In all my time at Steemit, it is now that I am the most uncertain about its future and the vision I had planned for my place within it. It was always a bit of a long shot but the odds are decreasing but, this doesn't mean they are non-existent. In some ways, I am glad this is happening now as Steem is still in its infancy.
In uncertainty is where life is really lived and the most valuable of it is when what is uncertain is the concept of the future itself. What I mean by this is that when we have our plans questioned heavily by circumstance we have the chance to step back, take stock and reevaluate our positions. Perhaps that is what I am doing now.
In no uncertain terms, the bidbots (at least in their current form) are the single largest threat to the community and if something isn't done, they will kill it. You might not care too much if you are a bidbot operator since you will make a pretty penny (if you own your own stake) and when it fails (due in large part to you), you will move on and justify your actions as "Lucky, you made it out with profit." For those using the bidbots however, I hope you have enough to retire on or your content is good enough that it can survive another platform.
If Steemit does fail, that will not be the end of this type of platform but, it may be the end of a decentralized version as a successful decentralized community requires members who self-govern for community development. That hasn't happened here yet and may never as greed overpowers community in the hierarchy of values. The next versions will take lessons from Steemit and likely say no to decentralization.
Funny isn't it? The thing that drew so many people onto the platform to begin with is probably going to be the nail in the coffin for the platform itself. Instead of using the decentralization to build a strong and equitable community, they use it to take all they can for individuals. Maybe the ability to maximize individual profits, not the distribution for community strength, was the real draw card for them and their pockets are never full enough.
The next platforms to come will solve many of the problems here but, don't expect users to have any control over it. Don't even expect you yourself to be able to earn at all. The next platforms will be monetized versions of the old where the ones who make the money are the already famous stars and those who are willing to sell themselves out for money and act in accordance with guidelines or, be demonetized. They will attract the masses but for the most part, the same old people will earn and just like the centralized/privatized bidbots, the owners will take the lion's share.
But, here is the uncertainty still, that final nail is not yet in the coffin, there is still a lot to hope for but, that hope swings on the community pulling together including the people who have the power to make real changes. It will be in these uncertain times that will make or break Steemit, not the times when everything seems like it will work out.
It is in the uncertainty that change actions can be taken to rebuild the foundations to weather storms and take advantage of future values. It just isn't happening now. To get it to happen people would need to take that big step back to really think about what they want and see if that is actually where we are headed. I think most will find that the future being created on this time line isn't going to be one where they are flourishing.
Our actions are no different here than the actions of past generations, of past millennia. Actions that continually lead to extremes in wealth and poverty. Actions that inevitably lead to system failure and collapse. That is why so many people ended up at Steemit in the first place, the outside systems are collapsing.
For the most part, you don't see the wealthy of the real-world buying in to Steem do you? No, they are the downtrodden, the shunned, the social outcasts who were failing in a system that didn't accommodate them adequately. They come in here and what do they do? Act the same as the oppressors on the outside at the first opportunity they get.
It is to be expected though as they have learned their behaviours like monkeys in a cage being hosed for trying to get the banana. Socialized to think that the only way to get ahead in life is to get rich by making others poor. The actions of governments, bankers and rent-seeking middlemen the world over. They are acting like programmed robots.
The irony.
They don't seem to understand that this learned behaviour is the control mechanism, they are never going to be free acting on what they have learned. It is through this behaviour that those in power continue to maintain and grow their positions, continue to win. It is CERTAIN.
The only way to break that system is to understand their manipulations and wear the cost of changed behaviour in the short term for long term benefits. The problem is that crypto people are not long-term thinkers, they are profit seekers. They are not generally hard workers, they are looking for easy paths to buy a Lamborghini. They are not community orientated, they want to get rich from a keyboard through a monitor.
And, it is these people running a social platform?
The reason that the other platforms have been so popular is that they focused on the people. No, it wasn't for those people's benefits but they understood the power of relationships and hacked human wiring to manipulate the majority into getting what they want. Assholes to be sure but, clever assholes.
Here, the same actions are taking place but they have forgotten to tie the community to the platform in the same way, the incentive was access to the pool but, that is dwindling away.
I have a question: What happens to the value of Steem if there are only bidbots and buyers. If everyone else that doesn't use or want to use migrated to another platform or just went back to Facebook, Instagram and all the other crap places that offer decent functionality?
Tell me, who is going to prop up the price of Steem? The pool becomes a pool of true monopoly money as no one on the open market is really going to want it unless, they are going to use it to buy bidbots. In that scenario, content is useless, ALL content. but, the system itself can't function.
It would be like me giving you 70 dollars and next week you give me 100 back but keep the 70 too. Tell me, where does that 70 come from? The pool right? Yes, but that pool needs to be backed by something otherwise it is just printing money, like banks. But, with no one to buy that added 70? The system can't work that way. It requires demand on that added value otherwise, the value decreases as the volume on the market increases and soon, nothing.
The only reason the bidbots can operate now is because there is a majority that don't use them and a sliver that do. the way to stop them is either no one use them (preferrable), or *everyone use them but never actually buy SBD for them. Just use what comes out of the pool. They will return losses of course so get prepared to wear it.
The other way to stop the bidbots is of course just abandon the platform altogether which many are doing. I talked about not onboarding anyone anymore as I just can't support them nor can I justify why to even start considering the pay to play culture and growing divides. The question of scam comes up and I no longer have an answer to give them.
Now I am trying to focus on keeping worthy people here instead. I don't care about those who leave because it is all too hard, good riddance. I care about those who are willing to deal in uncertainty and take some risks.
Most of the operators of bidbots aren't risk-seekers, they are rent-seekers and no matter their justifications, they are no better than the corrupt politicians and loan managers living off the interest of other people's money. Toxic members of any community. The ones who create the divides and collapse the systems in time. It is only their ability to brainwash the masses into supporting their habits again that they can move through generations repeating the actions.
There is a lot of uncertainty to come but, as far as I see it there is also a lot of certainty. The uncertainty is whether we as individuals can change our behaviours to improve the community. The certainty is that the current actions are going to destroy the possibilities for an equitable and ethical decentralized future.
At least at Steemit.
Taraz
[ a Steemit original ]
Excellent post Tarazkp - I have been concerned by the bidbots for quite some time - general voting bots too for that matter. You have given this Knight something to think about - perhaps it is time we did something about it.
I am... SirKnight!
Something definitely needs to be done. Let my know your thoughts if you come up with something.
Interesting post, I have so much to say about it. I actually want to think it out and take my time in replying. It's late here, but I also felt like I wanted to acknowledge the post now.
I'm looking forward to read that or just talk it over.
there needs to be at least some open discussion about this. It would be nice if some of the witnesses actually joined in too.
I have to run anyway but I welcome you back later.
Well, I suppose there's always its usefulness as a currency....
Still, the question of scam is easily answered. Plenty of space for someone to come in with no investment and earn on comments and networking. I honestly don't know why scam was ever a question. Even when the big drop comes and people leave, I hope to be part of the second wave that can set a better standard for the platform. Or at least help whoever has a better vision for how things should be.
In terms of bid bot usage, I doubt anyone is spending money to buy SBD to fit into the bot system. As you well noted earlier, the returns are actually not good for a buyer, and pretty damn good for the seller (except if you consider that they could get more if they self voted). As the first scenario is not likely, I'm actually secretly hoping that the second option you mentioned which saturates the pool so that it becomes almost useless, and discourages its use altogether.
I have to say, if you look at the bot usage awhile back vs now, even the trending page has improved considerably from what I remember. I can only hope we do even more to clean it up further, but you know what? I went into the trending page the other day with the intent of flagging something, and ended up not doing anything because it all the posts looked to have a good amount of engagement and was not obviously spam. It may not have been been worthy of such a high amount but it wasn't flag worthy. Maybe I'm too nice. I'm thinking about flagging it still though. Maybe when I'm of a lousier mood.
This leads me to option 3: tell everyone to reserve one out of their ten 100% votes to just flag anything on trending that doesn't deserve it. That should discourage low quality bot usage also!
Me either.
I estimate the returns at about 90% of a self-vote. No content required though and none of that pesky social uproar.
That is a reason to flag. (check my post on 'worth it or not') but, it comes out of the pool. a five hundred dollar nothing bought post could have given 100 authors 5 dollars each or 50, 10. Instead, the value goes to one that isn't worth so much and the SBD to a bidbot.
Again, there is another option in one of my new posts. :P
People with the highest stake has their voice to say. It's really up to them whether they want to protect their investment or not as hold the decisive powers.
it is more than protect their investment as for many, they have invested less than people assume. Some, not much at all considering the returns they are getting now.
yeah, but what and who invested is really irrelevant right now. Everyone (sane and reasonable) wants the best return, no matter what he invested.
Great post! I only disagree with one thing. The problem, in my mind, isn't decentralization, it's a flaw in steem's code / implementation. You have to look at this all through the lens of game theory. Right now, the rules of the system incentivize the abuse of the reward pool. These are problems that can be fixed, I've written many posts suggesting ways that would incentivize good behavior instead. (It's been a while so you'd have to dig through my older posts)
Anyway, the rest of your post is spot on.
You see the problem though don't you with that? It is engineering society again. Perhaps it is inevitable and i do understand incentivising 'good' behaviour but I also see where it will again lead, like it has so many other times. Of course, it will be a slow progression to actually change this world, if we don't destroy ourselves first.
I see your point. I look at it more as creating a system that is resistant to abuse by design. It is a similar problem that democracy is having now. We could just have a king /dictator (centralized) that could make sure everything runs smoothly, the problem is that as soon as the king goes rouge there is not much you can do to stop them. Where a decentralization of power is more resistant to corruption but the system has to be designed very carefully to make it last as long as possible. I will say that steem is one of the best examples I have seen but there are still some loopholes that need tightening as you pointed out.
This, precisely, is why exporting democracy is futile and why it took root in the former socialist bloc so poorly. It has to grow organically from the people.
Partly that, and partly that 'shock doctrine' is not very good at manifesting anything other than oligarchic fascism.
That's true, too.
A very interesting read. I get the part about bid operators being rent-seekers and that makes absolute sense.
Ya, this is a much bigger issue than most people think, vote bots really have no place if you ask me, the only thing I actually like them for is when other users use them to reward someone else. But this could be done with simple transfers...
I'm still not sure what can be done about them...
I have no idea either.
I have suggested many times that any post that has a bid bot used on it should go to the promotion section. Not trending.
It will just be hidden. without them, 70 percent of trending is circlejerks.
i know.
:(
that sucks
Which is exactly why bid bots are not really the problem... at all.
as scams get uncovered, new ones start. it is like hydra.
Lacking the ability to control or influence others, I must keep my own space clean. Still... I have much to learn. Thanks for the insight.
best not to get involved in some things.
Hello Taraz. Another good post. Where did the bot's come from and why were they allowed. Unfortunately greed finds it's way everywhere. My answer is just to boycott them or ban them. Boycotting won't work because the ones who use them will just carry on. So it leaves banning them.
bots have always been here but bidbots started after the last hardfork (19) as it made it easy to delegate and calculate. It is also when paid delegation started.
I've started to unfollow those who use bid bots to boost their posts that appear in my feed. I trawl through new from time to time, and vote with what little stake I have on the platform.
I flag spammers and scammers as I encounter them, yet none of the people running the bid bots seem to care about these things, in my view.
It might be extreme, but as far as I know, I also don't vote for witness anyone who operates a bid bot. These people aren't propagating the chain.
I actually think that witnesses should identify as operators/delegators/supporters of bidbots. Perhaps then they will be forced to remove their 'Cone of Silence' between them.
You can check. Its all on the Blockchain. Using the tools at steemworld.org you can see who is delegating to who. 2/30 witnesses (I've checked 5 so far) delegate to bid bots. They're getting their witness vote from me revoked today. :)
I've now got six witness votes ready for the taking... After going through all my top 30.
some delegate through other accounts to potentially or have something to do with the development teams
I was rather shocked by your post today. All the people in my network on Steemit are not the kind of people you describe in your post. I want to confess, I'm pretty naive when it comes to this, because I have never used a bot or something like it, but I do hope there are enough people like you, and exyle, ezzy, rea, lordofthruth, ericvancewalton, meesterboom, ahb12345, and all the others who really have the best in mind for the community and not only for themselves.
In your mind, what can people like me do, to prevent the downfall of Steemit?
There are many good people here but a great deal of the problems are generated by a very small percentage. I am naive to many of the working and algorithms but, there are obvious problems going on.
This is what I am trying to discover.
Well, I guess it's time for those of us willing to stick around to roll up our sleeves and see what can be done.
Going to require some thinking outside the square.
Where do most people hear about steemit and steem? For me it was word-of-mouth. But there have to be ways that the vested interests here reach new potential investors that aren't on steemit yet. Where does Steem.inc generate it's media and social media buzz? These are the places we need to be, telling the truth about the system, and generally making a nuisance of ourselves until someone notices.
It is nearly all word of mouth now yet I hear they are starting to market soon. This is one of the issues as for the most part, it is the user base onboarding but it seems to mostly be the low to mid range doing the most.
Before they start actively marketing we could aim to influence the conversation. What you would really want to do is try to do something that gets on the first page of a google search on steemit or steem, which is actually pretty difficult - unless you take a short-cut and take an interest in editing the relevant wikipedia article.
Once the social media-based marketing starts, it would actually get easier to get a message out as we can piggyback on the coverage that they are paying for. This requires a bit of coordination, but it's not that difficult.
It's not necessarily that we want to dissuade people from joining, it's that we want new people to ask the same questions we now are (or at least be aware of them), so that the 'powers that be' have to provide answers in order to keep attracting new users and new capital.
On that note, how do SMT's figure into all of this? Can they get new money coming into the system without addressing the concerns we've talked about here?
I think this is the same issue we have in the real world, as it were. Even if we had the chance to change things, if suddenly all the world order disappeared and a voice said 'start again', if we had the real opportunity to build a new, we'd build the same thing.
it's all we know.
And I fear we may be too far gone to change now. Bu despair won't help, will it?
If we agree now that it's too late, we're nailing the coffin ourselves. So, it's people like you, who see things differently and are aware of these mistakes to act, to speak up. :)
Your post is full of excellent points and questions of which I do not have the answers. Resteemed!
If bidbots are not actually profitable for the buyer, why are you afraid they’ll kill the platform? They’re essentially advertising tools, and ads cost money. If people are stupid enough to pay to advertise their shitposts, the same people will quickly run out of their funds and stop doing it. The rest of us can still create and profit from the platform IMHO.
No, they are not. They don't increase engagement or eyes on much at all.
Over 40 percent of the pool is locked up by bidbots and this is increasing. Almost no new users coming in have access to that. It goes to only 1.5% of all votes. Those bidbot delegators are no longer looking at other content as they once did, they are blind voting. 10,000 odd people are coming a day but the effective pool is getting smaller. The SBD going to th bidbot operators is 30% of all SBD payouts which the operators can use to increase their stake and increase their selling activities. It is creating a value gap similar to what is happening in the real world, the real world with a crumbling economic system. If there are only bots and buyers, the platform collapses,( that should tell something) as it is just a market place and Steem is just another coin.
But who’s going to keep on bidding if it’s not profitable?
The bidbot operators and a few at the very top will always make profit.
this might help visualise a little:
https://steemit.com/steemit/@tarazkp/bidbots-and-you-a-foretelling
Understand that the operators will make profit but if a bidbot is not profitable for me as a user (and it’s not, we know that) then what incentive do I have to use it, other than push my post to the trending page? In which case it would be stupid of me to spend loads of money on a shitpost to push it to the trending page and then not get my money worth in the end...
Thanks for the link though! I read it but I must disagree with your numbers - because majority of the time the bidding just isn’t profitable. You can even see ROI after curation in the bidbots “Details” section. And it’s almost always negative.
imagine that only the top ten bidders get a positive return and all the rest lose out. Even if al the rest stop using it, the game continues on. Essentially haejin and ranchrelaxo are proving how it works without selling the vote publicly. Pretty much the same deal though by the looks.
Well, I’m certainly learning a lot here. Thank you! I haven seen the war against haejin and indeed it’s annoying to see people like him misusing the platform but as long as this option is built into the existing system, I’m not sure what can stop jerks like him. And I know that’s your argument... I just feel that there’s enough good guys in this community that will fight for preserving the good things it can offer... let’s see!
I would like to ask you a bit about,
How to be a good steemit so that our articles can be appreciated, thanks
remind me on another post or find me at steemit.chat
At the moment, not many people's work is being appreciated so I am unsure to be honest.
okay, thanks for your response, i'm very happy
Sir, the platform is still in beta and hopefully, it will change with time and will sustain itself. No worries and no hurries.
The foundations and behaviours are built and developed now. It being in Beta is exactly why it needs to be discussed now.
You were one of the first voices of inspiration that I encountered when I first joined Steemit and I am sad to see you have lost some of this hope you may have had.I have never used bidbots to my knowledge ( when I was never I may have tried something without understanding what it was).. so I have not fully followed their effect/ news about them/ etc. Makes sense though.I had been on a brief hiatus and am just coming back to posting and reading on Steemit again in the past few days. This post is just depressing as I'd been having hope again. So many conflicting opinions on steemit's future. You really think it's not bouncing back?
That is the uncertainty isnt it and what actually needs to be discussed.
Good to see you maintaining that upbeat mood!
😂
Patience...(and Valium)
;)
I have been adamant against using bidbots for a while now. I was initially misled into using them a LONG time ago by @enazwahsdarb. His justification is it shows others you are serious about blogging on Steemit.
I soon came to the realization that this mindset was diametrically opposed to what curation is intended to accomplish along with presenting a myriad of other issues such as bid bot abuse (which I have been striving against but it is an uphill battle with the rise of the many negligent bot owners). Bid bots have effectively hijacked and undermined the process under the guise of "promoting yourself" and/or "advertisement".
As @nonameslefttouse also affirms, these sort of paid programming has a place. The promoted tab! Some people complain that hardly anyone looks at the promoted tab. I say
Exactly!
Most come to Steem for original and interesting content. Not the narcisstic drivel that usually fills trending and not for advertisements!
Users are so absorbed with that little number next to their name that they don't care what it costs in terms of long term viability of the platform.
I have a few things planned to combat the problem but am questioning whether it is worth it to work for such a mostly self-destructive and laughably short-sighted community.
Further develop @flagawhale project to deter blatant junk post reward manipulation and put the spotlight in manipulators.
Design front end with capability to filter out bid-botted posts, collusive voters and excessive self voters to weed out selfish users.
Push for drastic changes to the reputation system. It's broke as hell and gives spammers a lot of leeway due to the limitations on downvotes from users of lesser rank. High rep scammers are difficult to address. The more stake they accumulate by cheating, the more difficult this will become. We need more high rep, high stake users with backbone to really address them but too many are not willing to sacrifice their VP to protect this platform. Damn shame.
I got some $ sitting in Coinbase ready to move into crypto once the bleeding stops. Two months ago Steem really felt like a sure thing, but then the pool rape, Haejin nonsense, and Bidbot proliferation happened and I'm just not sure if I should invest more or wait to see what happens when Dan decides to try and compete on the EOS platform.
Here's the thing, it's easier to cheat than it is to punish cheating. People don't like authority until they need it to nail someone who is cheating them. To cheat, all I have to do is do it. To punish cheating, someone needs to see it, take action against it or report it to someone with authority to, and hope that we have enough authority to punish the cheating at a level that prevents it in the future, or even just enough to make it not worth their attempt to do so.
Steem would work if rep actually mattered and flagging wasn't taboo here so we could actually crowd mod. But as it stands, cheating wins because there is almost no incentive not to. I can buy votes and circle jerk all day because you probably won't even see me do it, and if you do, you probably can't do much about it. At the end of the day, a very average steemian such as myself just wants to have positive interactions with people, not wade into the shitposts and start flagging. Modding is WORK. Expecting decentralized modding to be effective is pretty foolish.
We've made a dent in Haejin's earnings with @fulltimegeek's quest in conjunction with @flagawhale's decentralized abuse fighting initiative. About $26k STU recovered from the reward pool.
Also, check out my other project @steemflagrewards. We are making progress but our efficacy really depends on community support. These projects are intended to incentivized downvotes with liquid rewards until a Steem code based solution can be arrived at.
Hopefully, people stop supporting worthless trending bid botted posts and support more decentralized moderation initiatives.
sir,what are your long term goals here and what you are expecting exactly.
originally to be part of and help to build a better and more equitable economic model. Now... not sure. I have very few expectations when it comes to the actions of humanity.
I think steemit will survive and have a place in the future of decentralised social media, but it might not retain the number 1 spot. With ONO, U Network and the EOS based one being built by BlockOne, competition is about to arrive big time. It will be interesting to see which of these offers what unique selling points. For many, post rewards might not be the driving force of adoption. Privacy might be a bigger concern.
Privacy may be a big selling point for some, transparency for others.
Lovely post here. I would really appreciate it if you all check out my blogs and please upvote. Trying to get a hang of steemit, I am new. Thank you.
It really is not on them that they want to protect them as investing or as abusive power as it is kept
Saya sangat setuju dengan pendapat Abang @tarazkp, bahwa kita harus berani memilih. Apakah tetap berada dalam penindasan dengan platform yang bersistem terpusat/diprivatisasi, atau pindah ke platform yang bersistem terdesentralisasi meskipun berhadapan dengan resiko kegagalan. Stay on Steemit
while i may not grasp everything you write i feel that this platform is becoming a bit too capitalistic as the bigger fishes here get bigger while the smaller fishes stay small for a longer period of time. i still have hope for this platform though. i see more people aware of how unfair the distribution is and that can make a huge difference
Nice post
This is what I also fear that maybe one day Steemit will collapse. What if people lose their interest in steemit due to these bidbots and blind voting? Will the community prosper without interactions?
The platform (cyber) is acting to what is also happening in the real world. The poor are oppressed and the powerful always remain in power. The future of steemit is very uncertain. Hopefully things will change!
Great commentary on Steemit, as there are many different kinds of user profiles, there are as many perspectives on the future of the Social Media Token project. Steemit poses an incredible potential for the evolution of social media connecting people from all over the world, from various backgrounds and disciplines. Places like #Steemgigs and user-led crowdsourcing like @Steembasicincome give me hope that the current state of uncertainty, as you say, isn't forever.
I cannot admit to an extensive experience with Steemit, as I was introduced recently by word-of-mouth and then became a contributor to a now-defunct guild (@earthnation), I've used bid-bots when promised returns faltered. Still, there's plenty to make of it for ourselves, more so than that of Facebook or even Myspace ever offered. My artwork has found its way to the feeds of hundreds of other fellow artists and illustrators, so I'm grateful for the reblogging bots and spotlight feeds. Since joining @Steemauto and @smartsteem, from the beginning, I understood for this whole thing to work, we've got to share the wealth and build each other up. The real interest in advancements made in ETH blockchain technology and interconnectivity in the background that will unchain STEEM from its fishbowl domain and into the vast Internet ocean. Savvy bloggers, journalists, weekend writers, even artists can self-publish their works here and because of Proof-of-Brain validate some semblance of value, at least champion a sustainable, passive income stream from producing and sharing original content online is enough to commit to Steemit.
Yes, keep your head up and forward, as we're here now forging tomorrow.
Thank you @tarazkp for sharing!
So, no one use them, or everyone use them, but not buy sbd(not sure what that means - sounds like they wouldn't really be using them) or abandon the platform. None of this sounds like an actual solution for this platform to me. I agree that the bidbots are a problem and that the platform would be better off, if no one used them. I do also think talking about it is a step in the right direction.
My suggestion has been to mark the posts that are promoted with the paid bots as ads, similar to the way google does it. Talking about it is a good move because I feel that if whales where thinking long-term they would not sell their vote for short term profit but build much bigger profits in the longer term by helping to build the platform in any number of ways. This would be going back to the old culture and moving away from this greed driven one that we have devolved into.
As you pointed out, long term thinking does not seem to be a common strategy for many of the later coming crypto enthusiasts. That's why marking them as ads seems to me to be the best solution, I mean that's what it is. Putting them in the promoted tab that no one really pays attention to, would maybe be even better. Then people would maybe be less likely to give them their attention or support them. What do you think about these suggestions? Do you have any plausible solutions?
intersting post,Good to see you maintaining that upbeat mood!
i like your philosophy
good thinking,creative mind
nice post.. hi friend esteem.. follback and upvote me thanks for u ...
@romyjaykar Its people like u that contribute to the fall back of the commnunity, how hard ot it to contribute towards the discussion something worthy an upvote? Jeez.😑
yes.. thanks u ..