This will be little different compared to anything I have ever posted. When I am talking about "Trending" , I specifically mean the https://steemit.com/trending/ landing page and with "All Tags". These is where a new steemian, or a casual observer might land. Now, before you start arguing where a new steemian might land please hear me out. I am saying you are correct, there are many other places a new steemian can land, and so can a casual observer. All I am saying, a person "can" land at the front page of Steemit, which is likely its trending page (or he/she can click on the "Trending" button.
So if we agree at least some people see Steemit for the first time at the landing page, then for our own sake it matters. It matters a lot what we see on that page. Personally speaking, I visit "All Tags" quite a lot. I have seen it evolve through time. Before, the latest HF, it was littered with bid-botted posts, Adsactly's wikipedia knock-offs and whole bunch of other junk. Anyone who saw them, used to get so repulsive that they never saw it again.
After the latest HF in August 2019, for the first time after a long time, it become meaningful to look at Trending again. There were a variety of post begin to appear there, as it should be. It was such an welcome change for both existing and new users alike!
Then, there were two projects, both good projects, burnposts and SBD Potatoes, and their posts begins to appear a lot on trending. I must say, that they are both good initiatives for the steem economy, but those posts were devoid of any content. If anyone reading this is not familiar with those project, you can look them up. They are not particularly difficult to find (that is the problem actually). Since "Trending" is directly proportional to amount of up-vote a post received and those two projects initially received a lot of up-votes, and were uncapped, they will always be on trending. That does make our landing page look unappealing for both new and existing users.
That leads to the question "Can we fix it?" Yes, we can! And we did. Somewhat.... its a work in progress. A few of us talked about it say 3-4 weeks back, and thought well; we can complain about it, or we can do something about it. We decided to do the second. Actually its @joshman's brain wave, I just support the initiative along with many others with somewhat substantial stake in this DPOS blockchain.
There is nothing to join. Nothing to do for the general public. Just enjoy the better looking landing page. I am thankful to the project managers for both burnpost and sbd potatoes for being patient and listening to me. They have both actively suggested initiatives so that both of those posts are fewer and hopefully does not trend as much.
At the same time @joshman spearheaded in finding visually stunning content that has length, breadth and depth. With the help of manual voting from large stakeholders those stunning posts were boosted them into trending. It was as simple as that. The result is the "trending" page screenshot that I took at 2PM GMT on Jan30, 2020.
I don't know about you, but I am quite satisfied with this. I like to thank everyone who supported this.
PS. Please note; that I didn't put any project link or people's name, as it is not really needed. This is a voluntary effort and self-sustained. You don't really have to do anything. Just do your own thing and generate quality content for us to consume. No debate is needed on what is "quality". As that is not the purpose of this effort.
The main trending page is always going to be a work in progress. This is definitely a step in the right direction. I want to thank all involved in helping to make this happen.
You are welcome. We try to do our best.
Also my goal is to answer to every comment as much as my time permits. More I comment, more downvote I will get and more I will drain the DV mana of the spammers. Its a win-win situation.
Thank you for your behind the scenes work to help put Steem in a better place in the future 😁
You are welcome Asher. Often time I can accomplish a lot more staying behind the scene, but sometime you got to come forward.
Thanks for being an ardent supporter! While trending is important from a landing page perspective, I can't stress enough what I feel are the peripheral benefits. These include providing an aspirational target for potential authors, as well as driving up overall quality on the platform. This makes trending a tool for raising the bar whether people frequent it or not, based on reward incentives alone.
!ENGAGE 25
Solid point about displaying the standard to aspire to to get your name In lights, long may it continue.
Imagine being dumb enough to think this will accomplish anything. I only have pity for you @flysky and @dobartim. For whatever reason, the universe decided to give you double-digit IQs. Who am I to question its will?
and thanks to @steem.ninja for the heal!
Double digit when added together
LMAO
I think that's within the margin of error of being zero!
Now what? @flysky?
Absolutely Josh. Our cumulative goal is to make this platform where people will be afraid to do shitposting. Because there will always be someone watching. In terms of resources, more we can pull better it is for the platform. Having quality posts with $100 payout will give content creators incentive to produce better content with both length and depth. It will be easy to take out spammer and scammers that way.
@joshman you have received
25 ENGAGEfrom @abh12345!View and trade the tokens on Steem Engine.
A little bit at a time is all we can do. Thanks for trying.
You know my ideas quite clearly, as we already spend enough time off the chain. I always thank you for the job you do for us. It is thankless and you don't get any credit for it.
Anytime.
Congratulations @azircon! You have completed the following achievement on the Steem blockchain and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :
You can view your badges on your Steem Board and compare to others on the Steem Ranking
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word
STOPVote for @Steemitboard as a witness to get one more award and increased upvotes!
Dear @azircon
Interesting choice of topic. I don't even remember last time I visited trending. I'm sure one can find interesting content there - however now I'm kind of moving my entire attention towards upcoming HIVES. Together with few friends we even launched our own community.
It surely helps me with content discovery. More than my own feed or trending page.
However it's clear to me, that new users will end up looking at trending page in the first place. And my belief is that instead of focusing on displayed content - their attention will be fully on posts rewards. Sometimes I wonder what all those new users can think at that moment.
You've such a good point here. I never actually thought about this issue.
Again, solid read. Upvoted already.
enjoy your sunday :)
Yours, Piotr
Why don’t you stop your wallet spam? That will help the community.
Hi @azircon
Is that really all you have to reply to my comment? It made me wonder why did I bother to read your post and spent extra few minutes commenting on it.
Anyway, I will surely not bother you again with sending memos if it does frustrate you so much.
Yours
Piotr
Thanks for the support and thanks for the post !
Did not see this within the first week so I can't upvote but nice initiative and presentation.
Hi
I noticed you downvote me
Why
What is going on here
I don't appreciate downvote to my post
Good your rep is now 2 darling! Do one more comment and I will be able to get it down to negative! Many thanks!