"Authors are being paid less. Lesser accounts are struggling. No one rewards comments. People are discouraged. HF21 was bad. Steem is declining in both value, content and active users. Steem is not fair."
We've heard all of it before. People complain about various things, and I have seen a wide variety of complaints ever since I joined in July 2016. Nothing is ever good enough. Many users seems to believe that they are entitled to high rewards and they obviously express their feelings whenever something affects them in a negative way, but most of them doesn't say much whenever something positive occurs.
It's easy to talk about a flag (downvote) you receive, but users doesn't talk about that awesome upvote they got from a large account. Whenever things are going south and affects people in a negative way, people complain. It seems to be in our nature.
I was skeptical and I am still not entirely convinced that HF21 was as good as some people claimed it to be, but I am more positive than ever due to many of the great things I have seen so far. I have truly started to believe that HF21 was something good and that we will benefit from it in the long haul. I have seen others who aren't as convinced as me, and I have seen dozens of people talking about how lesser accounts are being punished and that HF21 was something extremely bad.
I hear and read complaints, but I don't really see anything that proves their claims. Some of the users I follow seems to earn just a fraction less than before meanwhile others seems to earn much more. Often due to @smartsteem and/or @ocdb or other large accounts that has started to curate content manually.
Personally, it seems like I earn more or less the same as before, perhaps a few cents less than before, based on the support I've had for a long period of time (including auto-votes). Due to the accounts I mentioned above, (@smartsteem, @ocdb and other users), I have started to earn more than before. Often several hundred percent more than I would've earned before HF21. So this obviously makes me satisfied with my own results.
However, I have also seen many users that benefits from the actions from these exact accounts too. In a very positive way. Many of them had potential payouts of $0.50-$2 before HF21 and I've seen many of them have well-more than $2 and $5 afterwards. Some of them have reached potential rewards of $10 all the way up to ~$20.
- I fail to see how HF21 had a negative impact on these users.
HF21 is about rewarding quality authors. It's about taking away rewards from low quality, spam and bid-bot abuse. It's about redistribution. We don't want to reward low quality content. We want to reward authors who puts in time and effort in an attempt to share high quality.
I know that not all of my content would be considered high quality, but I do my best. I try to bring my "A-Game" so to speak, and I do that for each and every article or post I write.
Some of the users who are feeling the negative impact might not have done so in the past. Perhaps their posts or articles are poorly written or contains loads of spelling errors. HF21 is not about taking away their rewards, it's about rewarding them for their efforts. It's about encouragement and motivation.
Steem is supposed to be fun and rewarding, but that doesn't mean that these things comes without effort. Steem is supposed to take time. It's a steep learning curve for many users and people are supposed to struggle. It should be difficult...
We often hear that Steem is far from fair, and that well-known authors are being over-paid in comparison to others. We often hear that only the rich can and will succeed.
I can actually relate to some of those feelings and thoughts, but in reality, it's far from true. It's easy to compare ourselves with others, but to compare yourself with an author who has been here for years would only give you false information.
You need to build your brand. You need to get recognition. You need to gain followers and build an audience. Steem is supposed to be a long term commitment. Just like YouTube, Twitter or Instagram.
You won't get hundreds of followers because of one tweet or a photo. You won't get hundreds or thousands of subscribers because you upload a video on YouTube. Success for an influencer takes a long time, requires hard work, blood, sweat and tears. It takes time. It also involves luck.
- Have you heard of PewDiePie?
He struggled for a long time too. He almost gave up on YouTube at one point. He recently reached 100 million subscribers and it took him days to get another million subscribers.
The snowball effect kicked in for Felix a long time ago. He get more followers on his social media profiles and he gets more subscribers on a daily basis. It doesn't matter if he publish new content or not. People subscribe and follow him for who he is, what he has done and what they think he will do in the future.
Many other YouTubers helped him towards the goal of 100 million subscribers. Mr.Beast for instance. He has done wonderful things in an attempt to spread awareness and help Felix, even though some would say that they are "competitors".
‘Subscribe to PewDiePie’ campaign hits the Super Bowl
I obviously understand that things are different on Steem, but we have some basic tools to use for these exact purposes too.
- We can upvote content to reward specific authors.
- We can share content on other social medias.
- We can resteem content for others to see.
You shouldn't see other Steemians as competitors, even though you might work towards the same goals. Mr.Beast gained something for all the things he did, just like you will.
Mr.Beast got more recognition. People loved what he did so they were eager to see more. Mr.Beast was able to attract tons of eyeballs and he gained followers and subscribers. He built his brand and his audience simultaneously. He gained something that would benefit him in the future. He thought long-term.
- What do you think a resteem from a well-known author would mean?
In theory, it would give you more exposure, which basically means a larger audience and the possibility to earn more rewards. Both for that specific content that was resteemed, but also on any of your future contributions.
Steem might not feel fair, but how fair would it be if a newcomer that published low quality content earned well-more than an established user who's been here for years? I guess most people would still be somewhat okay with that as long as it happened once or twice.
What if a newcomer would earn more than a well-known author who is known for his hard work and high quality content, and the newcomer started to earn more on a regular basis while his contributions were low quality?
- That wouldn't be fair.
Remember, Steem is supposed to be difficult. It's not until you have reached the top of the mountain things are becoming easier. That's when you'll see the true results of your hard work. That's when your hard work, effort and time truly pays off.
- That's what the snowball effect is all about.
Its sad that everybody is concerned about the price of steem.
For people where it provides a better life or improve ones life, I get it.
But someone like me who only wanna grow and maybe in a few years wanna recover what I have invested, doesn't care about the price :D
Well, I honestly think it's a given consequence of how Steem have been in the past, how users have behaved and how easy it has been to accumulate Steem.
What you can regret nowadays is that you didn't jumped on the bandwagon and bid-botted each of your posts to extreme rewards, as you could've done so to rapidly grow your account. By doing so in the past, you would be much better off nowadays... But, that is only if you powered up your account.
I would never allow greed to steer my actions though, which is the main reason for me to never have behaved like that. I also think it shows your character to avoid certain types of behaviour, and I believe in some sort of karma, so I think it will yield me better results further on.
It's very unfortunate though, that many are so extremely concerned and focused on the price. Things would be a lot better if people powered up at least some of the rewards before cashing out.
Even if I bid-botted the shit out of every post way back and was better off now. I would still not take more out than I needed, I would never want to lose my stake. So I think it would have benefitted me and others if I did that :p and well the tax on exchanging crypto is like the tax on trade stocks in Denmark. Not cheap x)
I fell in that $0.50-$2 before HF21 and still sort of in it so time will tell, I just don't post real frequently. I have gotten a lot more in curation rewards since HF 21/22 and that is nice. The comment votes, those were nice when people could afford to give them, and I still think they will be back when the price of steem recovers, I know I will return to voting comments when the price recovers, for now patience is all people can have.
I feel that if I like a post, and I have time, and I up vote it I should let the author know I appreciated their thoughts/post. So a vote on a comment nice but lack of does not stop me from commenting.
I am not sure there is a fair system for anything in life. Hard work, luck, and who you learn to know is what will help new users grow. People need to get over the not fair, attitude and just make stuff for me to consume, to read, to look at to enjoy, and then to vote on and comment on, that is the only fair I am looking for, variety makes fair.
Yup. I mean, I published this 31 minutes ago and I have (so far) potential payouts of $0.61. I saw another post being published before mine and another one about 5-6 minutes after mine. Both of them have potential rewards of about ~$10 at the time I'm writing this. If something, it's unfortunate, but I wouldn't call it unfair.
I was fortunate to receive large upvotes on my previous content and my content can still get upvotes until payout, so even though my potential payouts might not change much, there's still a chance. And, I wouldn't have potential rewards of $0.61 if I had published this on Facebook for instance, so I'm obviously glad that I earn something.
We still haven't seen the true results of the latest HardForks so patience is key. I hope we will get back to rewarding comments though. I miss that.
Edit:
During the time I wrote this comment, one of the posts has ~$10 and the other is up to almost $20 in potential rewards. While mine has increased with $0.01.
Patience, they say is a virtue. I think we need to wait til December or early Jan to see the real effects of the HF, just like the last one, time will tell if it was a smart thing or not, but they can always fix issues along the way.
I am glad to see that your post did get hit by some curators, it is always nice to see good well thought out post get recognition.
Yeah, that felt amazing. It was so cool to see my post on top of the hot pages and high up in the trending pages for a while. It's been years since that happened. But, it also proves my point that your potential payout can change even after the "5 minute mark".
That being said, I think you are correct. I think it will take us a couple of months before we can see the real effects. Some people seems to have believed that the price of Steem would moon instantly after HF21, and I can't really understand how they believed that...
It takes time to change things. Especially when Steem has been on what seems to be a never-ending decline for a long period of time. A HF can't change that immediately. That would've been a true miracle.
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"You need to build your brand. You need to get recognition. You need to gain followers and build an audience. Steem is supposed to be a long term commitment."
BOOM!! People need to re-read this! :)
Thanks, and yeah, I think so too.
I guess people got comfortable and used to how things were previously, but that was far from sustainable. Steem shouldn't be a place where people just grabs a large chunk of money when- and however they please. It's supposed to be about rewarding those who goes the extra mile.
All of this is very well said. I can see how this new set up might see him unfair to some. But I feel it is really fair for the great content creators. It is also more fair for people who curate. That I why I bought enough steem to more than double what I had. Over time I feel more will do that. I don’t create amazing content. I do giveaways and sometimes write a story. It took me over a year to see my followers grow. To find my niche here. I am still working my way up but I can see pretty amazing things in the future. I hope a lot more see that too.
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I agree. It's obviously unfortunate that not all high quality contributions will be rewarded, but that could never have happened regardless of what anyone did.
Exactly. It takes time to build your brand and gain followers, but many users out there expects the world for nothing.
I think HF21 hasn't been good for newbies on Steemit. Besides, I have started using Stemit lesser afterwards. HF21 was supposed to have increased Steem price; on the contrary, the price has gone much more down.
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HF21 was like medicine. It's supposed to aid in the healing process, not allow the body to skip it altogether. It might even get worse, but that's the path in order to grow.
Assessing the quality of HF21 by its immediate effect is not the right option. You need to have patience and see the big picture.
I keep hearing these things, but have yet seen anything that really backs this up. In what way was HF21 bad for newbies? I have some ideas myself, and I have been concerned as well, but the more I think and talk about it, the more I realize how HF21 seems to have been literally the best thing for Steem. Long term.
In comparison to what was HF21 bad for newbies? In comparison to how easy it was to basically "steal" rewards before? In that case, HF21 does exactly what's intended, as we don't want to reward low quality, bid-bot abuse or spam.
Do you have any more details to share about this?
Also, we still haven't seen the full effect of the latest HardFork. Things takes time. It would've been a true miracle if we saw the price of Steem increase immediately after the HardFork. Things have to settle down before we will see those types of results.
#Newsteem is about changing how Steem has worked previously, as it has been far from sustainable for a long period of time. You can't expect one HardFork to change the price immediately. We need to prove that the mindset and behaviour of #newsteem is the new route for Steem, and that will obviously take some time.
It has been bad for smaller accounts in fact it has been good for only about 200 accounts who keep repeating that HF21 is great, just look at what the trending articles are about and who votes for them. These guys are OK, the rest of us are worse off, it is there in plain sight only those who don't want to see don't see this.
I agree that the trending pages are filled with Steem-related content, and I would like to see a variety of content further on, but I also think it's logical to reward that content, and truth is, that Steem-related articles has always been rewarded.
Like I said in this article, I have seen many of the accounts I follow go in both directions. Those who seem to earn less though, seems to earn just a little bit less than before, meanwhile others seems to earn more. Often well-more than before.
However, I have obviously seen that some actifit posts for instance, or posts with one sentence and a link to another site etc. I have seen that those have started to earn less than before, but I also think that is the right direction, as we are supposed to reward high quality and effort. We don't want spam, bid-bot abuse or low quality posts to earn massive rewards.
That being said, I can understand that some authors might be affected in a negative way because of this, but I still think it's for the greater good. This might affect some (or even most of) us in a negative way short term, but I think it will pay off long term.
https://steemit.com/statistics/@arcange/steem-statistics-20190911-en
Here are some stats, I think theya re kind of interesting.
https://steemit.com/steem/@pharesim/the-eip-and-how-curation-will-matter-again-a-k-a-false-hopes
And this is about what I think also.
%50-%50 rewards might not encourage not only newbies but many other users to produce new/quality contents. There's a high possibilty that a user may ask "Why %50 of my effort would go to someone else?"
HF21 will likely encourage users to comment more and more, however I have noticed that comments are not upvoted as before, under this post e.g.
Steemit even before HF21 was played between the users that have high rep and SP, now it has been much more. I don't think that a newbie will want to go on Steemit.
As said, let's see for a long term, but there is some reality that can't be played down.
Comments are not rewarded like they were before HF21, so it's likely to decrease engagement. People are better off upvoting content after HF21.
Here's a comment from @bashadow that explains this in detail:
That is also the reason I don't upvote comments anymore, which I honestly think is sad, because I have always loved the idea of rewarding my audience with something.
Honestly, I think the only people who thinks like that are existing Steemians. I doubt that a newcomer would think like that, because they earn 0 from Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and other social media platforms out there.
Truth to be told, I was thinking in the same lines too, previously. I saw HF21 as something terrible which would make things far more difficult for me and for all the lesser accounts we have. Due to many of the great things I have seen though, I have started to be less skeptical and I am starting to truly believe that HF21 was something good. That it was something we should have done a long time ago.
In a nutshell, HF21 have countered bid-bot abuse. People don't earn from spam or low quality posts in the same extent as before and those rewards are being redistributed to high quality content instead. Meaning, authors who didn't earn much previously, has started to earn more and anyone that produces high quality has a higher chance than before to receive upvotes. Especially as more people are looking for good content to curate.
However, I can still see that some people, perhaps some people who doesn't deserve it, have been affected in a negative way because of this.. But we need to take the bad with the good.
This is also why I recently wrote about Tribes too. People are basically leaving rewards on the table by not using tribes yet, and I definitely think that rewards from tribes can make up for the potential loss of rewards.
Like you said though, we need to wait. It will probably take us a few more months to see the true results of the recent HardForks.
I've changed my way to reward comments now. I don't upvote but UpFund with !UFM I think I should write a post on it too ;)
You can use UFM for posting and curating content on https://upfund.me or to get a vote from @ufmbot.
I think "like" is more valuable than 0.001$ upvote for those people on FB, Insta as such. This is kinda Ego > Money. I also think that Steemit or the idea of blockchain based platform has not been popular yet, but been more difficult to sustain on. I know many users from my country left Steemit due to price drop last year. Now reward decrease. Even if you put HF100 into use, people want to get the return of their effort.
You should lay the base very well before raise a building.
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We've had a building for a long time, but that building has fallen apart. Brick by brick, for a long period of time. The intentions of HF21 was not to raise a new building on that same foundation, but to strengthen the foundation, and raise a new building afterwards.
I get your point though, and I can understand your feelings. How many of those users are able to earn something from their content nowadays?
Also, while the price is low, you are able to earn more Steem. We are talking about tokens, not the value of those tokens.
That being said, I know more than a handful of people who gave up on Steem too. They gave up in late 2016 and the beginning of 2017. They gave up during the time we saw the record for the highest paid out post ever (~$32K), and they gave up because they didn't earn...
It's impossible to please everyone.
👍
~Smartsteem Curation Team
Wow, thank you very much!
I was very much against HF21. I still think curation should be optional to be determined by the owner of the content and chosen on a sliding scale from 0%-100%.
However, HF21 seems to be a net positive regardless. If HF21 were to double the value of Steem... it doesn't matter if you're receiving half as much Steem. No one seems to think about the base value of the token and network.
It's rather strange that people seem to forget that part, even though they are talking about the price all the time....
I really love the resteem feature and for those that don’t just spam use it. I think it gives quite a lot of authority behind the action of one creator speaking up about another’s work in such a way.
I also love it when I’m going be semi-inactive for a few days or something is taking longer than expected. I can resteem something else’s hard work if I can make the time. That way when someone stops by to see what I’ve been up to they have something to read while I’m busy trying get something finished.
It’s quite a powerful tool and I love it.
I have so many things going on in the background. I think the next couple of years will be interesting to see those that started to focus more on the long term and those that just wanted to make a quick Steem or two. The reward pool is great for giving you something in a week. it’s also a drop in the bucket once an audience is built up and other opportunities can be used along with it.
So many small YouTubers seem to look at the big channels and think “if only I made all that money from AdSense.” I’ve also seen some big YouTubers share they are glad to have other options as Absence would not cover the bills.
I think he's a great example that quality has its limitations. He does not have the highest production quality. He’s not spending insane money on fancy editors and equipment. He is being himself and people can relate to that.
I have often seen a YouTuber go from creating content in their bedroom and having fun to a professional studio. They get the fancy lighting, cameras, an editor and some of that magic is lost when they have a stack of bills to pay to cover it all. They sometimes stop innovating and taking risks as not wanting to lose it all. In return, they slowly lose it all when they can’t regain newer viewers.
The resteem feature is really great, as long as people don't over-use it. I don't want authors I follow to resteem 34 different articles per day. I want to read the content they produce, that's the whole point of following them, but to see them resteem one or two articles is awesome. That gives me more content to enjoy.
I totally agree with you. I have seen many twitch streamers invest a ton of money because they seem to believe that they will be famous because of a superb camera, an awesome microphone and studio lights. It doesn't work like that.
They still have to build their audience and get recognition. That's the first thing they should focus on. Studio lights and other upgrades comes when they have established themselves and when they have a decent amount of viewers and followers.