My solution.
- Allow only "community approved" interfaces to do upvoting. Sure, this removes some of the decentralization of Steem, but it will reduce applications used to do auto upvotes. Just like witnesses, people vote on the applications and the applications have a duty to perform correctly or have their vote removed.
- Add a human check (like the slider used on Binance) when a person does an upvote on all apps that access Steem. That will eliminate 99% of the upvote bots. Again, this will require the app builder to follow the rule and for the community to remove the vote if the app doesn't.
This means that open-entry systems built around anonymous participation will have no means expelling bad actors and will eventually succumb to profit-driven corruption.
The fact that they couldn't see this at the beginning is laughable. Maybe before people start a blockchain app, they should talk to someone who has studied human nature first.
I like this as a possible 99% solution. Bravo.
If we want to eliminate upvote bots we can just start reorganizing the site so it's not 100% ordered according to stake weight. This isn't something we need permission to fix. We don't need the witnesses' help. We can just do it.
How does this impact bots at all? VP is based on SP, stake. All the minnows on the platform don't have 10% of the stake. 35 whales can just approve whatever they want.
Are you replying to me? Witness votes are even, I think. Because you get a certain number of votes.
Of course, it wouldn't stop the bot makers from making a bunch of accounts and voting, but it would be something. I personally would prefer that only Steemit has upvote ability, but one of the witnesses (who I removed my vote from) said that was stupid to centralize a decentralized system on one UI.
Witness votes are stake-weighted. The whales elect the witnesses that will run the code they want.
This means that Steem isn't decentralized at all, but that control is centralized in the form of SP--money.
Equal votes for witnesses is something I have advocated, even beyond my desire for equal weighted votes generally. I prefer rep as a weighting mechanism, however, especially if it is fixed so that it can't just be bought, as it can at present.
I have talked (I am sure) to that witness regarding these matters. 2FA as a means of eliminating bots particularly drew their ire, which makes me think it's definitely something we should do.
When I bring up 2FA or human check on one of the Flag war posts, it is either ignored or called stupid. The "tech" person of Steemit ask me if I knew how the Internet works. I never hear back from them when I challenge them further.
Think about who is talking to you when you consider what they have to say. You may not be a coder, but you can understand that code works a certain way, and you can see examples of code that does 2FA around the web.
It's not rocket science. You're not stupid.
Some people don't want it--in fact they need it to not happen--because they rely on the income from the way things are presently. 'Fixing' the problem of increasing concentration of Steem is a harm to them. For those that make money from delegating to bots, or running votebots, proposing removing bots from Steemit is tantamount to offering them a job digging ditches.
Even folks that aren't dependent or benefiting from the bots, some that would prefer Steemit was an actual social media platform, rely on the opinions of those that convince them too that it's either technically impossible, unrealistically difficult, or otherwise not a good idea.
Not everyone tells the truth.
I've discussed this matter with many top witnesses, and Stinc. Your experience isn't singular, and many others have had the same conversation. It's been a successful strategy so far at keeping a serious discussion of 2FA or removing bots from being undertaken.
When someone explains in detail what exactly is the technical impediment to 2FA, then you will have some matters to consider. It isn't done, because there are no actual technical impediments.
Folks profiting from bots want to keep profiting from bots. The top witnesses and Stinc itself are dependent financially on the whales, who are the folks profiting from bots, so they either toe the company line, or they find other work.
If they ask you how the internet works, tell them it's a seriies of pipes, and 2FA is like a valve that only lets good stuff in them.
It's that simple.
Wow. Excellent poins and discussion.
Interesting ideas. Those would require the community to get more involved and care to do something about it :/
Not everything can be predicted. In the present, everything in the past is seen with 20/20 hindsight vision, but at the past time, you can't foretell the certainty of the future that will develop.
No, not everything can be predict, but human nature is fairly basic. They expected everyone to be altruistic in the upvoting.
Yes, it would require people to be involved and understand that the upvote bots doesn't help Steem.