Just as an aside....
As I've been reading the comments I'm reminded of the 'crab bucket mentality'. Crabs in a bucket could all cooperate and get out of the bucket, but rather than cooperate, the crabs that rise up above the others are pulled down by those below them.
Here is a quote from Wikipedia
The analogy in human behavior is claimed to be that members of a group will attempt to negate or diminish the importance of any member who achieves success beyond the others, out of envy, spite, conspiracy, or competitive feelings, to halt their progress
I've heard the analogy used before in reference to how women tend to use a consensus model to reduce competitive friction in choosing mates. The group forms a consenus on what acceptable behavior in pursuit of a mate is, and if any member of the group seeks to move outside the consensus, the other participants drag them down.
Why I mention this is I wonder whether this behavior is a symptom of a consensus model (I believe Steemit could be described as a consensus model).
I don't know know the rights or wrongs of downvoting. I'm leaning towards the ying/yang idea of a balance between the forces of order and chaos. So I like the chaotic element of the downvote. It keeps everyone on their toes. Without any repercussions, would we all really 'just get along'? I don't think so.
Another way to see it might be, that when the downvote is abused, it is out in the open, where we can defend against it. A consensus model needs to have a shaming mechanism, is what I'm trying to say I guess. There has to be a way to ostracize those who don't want to play by the rules.
Whether that is a good or bad thing for Steemit, I'm not really certain. These are my thoughts on what I'm looking at.
Also you can still express such a thing in comments without negatively impacting and cancelling out the rewards of someone else that was genuinely interested in that topic.
It is actually a pretty hostile move. More so because of the currency aspect.
That is true. It is not necessary to escalate to nuclear war at the first infraction. At some stage though, don't you think there will still be a necessity to have that nuclear deterrent?
That actually makes me think of another analogy. A nuclear war has a cost to those who escalate to that level. What is the cost of flagging to the flagger? Could it mean a commensurate drop in reputation? A serial flagger might flag themselves into oblivion.
-edit-
Heh..we would never see the cheetah again. It would mute itself. :-D
I think a FALSE FLAG should get a reputation ding. Yet there is no way to do that currently, and this system is intentionally designed so ideally there is really no such thing as a moderator.
As to cost...
It counts towards their voting percentage for the day, and they get no curation reward, but that is the only cost.
If they are powerful though the cost to the person they flagged can be quite devastating.
The nuclear deterent also makes sense when the actors are similar in strength. It is not so much a deterent when one can swat the other like a fly. :)
Let's try another analogy. :-)
You are in the Wild West. In the street someone pulls a gun on you and fires. Do you shoot back, or do you attempt to negotiate a ceasefire? There are probably a few answers to that and some, none or all of them might be good in any given situation. How are we to judge? We would need to bring in a judge, jury and executioner. That has overheads. People would need to pay taxes to cover those overheads. Do we want that?
It would be simpler to just say that escalating to a flag at any time has a reputation cost. I'd prefer simpler. It's transparent and has a low overhead. We lose some of the nuances of a full trial I guess.
The Crab Bucket example is actually in the Steemit White Paper so I am familiar with it. It is ironic that you came up independently with the same example that Dan put into the White Paper when designing Steem/Steemit.
The whole concept of a consensus mechanism concerns me really. Philosophically, I'm in a place where I'm trying to understand the interplay of masculine and feminine forces in the world. I perceive, perhaps wrongly, that consensus is a tool of the feminine. When I say feminine, I'm not saying women. I'm saying it in the sense of that nurturing, mothering, compassionate part of our culture.
I don't see the masculine element in this model yet. The risk taking, the manipulation of nature (feminine), the aggressive competition.
That might all sound kind of stupid to some people, but I think it will dictate how much utility Steemit will play in my own self interest.
How does that relate to downvoting? Well, downvoting is kind of a masculine thing. It sends a fuck you to the other person. :-) " I have power and I'll do with it what I wish". That is a very aggressive masculine message. I sometimes think we need that. Now having said that, this is all an artificial environment here in Steemit. All the same forces are not in play. So I understand that other unforseen imbalances probably do exist.
Again you can use the comment section to achieve such things. You do not need to physically force your will upon others. I've studied Taoism, Tai Chi Chuan, Qiqong, and even a little bit of Psychology. With that said I don't really give much thought to masculine/feminine any more. I was way into the concept of yin/yang. Balance. I do like the idea of balance, but then again I am not a D&D Druid. I don't really believe we must destroy things because there is too much creation going on. There are CASES where the masculine/feminine approach really has relevance. There are other places where it may not actually improve things.
I do think the masculine/feminine can be used in comments without attack a person.
I guess one way to view this approach is that there are cultures that do believe in yin/yang and practice belief systems that are non-aggressive and still achieve the masculine/feminine dance.
Yet here the flag is more of an aggressive thing. It can have very real impact upon the receiver as it does have monetary weight behind it.
I am NOT trying to bash your statement, it was well thought out. I have this thing going on right now in my head (lately) where I believe it is important to study from and learn from the past, though I also realize that doesn't always mean the past got it right and we should emulate them. I like the idea of trying new things. New things are a risk. They succeed, and they fail. Which will happen is sometimes difficult to know without putting them to the test. Yet I also don't really endorse doing things that we did in the past over and over again and expecting a different outcome. So... I likely reacted to the masculine/feminine statements here with a bit of my OWN current mental bias. It did make me think though, so thank you.