Why is it i only stumble upon you today??!!!
I should have been reading your stuff on the daily since last year! You wrote so well and I can't help but to agree with you, to a degree.
While I believe you do agree that there are certain issues on here that needs tweaking (we havent even reach version 1.0.0 yet for a reason). Spam isnt an issue at all.. as a user.
Maybe it's because Steemit does not have the ability to show only the best stuff on the front page yet, what with the trending page being a joke. Maybe it's because of the frustration of some people who don't know the existence of a bidbot who saw a shitty phone camera picture of a table without context that got upvoted to the high heavens. Maybe it's alot of other things..
Steemit isnt perfect, just like many things around blockchain tech.
But it's the best damn thing for people like us.
While what you say has it's truth. Without user growth steemit can't grow as a platform. And if there is no user growth then what is the value behind steem other than speculation?
I have this problem all too often as someone who introduces people to steemit, i think the fancy term is "community builder". Unless i struck gold and found someone who hustles, less than 1 out of 8 people i've talked to got themselves a steemit account, lower still for those who is still posting stuff on Steemit.
There are truth on both sides... Personally we can just tune out the shit unless one belongs to a subset of steemians who is passionate about wading in shit on the daily. But the platform as a whole must figure out a way to tune away the shit if they are thinking about user growth, which as a content platform is absolutely crucial. Dont forget that everyone who has steem power has a stake on the company and it's in our best interest to strive for the betterment of the platform. We are the investors afterall.
Or maybe a great steem-based 3rd party app comes along and leave steemit in the dust.. I havent found one yet but when i do im more than okay to give away 5% as beneficiary.
The platform is US and all we have to do is pay more attention to the things that are worthwhile. Encourage the right people. Stop bashing everyone just because of a few problems. Things like that.
I said carry your weight. There's so much confusion here, so many little false promises of easy money. I just noticed today, there are people out there who listened to the sales pitch, bought it, delegated away their SP (so now they can't vote for anyone, basically a dead account that can't contribute), then they turn around and BUY the vote from the bots they delegated to. They're literally so confused, someone was able to convince them it's okay to buy some apples, then pay a random stranger each time they'd like to eat one of those apples they already own. How to solve this though in a day and age when so many people can't even admit to making a mistake and feel insulted if you point out how they've done something completely stupid? You have to just let these people find out the hard way, and of course they're going to leave. They'll blame this place once they realize the truth, instead of themselves. Anyway, I'm rambling...
well...... i would argue that said strawman delegator should have done more research to understand where is the money going.. I mean, i would read the shit off every material i can i get my hands on before putting money into anything. Especially when it comes to anything near an "investment".
But yea, the phenomena you described is real. Its unforunately the social cost of decentralization. Youtube/facebook/twitch has their TOS, guidelines and policies and those are literally the word of god to those involved. Top-down hierarchy and so it's relatively easy.
Steem has rules too, but unless one is an expert programmer, there's no way to understand it from the source. Decentralization causes information fragmentation and the need for everyone to verify their own information is something totally new to people.
that is why its so important to recruit new members through communities rather than hoping people to stumble upon the blockchain themselves. I'd say the value of the blockchain is not the marketcap of the token but the users. less than 60k daily users is abysmal for a content platform.
I was first thinking along the line of "yea Digital Darwinian Selection" but then it's mighty unfair to new users and unhelpful to the platform.. sadly not everyone is like you and me, and eventually we'd have to lower the barrier of understanding that at least those willing to put in the work can make it on the platform. where the rest can stay being content consumers and use the steem wallet app to like people and send money.