This post is in response to the post from @aggroed and @minnowsupport dated 29 October 2017, Minnow Support Project Updated Witness Voting - A Public Service Announcement. The contents of this post are my own, and do not reflect the thoughts and beliefs of the entire Curie project, unless so noted in the comments below.
When I joined Steem on August 9th and began my journey of posting to the block chain, it was a member of the Curie team that found one of my early stories and gave it a boost which would propel my interest in the platform. On August 17th I posted a story, based on a writing prompt. Like many posts before it, I put it on the blockchain and left it. When I woke the next morning and checked my blog, instead of a post worth $0.07 like I was used to seeing, I instead had a post worth $134.00! On His Own Terms remains my top payout piece to date, and that is because one of the #Curie curators found my post and submitted it as a nominee for a vote from Curie.
So I endeavored to find out as much as I could about this @curie person. I had no idea at the time who or what Curie was. But I found my way into the steemit.chat #curie channel and began to meet some incredible people who make up the Curie team. That process went on until I finally joined the ranks of curator just a few short weeks ago.
So What Is Curie?
Curie, at it's core, is a group of people who go out and wade through the thousands of posts that come in to the Steem platform by the second. As of this moment, per the Streemian page, there are 745 Curators, who have submitted 14,427 posts of which 13,766 have been reviewed and rewarded since they started using Streemian. For additional statistics you can check out the 1 Year Anniversary Post for a detailed list of stats as of 11 August 2017. You can also see a list of the most recent posts upvoted by the reviewers at the Streemian Page (note, a streemian free account is required before accessing the guild page).
Curie's own guidelines make the organization a focus not just on Minnows, but specifically red fish. We are looking for authors who are of a reputation between 27 and 52 who are providing terrific, but undervalued content on the blockchain.
The Curie account itself controls over 2.6 million Steem Power, and the Streemian voting trail typically more than doubles the value the @curie account adds to a post.
If you want to know more about Curie and the mission of the group, I have written two pieces that took in depth looks at the organization before I ever became a Curator. You can check those out if you wish. The first is a portion of a review of several curation projects The realm of curation in Steem. The Second documents the week I spent attempting (and mostly failing) to curate content for Curie as part of my mentoring process before becoming a curator, Observations from a week with Curie
So Let's get to @Aggroed's Questions
In determining who the Minnow Support Project will support for witness, Aggroed asked for three main questions to be answered.
- What are you pledging to do to support the Steemit Community?
- What are you pledging to do to support the Minnow Community?
- What are you pledging to do to support the Minnow Support Project?
I believe these are addressed to a greater or lesser extent above, but let's take them one by one.
What are you pledging to do to support the Steemit Community?
Curie, to my knowledge, has no plans to divert from the path which it has been on since the project introduced itself on 9 September 2016.
Its mission is to help reward content creators who are posting great original content, yet who have not yet become established.
The Goal is to support Steem by raising the best content creators to the top. Giving encouragement to those who are approaching Steem the right way, bringing great content to the platform.
Supporting great content, supports the platform. By showing others what it means to post great content, hopefully those who are not producing that content will want the Curie vote, and will endeavor to create content worthy of the vote.
With Great Content, comes great increases in the value of Steem and the platform.
What are you pledging to do to support the Minnow Community?
As mentioned above, the Curie guidelines call for nominees to be of a reputation of 27 to 52. We are looking specifically at minnows.
There are sub-communities of Curie where authors outside of this range do get votes from curie. These, however, are not the main mission. The mission is to support those who are just finding their way. For whom the content and the drive are there, it is the financial reward that has thus far been lacking.
Curie is here to give those people a boost. To support them with a pat on the back that says "You have been noticed for the great work you are doing! Keep it up!"
Today's minnows are tomorrow's dolphin and whale. Just look back at the Curie Daily Curation List on that first day. Look through the list of authors who received a curie vote that day and how many of those names pop out at you as influential Steemians today. You will doubtless recognize a fair few of those names. Curie did not create their success, but Curie is offering support to those people today who will be those influential Steemians a year from now.
What are you pledging to do to support the Minnow Support Project?
This one is a little trickier, and so my answer will be more brief.
Several of the current most active curators are also members of the Minnow Support Project on some level. We participate in the MSP Discord Channel, and believe me when I say, as a curator, we are always looking for content creators who fall into the demographic we are curating. That is no different when we are chatting in discord.
Content Creators in the MSP will be seen by Curie Curators. Will all of them receive a curie vote? No, I'm sorry, we can't promise that. But we have our eye on the community, and we want to support everyone who is creating excellent content. MSP is one of those avenues we utilize to find the content we nominate, and that will certainly continue.
Summing Up
As usual, I've gone over on my word count. So I will attempt to be brief in my closing.
Curie, in my mind, is most assuredly a witness for the minnow community. This is an organization that strives daily to make Steem a better place by recognizing the hard work of the minnow community. Providing a witness vote to @curie allows the leadership to continue their mission in seeking out the best that Steem has to offer, and providing that push that can propel minnows to a new level of the Steem Platform. Curie, and the curie vote, is a great encourager of people.
We are seeking "Proof of Brain" as displayed by excellent content. The vote of the Minnow Support Project helps Curie to continue the work of elevating terrific content on this platform we all love and cherish.
I appreciate this opportunity to speak on behalf of the Curie witness. I hope I have done justice to the mission of the group, and that these words are effective in communicating the drive and effort that Curie provides.
Any questions about Curie and what the team is doing can be commented below, or more effectively brought to the steemit.chat #curie channel. I don't have all the answers, so you might find that your questions are better answered by a member of the leadership in the chat. But I will do my best to get answers for any questions left here as well.
Thank you for your continued support of Curie and the mission to seek out great content from new creators on the platform!
yes, it's hard to find a witness project that so actively supports minnows as curie!
I'm glad you agree. Curie, as PALnet MSP, ranks among the best incubation for Steemit minnows. One can make a case for the retention contribution Curie has brought to the ecosystem. I still look forward to when there will be an equally effective second phase project that takes over from curie when author becomes a little more established. I hope the decision makers at minnowsupport will deem it worthwhile to put it's weight behind the curie witness project.
Bottom line here: Curie works. I am one who has been helped by @curie with the earlier short stories I posted. Now I am working to be active helping folks newer even than myself. The example set, I followed it.
Nice post @mikepm74...
May i use this post n i will translete in language
I interest with your post ...
Its very² important ..
I want to share with my friends too in my country..
While the main goal of this post was to encourage MSP to vote Curie as a witness, and I believe those decisions have already been made, if you believe the information in this post would be useful to your follower, sure, translate away