the thing is, the cryptoblock is so ornery that when you ask anyone to show proof of work so you can turn in a decent curie post, or make any comment about a lack of documentation or quality of work, peeps get so ape shit. some go so far as to point to a piece of my poetry as proof that i dont put out what they feel is quality work (ignoring how long i might have spent writing, or every long ass post ive made), and act like they are being oppressed by my opinion.
how do i prove that i sit at my desk close to 12 hours a day curating, reading, awarding? taking selfies every hour to post would be boring. truth is with a little extra work artists can provide proof of process/work. but then we have no idea how long any artist or writer actually spends doing the work unless they volunteer the information.
for instance i know for painting, there's usually a down time while you watch paint dry. there's time to prep, mix colors, clean up, and add to that the job of posting on top of that. for writing, it's editing 1001 times until it's perfect. for photography, driving out to the shoot, waiting for the light, editing, uploading.
then there's the risk of odd duck that comes along and says your work isnt worth the money you have earned, so you get flagged.
the problem is sometimes while the work is good, the post is not, and people just don't understand this aspect of it. documenting a good post takes time - writing in html or markdown, formatting, finding the right photos, resize them, note the sources, creating to headers and banners and logos that make it stand out, etc
and then factor in the cost. time away from kids, work, chores. if you live in a less developed country, cost of internet and electric versus the return you get on the investment? people are losing money. we won't even mention trying to write in a language that isn't your native tongue.
what i am saying is that maybe we are expecting a bit too much when we curate. we are rewarding people that have the time and resources to create some amazing post, while ignoring the people who simply can't compete. end result? the people who can't compete drop out of steemit for lack of incentive.
i'm not offering any solutions here. just saying, maybe we need to look at curating a bit differently.
You are, of course, correct in that the proof of work aspect is very difficult to work with. There are some of the guidelines in Curie that I would change if I was in charge, but I am not, so I have to do the best I can with the tools I am given.
Poetry is a tough one. I am sure you have spent way longer on your poems than I ever have on a short story. So why did my stories get curated while your poems didn't? Does length of a written piece equate to proof of effort? No, but again, that's where we are.
Hopefully the platform will work itself into a place where more open opportunities exist for curation. Where we can consider posts by people with a reputation 55-60 (because that is where a ton of great content lives that I can't touch).
Curie may or may not be the group that expands those horizons to open things up. It is where, to this point, I felt I could make the biggest impact on Steemians due to the large upvote value, so that is where I applied. If a better organization comes along with more open parameters and as much weight behind the vote as curie has, then I will be happy to go and work for them.
And maybe communities will help with curation as well. Who knows. The future is impossible to predict!
I totally understand that poetry is a lost and underappreciated art form, so people hating on it doesnt phase me. I even disagree with a majority of the "poets" out there who insist that poetry must rhyme and be in a standardized form. I can usually tell from use of a specific word or lack of precision and clarity in writing how long someone has spent on poetry, because I have spent years working on my own. And while it might be less time spent than on a short story, what confuses me is why my poetry earns more than a huge article that took me 12 hours to write. The payout then has less to do with the evidence or proof of work, and more to do with how much people see worth in the work.
my idea of curating is showing the people who are less talented, who have less access to tech and education, that their work has value. what i also try to do is educate as i go along. drop an article about html, sources, whatever. if someone does not understand the difference between copy/paste and plagiarism, i tell them. this is one thing i think that the community is failing to do; helping the people who are coming here with english as a second language and trying to post. there are some truly sincere people who just dont understand what curie requires. and I don't see any long articles (hint hint) defining what "proof of work" entails, examples of how to cite correctly, links to html.
actually i have meant to do that for a long time.... hmmm.
I call this the huck finn measurement of good poetry :-)