People are using the platform as a rewards system rather than a content system. The majority of posts I see - even highly upvoted ones - have an incredibly low ratio of upvotes to actual views.
Look at the "Hot" page:
214 Votes / 15 views
https://steemit.com/life/@little-peppers/duck-duck-goose-no-duck-duck-duck
208 / 15 views
https://steemit.com/food/@therawfoodie/raw-vegan-chewy-twix-bars
This seems fairly typical. Unless something is wrong with the view counting system, or I am just an idiot who doesn't know how to correctly look up view numbers (highly possible), I don't see how this is a viable solution to promote content makers. If people aren't looking at the content we make, why make it?
It seems the payout system is rewarding and encouraging people to mass upvote things in the hopes that other people will too - and drive the price up until they get a good cut.
I'm new here, so not too sure if this is the case, but it's what it seems like to me. Maybe someone more experienced can provide a contrasting opinion or help fill me in on why I'm wrong.
I like Steemit and I'll continue to use it. It provides a place for me to randomly write and I will continue to take advantage of it. This won't affect my use of the site and I will be supporting it in the hopes it grows, this is just something I've noticed in my brief time here.
'Views' is not a reliable number, lots of people look at the posts from other interfaces, steemdb, steemd, busy, etc, so views are not accurate.
If you learn the code you can make a custom interface that lets you do everything outside of this one.
Steemviz.com
A lot of people, me included, use bots to vote.
I use @steemvoter.
My main reasons are to vote when i'm away, and to populate a list of my favorite authors for when I get back.
Some people do it purely as mining the system.
So far that mining hasn't proven to be an issue, afaik.
I think after the hardfork that voting and posting will be very different.
Right now unless you are a whale sycophant you got nothing coming, but the rewards curve is supposed to make the new math a little more minnow friendly.
As for the steem, buy and hold, look at what btc is doing and know that this is a better system in many tech folks' opinions.
Granted there is drama, but as long as the whales and witnesses don't commit mass suicide the platform should be solid.
I know I have ordered stuff with 'money' from here.
I have noticed the same thing. It's sad really because if people are voting without actually viewing then the vote they give is essentially fake. Personally I don't think you should be able to vote unless you have viewed the content for at least 30 seconds.
Great idea. I was thinking something similar. If people just go around voting just for the purpose of voting, not to reward positive posts, it kind of ruins the platform IMO. I really like the idea of this and want it to succeed!
good observation
there are just too many bots around. Maybe once the site gets out of Beta mode and expand, things will change.
Voting should take place inside the post, at the bottom of the article. Bots can't clink links, can they?
Would encourage engagement as well!
Good idea, though I think you can program a bot to just about anything. There is at least one bot programmed to write comments.
They don't need. Steemit works over a blockchain. Upvoting is one of the transactions someone can do to a post. No need to read it.