RE: There is a revolution going on and you are part of it! (Maybe not even knowing it, until you read this article...)

[chkoenig]

I still see some challenges with steem or in particular steemit

1. Bots - buying upvotes is manipulation, but nearly everyone does is because nobody - at least no central party - can't stop it. There has to be a way to stop that in a decentralised way.
2. Laws - like the one from Germany that you must delete "illegal content" including hate speech and stuff within 24 hours. On a blockchain you simply can't delete it, because everything is immutable. Well, you can edit it the first 7 days but that's it. That could face fines up to 50 Million €.
3. Business - You have to register a Business if you use Steemit because you generate income. At least in Germany, I don't know how this works in other countries.
4. Whales - already covered by @sayee here in the comments

I really like steemit, but these are challenges they face which can lead to big problems, especially those with the government. Therefore, I like hangig around here reading nice articles like this one but I don't invest in it. It's too risky imho.

And a last point: New members like me having a really hard time to earn money with it without investing. And I really don't want to invest. And I think 95+% of new members won't invest, especially those who come from facebook or similar platforms. They don't understand blockchain. They don't put $5000 into SP that that upvotes are worth more. They come because they see: "Hey some people getting $100+ for a single post. I want that too!". As soon as they realise that's not possible they stop using it - not all but many.

I just wanted to share some negative aspects to think about. @atmosblack keep up the great articles. I enjoy reading every single one of them.

Comments

[atmosblack]

Thanks for your wonderful comment and the valid points you are bringing up!

• Bots are a problem and also an opportunity. Yes, I also would like to live in a world, where bots are not that important. At the moment they are - especially for newbies. Without them, you won´t earn anything at all, because whales don´t care and "good content" is not that important to them. Luckily the minnows and dolphins of today, will become whales in the future and have the chance to stick to their higher standards of value and rewarding post, without misusing their power.
• Laws are also a problem - espeically in Germany where there are very restricted laws and everything that would allow true freedom is considered a criminal behaviour. Unfortunately we can´t expect Steemit to sort thing out, so we have to find our own path to deal with it.
• Business is a similar point, but as long as you are not converting STEEM to fiat under a year and hold your STEEM longer than a year, your rewards are treated like an investment and dividends (like other investments, shares etc.). If you are cashing out, it won´t be different to any other blogger or YouTuber out there, who is earning rewards from their posts and videos. So Steemit is not different there....

---

Regarding your last point I totally agree. It´s simply a fact, that 90% of social media users are passive and don´t want or are not able to produce content at all. You have this situation with every Facebook page, where 5% are contributing regularly and another 5% from time to time and the rest being just passive consumers that may hit "like" sometimes but mostly be quite.
That´s why I think, we shouldn´t market STEEM as an income opportunity to the masses. I wrote an article about this here
We will need the 90%, but we shouldn´t make them believe, that the main reason for being here is to earn money - it´s simply not true.

[chkoenig]

One more thing: It's hard to find good content. A lot of people (probably most of them are bots) are copy & paste articles from the internet and try to earn money. You read a new article on cointelegraph and within minutes there are like 10 new posts on steemit. This should be censored as duplicate way harder.

[atmosblack]

Thanks for your comment! I´m busy at the moment, but I will reply to you tomorrow!