some who genuinely like curating good content and establish groups that find such talent and upvote it. They are what I think is what Steemit intended to function when they were delegated their SP.
We also have whales that became that because they invested their own money and set up their own nodes so that they effectively mine Steemit. They usually are those that lease out their SP to voting bots and delegation and they have said that they earn more that way than curating in some unknown person's quality post which may or may not get upvotes. In a way they are not gambling their voting power to anyone they think will not earn them more.
And we get to the faction of whales that just upvote each other this they are the only ones increasing their SP and never mind the planktins, redfishes and minnows that join and leave because they usually don't get any votes.
I have been here for about 3 months and honestly I get more in joining contests and getting curation rewards on some people. There has been a point where in I wanted to quit because the things that I like writing about get no love but when I do what most people do then I get some votes. Still not a lot but makes a difference for a plankton like me.
We all agree that the rewards system is broken and you taking the cudgels of trying to find a way to fix it is admirable. I hope that I will still be in this platform when that time comes.
We all experience that Steemit fatigue when we are at our low point and think why am I still posting here when I don't get a lot of interactions. When you think your voice is hardly heard or your opinions matter because end of the day people look at the number next to your name and will always think how they will benefit with an interaction with you.
I wait and will see when Steemit becomes great. It is good now but for something that has been on going for the past two years it could have gotten a whole lot better. Some may disagree that it is still in beta stage or that these are growing pains but need to get better faster as we do not have the luxury of time. There are so many platforms popping out there with similiar promises so what differentiates us from them? Surely not content because lately all I find are selfies and very general posts. We have to get better in terms of content and how to reward that content.
We need to continue growing and stop people from suddenly ghosting and disappearing from Steemit because all the power are consolidated on the few. We need to get better.
I have no idea how but I feel an urgency to it.
Yes, many whales come in many different forms. This is why I think we all need to be in the discussion.
I know just what you mean about steemit fatigue. I've been quite upset at times here for many reasons.
I really like what you said about steemit needs to get better faster. I think that touches on the heart of what I'm getting at here by starting these discussions.
I would like Steem to be marketed more for its blockchain capabilities ie ability to handle transactions and no fees, and less on make money blogging. One of the most impressive pieces is how great the blockchain of Steem is IMHO.
I think this is a wonderful idea. To be quite honest, I really don't know anything about the chain outside of the blogging and I don't think I'm the only one.
Petitions, love the idea! As for whales deciding everything, hell no. I think it all be put to a vote every time. Of course, I don't think some accounts should be able to weigh in, say for instance the rep 28 that only made one post and has been here a month. He obviously has no vested interest in the platform. But, people that are putting the time in and have dedicated themselves to this platform should have an equal seat at the frign table.
Great response! We definitely all need to be more involved in community decisions! When it comes to decisions, amount of sp should not factor in.
My thought about the 28 guy you speak of is that they also have a voice that needs to be heard. If it is that 28 person may very well feel more invited into the platform as a whole and could have something wonderful bubbling under the surface that they finally reveal after feeling that way. Excluding them based on anything really will not bring a feeling of equality and could potentially add to the feelings of exclusion or oppression.
However, if they are really not involved on the site and have actually dropped off like that, they are not likely to join the discussion or weigh in anyway. It's more about the feeling that they could if they wanted.
#thealliance :)
I don't know, if he's posted several times and is trying, then yes sure, but if he's not actually trying to figure out 'the formula' or grow here, than no. I doubt a person/account of that caliber would show up at the table anyway lol
likely not. :)
This is some beautiful discussion. I'm a total noob here and still working on my first post(I want it to be good 😉) but I just wanted to point out that posting frequency need not be the criteria by which one is judged. There needs to be people involved in this platform as consumers of the content that the creators post. Those people are just as important imho. (Which may not be worth much as I am still learning the platform, hah)
I would say that you are right that what you are posting is more important than how often.
Also your demeanor behind posting. If it is clear you are solely after profit with no care of your posts it is one thing. If you are not writing good posts yet you are wanting to be here and learn to grow this is another.
Indeed a great initiative Michael. I am sure a lot of open bothering points shall be discussed in this forum and hopefully resolved in the best interest of the steemit platform.
Regards Nainaz
#thealliance
Thanks @nainaztengra.
I believe they will as well. Thanks so much for the support. Please feel free to add your voice as it grows :)
#thealliance
I think one of the problems of this community is the Steemcleaners service and cheater
Cheater for me was wrongly coded as it usually flags posts wrongly sometimes and newbies or even old users tend to leave posts with cheater comment without curation..
Great work on trying to solve community issues @michaeldavid
By the way, @raggaemuffin and @surpassinggoogle are my favorite whales..
Steemcleaners do an excellent job in my opinion. It's very important that they go after plagiarists. Not long after I joined, someone on here was impersonating a professional photographer and posting all his work and claiming it as their own.
They do a great job with plagiarists. It is a shame when some users that are not trying to scam get caught in the crossfire. However, I really don't hear of this much from them.
If Steemit is going to be looked upon with real credibility as a quality blogging platform, the community has got to take a stand against real image plagiarism and copyright infringement. Steemcleaners do a great job with written plagiarism, but photography plagiarism is not properly addressed.
We have to say it is not tolerated, but unfortunately whales are getting away with it more than anyone. Too often I see Image Source cited as a search engine like Google , or some web site that may have paid a fee to use the work, or it may be another site that has already stolen the work. It is still plagiarism to cite a wrong source. But no one wants to take the time to research that! The true source of a piece of work is the photographer, and that is where Steemcleaners falls short. You can cite Mickey Mouse as your source, as long as you don't say it is your own work.
As a professional stock photographer, I have twice found my own stock images being used on here without a license fee being paid - once with absolutely no credit given, and another time with some website where the image was lifted from being claimed as the source. In both instances, those stealing my work were whales and the posts made a lot of money, and my work was not compensated. Not only was this plagiarism, but also copyright infringement, which is by far a bigger problem on here than plagiarism. Citing even a true source is copyright infringement unless permission has been granted or a license fee paid.
I know this is a whole other area of discussion, but it is a very important one to those of us who are professional photographers. Legitimate sites always make it clear that copyright infringement will not be tolerated, and they have a stated method of dealing with it when it happens. That helps the site to get off the hook if they are sued. I dread to think what would happen here on Steemit, because there is no such published statement about copyright infringement. That could be Steemit's big downfall one day, and we will all suffer because of it.
I think i quite agree about Steemcleaners but I believe the image plaigiarism is somewhat difficult to handle
It's easy really. The photographer has often spent a lot of time and money creating the work. All businesses have overheads, and photography is no different. There are free sites like Pixabay where users can get images that are copyright free.
I believe that steemcleaners should class any source other than the free sites as plagiarism. (It's copyright infringement too, but stopping the plagiarism would stop the copyright infringement.)
Pixabay is a wonderful site actually. Perhaps promoting more awareness about the site (and others) and how you can get copyright free images would help as well, at least until @steemcleaners can workout a solution.
I think that many people just think you can pull an image from the net and not worry. Some knowing it is infringement and some likely not knowing as well.
I totally agree that plagiarism and copyright infringement are very serious and must be taken care of. These are things that are not only morally wrong, but actually illegal if you get right to it and cases can be brought against people even. I was aware that @steemcleaners was doing what they can about written forms. I was however, not really thinking about the photograph's as personally I was always in the habit of citing ones that I used.
This is a serious thing that we must definitely addressed. I've added this to my list of topics to bring up. :)
I'm sorry to hear that this has directly affected you also. That's a shame.
I know that other sites have ways of dealing with this issue better that steemit has though, i'm not exactly sure what they are.
I'm going to start with a couple lighter topics to get people talking then lead into some of the heavier ones like this. It may seem backwards I'm just wanting to get more voices talking before we get to the heavy stuff.
Thanks for bringing this up!
Yes Steamcleaners handles photo plagiarism too, but they don't go deeply enough. They accept whatever is given as a source, because it simply shows the person is not claiming it as their own. The problem is that it is plagiarism not to cite the ORIGINAL author!
I'm finding more and more professional photographers joining Steemit, so pretty soon there may be a unified voice with us too.
This is a very good point. You need to write a post on exactly where public domain pictures can be uploaded and how to determine if you are plagiarizing a picture. How does one go about getting permission if they find a picture they wish to use? Pixabay is very limited. There are lots of appropriate photos and graphics out there but there is no way (that I know of) to tell if what you would like to upload is already pirated or not. Can you work your way back the "image credit" chain to find the original source? It really isn't clear at all
OK, here's a link to the last post I made. At the bottom there is a series of links to other posts on the subject. The one about using Google Images will help you to trace back to a source. I need to write a post about using Tineye, which is my favorite site to use, but I used Google as an example, because i was tired of seeing google listed as a Source! LOL!
Thank you so much. I honor people's intellectual property and will do whatever it takes to not violate that trust.
I have written a few posts about it already, and so have other photographers on here. I do have a post somewhere that shows quite simply how to work back to the source - takes all of a couple of minutes in most instances! If you can't find the source, you can't use it! I will track down that post and link it here.
It is not a subject that most want to address, because the majority of posts that are using images not from Pixabay etc. are plagiarizing and infringing on copyright. No one has a right to use ANY image on the web - except where specific rights are given. It may be OK with the Steemit community, but that does not make it ethically right.
If you find an image on the web, unless you are willing to do the homework and find out what the source is , then you should not be using it. Steemit doesn't care. It's just a community! Of course you are going to be limited, that's why there are stock agencies that license content. We are professionals who work for a living like everyone else, but that is often hard to get across on here. My overhead over the years has been hundreds of thousands of dollars, so giving away my work for free was never my intention. LOL!
Thank you so much. I honor people's intellectual property and will do whatever it takes to not violate that trust.
I don't think it's appropriate to plug my latest link here, but I uploaded a post this morning about photo plagiarism and how to find the real source in just a few minutes and a few clicks of the mouse!
I see no problem linking to another of your posts, especially when you are answering directed questions and trying to help. Again, thank you I'll search it out.
I'm with @citizenzero. since you are helping discussion and not just advertising its all good and frankly helpful :)
If you are talking about cheetah it does sometimes mess up. That is the thing about a bot, it cannot determine the minor things that may decide about posts that are in grey area.
Thanks!
Great points to bring up @michaeldavid. This is awesome discussion to help improve our community. I think like others have said, we are slowly working out the kinks but bringing them to light it best to improve them quicker.
Wonderful comment and you are absolutely correct @bitdollar :)
We will keep it growing.
Great points, can't wait to see the other things you have to say. Resteemed
Wonderful! Thanks for the support!
Check back, it won't be long :)
I will, whales aren't gonna be too happy
Depends on the whales. Many know the issues and want, like us, to fix them as well. My hope is to get us all into an equal standing as far as being heard here. Whales and minnows. Besides if this type of thing pisses whales off it is just further proving that the issues need discussed.
I believe a lot of Steemit's problems will sort itself out once we establish a robust middle class of dolphins.
The way I see Steemit operating in the future when we go mainstream is much like a country. There is always going to be the super rich making money off of the poor, but once the minnows of today actually grow, I believe the power difference will spread out.
hmmm... interesting point to consider.
Something to add would be that if these lower classes (smaller fish) are to only allow it to happen naturally, that natural happening will be that the whales keep making decisions for us. Currently it may not be that obvious the impact of that. Soon it will be.
Thus strengthening the need for discussions that involve fish of all levels. :)
That's a very good point! If we continue to swim with the current nothing will change. Even if we all grow over time, there will always be a very small few making the critical decisions for our ecosystem.
Just how there is a big issue in America with voter turn out, I don't think people realize the importance of voting for witnesses, as well as equal representation on the witness leader board. I think we need a minnow who has been on this platform a long time to run! Or maybe make a rule that anyone in a seat of power has to delegate a certain portion of their steam as a donation to projects that helps grow the community!
True.
Much of the reason this awareness is not there is because it is not easy to find or even known by a massive amount of users. Which is just another topic to get to lol.
Learning anything real about this place takes far more effort than most are willing to put in. Simple human behavior. Again something else that needs discussing. I've opened a can of worms I'm afraid lol.
Yeah I believe you started something that can’t be stopped haha but we need this dialogue!
116 comments so far! Congrats on the post and thank you for getting so many people talking! I think this will spark a new wave of dialogue posts! We should make a tag haha
haha I think i was actually thinking of tags that are issue specific.
I think you are right on both counts. It's already a lot to keep up with. lol
Well I followed you a while back, so I'm looking forward to your next post!
#spiderblogger
This may be true, but isn't the point of what we're doing here to make a better system? One that doesn't subject the masses to control by the wealthy? If that's the vision for this platform Im not interested.
Frankly most if this is way above the heads of new people. I started here a couple days ago because FB got on my nerves. I am clueless about crypto. I can create 5-12 original posts per week and connect with real people. Is there a place here where that is valued. The points-money is secondary to me but interesting. I know there are millions of us who can create who need guidance from the techies and we will create. The rules and numbers are off putting. Someone is going to get rich "mentoring" "shepherding" folks into the system.
Its true, newbies won't know anything about most of this. This is precisely why many issues need to be discussed.
Stick around and much of this will begin to make sense.
There is a major learning curve her so I know just what you mean about it being off putting.
Thanks for joining and thanks for weighing in!
I just figure if I make friends they will teach me.
If someone whose interests were tied to mine told me to buy $100-500 of bitcoin and how to do it. Then told me how to convert it to steem. Then told me when and how to upvote to what bots I would do it. I would hope they made money off of what I did. It would make me trust someone who made money when I did
I can help you with all those things man. No worries. It's a lot at first but once you get it you get it. this is my facebook if you want to chat about it sometime. :)
direct message is weird here too lol
I guess I need to get back on Facebook. I shut it down cause they got on my nerves. :) do I need to buy bitcoin? Thanks brother
yea that's the best way to start. If we talk on fb I can get you all going on the right track :) Or if you have another way to talk is good to.
I've got to find a minute and get the fb back up. They want me to submi some kind of ID to prove I'm real
Dm is extremely weird on here ah swear
It really is not user friendly. lol
Should seek out #thealliance, they'll take care of ya :)
Can you elaborate on #thealliance?
yea man we are a group of non like minded individuals from many walks of life and places in the world that all produce good content and support each other here on the platform as allies or family. look at @thealliance, @killerwhale, @steemitcomics, @sneaky-ninja, plus the tag #thealliance to check out some of our members posts.
I've used @sneaky-ninja for upvoting one time..
So how do I become a part of #thealliance ?
I have been trying to find a way to help weight numbers more than single whales, but anything I think of would just encourage alt accounts and not really accomplish anything solid.
Can you elaborate on what you mean?
I am a fairly new user, but when I see a post with hundreds of votes and only a few dollars compared to a post that is worth much more because I whale jumped in, it doesn't seem fair. However, I can't think of a solution that wouldn't just encourage/reward an individual having multiple accounts and spreading power between. None of the solutions I can think of really do anything but complicate Steemit by creating many more accounts without removing any power from whales.
I see what you mean now. This is true. There are even services you can buy for like 2 steem to get 80+ little upvotes lol.
This goes hand in hand with what @nextgen622 means about altering the distribution of rewards.
All the two dollar post I've seen with 200+ votes are bought bot votes that really aren't worth anything to begin with. I've used them, I know. Legitimate engaging 200+ voters will assuredly get you at least 10$ every time from my experience...more now since SBD is in an awesome place.
Well said bro. you are totally right!
I went thru that link you posted for etiquette and nowhere in it did I see "don't upvote your own posts". First time I ever heard that was today when I find out steem cleaners is flagging for that. Good or bad whatever, it's the fact I have never heard of this until now. A site where people sell votes and have bot armies frowns on self votes. But there are no actual rules we are at the mercy of whales.
Exactly! Which is one of my very next topics. I actually almost led with it. There is actually a check box every time you make a post or comment that says Upvote post. It is a clear invitation to upvoting your own post or comment.
Upvoting your own post when it is good content that people want to see? Great and perfectly valid. Upvoting a garbage post to make a quick buck? I can see how people can get irritated with that. But if people get irritated they can flag! If enough users decide a behavior is bad and punish that behavior, it'll go away.
And that is just it isn't it? Where is the line? The site has not defined any. Many of the garbage posts you speak of could be a person trying to make a quick buck, and many could simply be someone that is no good at making a worthwhile post or simply does not understand that they are supposed to (and are they?). Then does it become a judgement or critique of how good a post is? I'm not sure that is what is steemit is meant to be any more than it was meant to be filled up with spammy crap.
Beyond that though, as a social site, we should really be used to posts that are worthless. If you look at facebook or any other sites, you will see people sharing the most ridiculously worthless things. It's sort of the nature of it.
When it comes right down to it, it is your voting power and you are free to use it how you see fit. Even if that is in a way that does not fit etiquette of the site.
Like you say, someone can flag it if they don't like it. Which of course raises a world of other issues I'll be posting about down the line.
Thanks for joining the discussion!
I've noticed that in pursuit of the sbd, people have resorted to using zap, and posting crap posts. It seems that great content has slowly started disappearing.
Two of the big whales that have downvoted people have different reasons why they did it. In one case, the whale in question was bullying a content creator because he didn't like her. It didn't have anything to do with her content, that I could tell. It was more like a personal vendetta.
In the second case, it was because the whale was concerned about the rewards pool and didn't think that certain types of content should be on Steemit.
It leads to the question of what content does belong on steemit. That debate is still ongoing.
I have seen this as well.
Yea, it is continuing. I'm hoping to bring it more out in the light so the majority can see it as well. :)
Damn right.
Thanks!
@steemcleaners doesn't flag for just upvoting your own post. There is something else going on there... like spamming and upvoting the spam or a myriad of other scamming that goes on across the platform while people are trying to make a quick buck instead of being functioning members of the community.
@sadkitten downvotes comment votes. I think there are/were more cat/kitty bots that do also.
4 that I'm aware of, plus the little army that one dude has.
there's cat bots! @goldenarms
This is a new one on me. I don't believe that Steemcleaners is flagging for simply Upvoting your own posts, because when you create a post, the capability is there and others have written about how important it is to do it. I believe they may be flagging those who are Upvoting their own multiple very cryptic comments!
Comment votes are downvoted by @sadkitten and I believe a couple more kitty bots.
I didn't know about that bot. I have never Upvoted my own comment, but when I see all the garbage comments with loads of votes and quality responses languishing, it makes me wonder about how fair the system really is. I saw a post the other day where someone highlighted a person who was really abusing the Upvoting of his own comments which consisted only of one or 2 words.
Yea, i know what you mean. The real issue is that if there is not a clear set of rules governing it then it is basically the site saying it is ok. Then, since the site is saying it's ok, it makes it questionable for larger accounts to be downvoting it. Kind of a catch 22 of sorts.
But whales should decide a lot, if not everything. Isn't that the concept of PoS, which this Blockchain is based on?
I think you should not mix Steem and Steemit in one topic.
I'm not actually. This discussion is about steemit. The blockchain is not the community, we are.
What have whales to do with steemit inc or the steemit condensor?
They don't have to be associated with either to make decisions that affect all of us.
That is a profound insight. If we forget the people part we will become programmed by the ai rather than us programming it.
Yes! You've got that right!
Precicely why I've started this discussion series :)
If you are on discord you can find me there too man, or in steemit chat though I don't use it a lot cause it kinda sucks lol.
The issue is not just steemit. Its the primary issue worldwide. Be spontaneous and human or get trapped in the mirror that is Ai. Not sure what discord is. Working on getting fb back up
My follos and followers pages are blank on the phone and laptop. Do you have any idea what that may be about. I mainly just want to make sure and touch base with new followers and say thanks.
hmmm if you mean her on steemit I've seen that when the internet wasa having trouble loading but it went away once it was back up.
My follows and followers pages are blank on the phone and laptop. Do you have any idea what that may be about. I mainly just want to make sure and touch base with new followers and say thanks.
Hi @michaeldavid, I just stopped back to let you know your post was one of my favourite reads and I included it in my Steemit Ramble. You can read what I wrote about your post here.
If you’d like to nominate someone’s post just visit the Steemit Ramble Discord
Thanks @shadowspub!
This is a great idea to have discussion posts about what concerns us. The problem as I understand it is that money talks as far as whales are concerned. I would love to see good content rise to the top, but it blows me away sometimes to see garbage content make a lot of money. It's not what you know, but who you know. Lol! I'm not sure what the solution is, but I do agree that the whole community should somehow be more involved.
It's very true. This is one key issue to discuss.
E pluribus unum! Lol! One voice!
yes!
I bet we could be as strong as they are if we were united in some way.
Believe it or not this was one part (of many) of why @enginewitty and I have worked so hard forming and growing #thealliance. :)
YAY! Go Alliance! I still have to figure out Delegation for the mothership. I'll need to Google it and see what the best way to do it is, as i keep reading different things, but this is another topic!
Sneaky Ninja Attack! You have been defended with a 48.42% vote... I was summoned by @michaeldavid! I have done their bidding and now I will vanish...Whoosh
This post has received gratitude of 6.59 % from @appreciator thanks to: @michaeldavid.
thanks It is beautiful
Thanks!
LMAO daphuk?
lmao
if you aren't part of the problem you are part of the solution or...
how did that go?
lmfao
LMAO exactly man
hello, i will so glad if u add me in ur steemvoter
hello, i will so glad if u add me in ur steemvoter