I think this articulates SOME of what I'm thinking (which is not easy to articulate):
"Overall it resembles a repentance of merritocracy and a move towards democracy.
Quite opposed to what STEEM is about."
IMHO, STEEM is broken currently..
When instant registration and communities happen (HF20?) then we see something that actually scales and can be advertised. So for now, I tell people it's broken, and it needs to be fixed, and we are waiting for the "fix".
But I do think this brings up a very good point. It's been Wild West now for a while, we see upvote bots, various things many would say FIX steem in some ways, or alter it so it works, for the time being...
Many call for more "Democracy". (!)
As if this actually works in the real world today (maybe not so far)?
But they have a point, so if Meritocracy is balanced with Democracy, it's balanced with "Wisdom of the Crowd" that really won't want to understand the underlying game theory that well. They just want to participate and see a healthy return on their investment of their time and energy spent.
I can imagine different sorts, and they may give people more of what they are looking for in a feed. Or better rewards when they have many upvotes and so far, no rewards for many minnows.. which obviously needs to be fixed.
A competitor that is truly decentralized, won't really gain competitive edge until it can satisfy all of these user types... And once it does?
Humm.. Danger Will Robinson.
HF20 will not fix anything.
Maybe the minor fix of "instant registration", if it is not instant already, because I read that a STEEM account can be created with a single linux command, and even the standard way, it did not take me too much to register.
The problem is premining, the source of STEEM extreme inequality and it propagates.
Upvote bots are inevitable, and better use them than to complain about them.
I refer only to the ones managed decently.
Merritocracy is good if it is based on good criteria or fair criteria, not if it is based on who joined first and had access to aggregated computer resources.
You got a 11.76% upvote from @luckyvotes courtesy of @stimialiti!
You got a 15.13% upvote from @sleeplesswhale courtesy of @stimialiti!