Consider for a moment the value proposition of a platform such as Steemit. Steemit allows for individuals to be rewarded financially for the content they deliver, be it photos, writing, poetry, performances... whatever you can create and put in a post you can share and potentially earn some money.
There are a lot of awesome community support initiatives that will help noobs gain some traction when starting off, and then there are some that seem to be taking advantage of Steemit users for their own (financial) gains. Ultimately, it's up to you what you choose to do but I am going to try to explain the difference and why this matters fundamentally.
Some initiatives have been created to help noobs get acclimated here on Steemit and have created methods that will help you get your content some traction. These kinds of initiatives are pretty awesome in my opinion and seem to be created by people who genuinely want to see Steemit succeed... so they want to see new users succeed. Any legitimate methods you can find that will help get your content which is on your own page and under your own username may help to give you an actual boost. @MinnowSupport is one of these initiatives and I not only appreciated the boost in exposure it gave to my content, but the active Discord community being there to help me understand my way around this platform.
On the flipside, I've seen far too many profiles that are created strictly to benefit financially from the content other people create, and they seem to target new users who do not yet fully understand why this is counterproductive and not fair. If an account wants to republish your content in full from their page, they are going to make money from content they didn't create. You will make $0. They may promise you exposure. They may promise you some sort of reward. But I guarantee you, they are using you for content and taking money from your pocket. You know what gets you exposure? Putting out your own quality content, consistently. Shouldn't you get paid for what you create? Is that not the very core goal here on Steemit?
These kinds of accounts are stealing from you. They are gaining traction and followers as well, based on the ideas of other people. Those people are maybe getting a handful of followers for being "promoted". But here's the thing: the more you post, the better you tag, and the higher quality your content is... the followers WILL come on their own and you will get to keep all of the money you make. These kinds of promotional accounts are a very clever scam that takes advantage of noobs, and I urge you to say no to those who ask you to repost your content in full without any financial incentive.
Here is a prime example. A couple of weeks ago I did a post, BE FUCKING NICE TO PEOPLE.. Posting this on my own, I made about $33. The post ended up featured as "Hot" and from that I gained a great deal of followers. I think part of what helped me get featured was the traction the post was gaining, and I believe MinnowSupport had something to do with that (this can be very effective if you time it well). Someone I had never heard from before left me a comment. I'll post the thread below:
Of note: This individual was not a follower. He waited over an hour until I specifically asked why he didn't upvote my content if he liked it so much. Very odd that he said I didn't give him time to do it. He had time to write the comment, it takes a fraction of that time to just upvote the post. Clearly, my curiousity was peaked but he failed to explain the concept and was immediately defensive that I was even asking. I took great offense to him alleging that his asking permission to repost my content was a formality due to reposting my images. Ummm: it's not about the images, it's not a formality. To repost my content, my writing, my writing in combination with the images... would be unethical. He didn't have a good reason as to why the @OCD page didn't just resteem content they liked. Hmm, interesting. Here's why the page doesn't just resteem the quality content they find:
Maybe it's because they are making over $100 per day regurgitating others content. And what do you think those people are making? A few new followers? The guy mentioned rewards, but as you can see never explained how one would get rewards. He also claimed they do resteem people, but if you look at their page do you see any resteems? I don't.
$100 per day times 30 days in a month... thousands of dollars each month, tens of thousands each year. And for what? Generating interesting and compelling content? Or exploiting others for financial gain? Screw these people.
Curation has always been encouraged on Steemit, and there are a lot of accounts that do it quite well, including @ocd. I wouldn't discover a lot of n00bs were it not for these curation posts. @curie is another one with a HUGE curation vote along with it, but your post does get linked in one of their posts. It's designed to help. @chiefmappster has been great to help new Steemians on the platform, and in fact, he basically jumped right in and started helping n00bs from the beginning when he was also a n00b. He has good intentions to help people connect with others, and is doing it quite well.
Many users simply don't pay attention to resteems, and a lot of users keep re-steeming to a minimum as it buries their own content, but by taking a few moments out to direct people to awesome content is designed to help new users, not hurt them.
I have a series called Cool Stuff Curation for this purpose, and it has helped a number of people connect with cool blogs they wouldn't have otherwise found.
Creating an entire account where you make over $100 each day from other people's content is sketchy to me. Where are those funds going? In their pockets. Curation is rewarded on Steemit through resteeming. Profiting off others content without giving them any of the money you earn is unethical in my opinion. I have managed to build followers without this kind of "help" and over time, your quality posts will earn money. That account never resteems, never posts anything of their own... People always want to skip the whole "doing the work" thing. Users who want to make tons of money immediately from mediocre content, and users that make money off of others are both doing this. I don't see how this helps people. Learning how to improve content, engage authentically, and RESTEEMING people's content so they get MONEY for what they created is what Steemit was built for. I am not making judgements on who these people are, but as marketing and content strategist, even if not intentionally, this seems exploitative to me. If this was all about giving back, the funds earned from this "curation" concept would go somehow TOWARDS the people who make the account possible.
I appreciate your opinion however and how it adds to this conversation.
That's what Curation Guilds do, and they have a lot of whale support behind them. Also, many higher-reputation users (including myself) consult those guilds almost exclusively for new, vetted, high-quality content.
I just hope this doesn't isolate you from those fields of vision, because those folks really are out to help you (I promise those new followers pay off...I've been here since last October and have seen it personally, but it does take time. Those votes do keep giving.) and they have lots of whale support and Steem Power on their side to do it.
In this particular example, maybe he just didn't explain very well (or at all) what the scope of this project was. He also said they resteem posts, but I do not see any of that on their page. And ultimately, his tone of that asking was a "formality" also rubbed me the wrong way. As I said in my post, there are legitimate concepts that do actually help noobs, and I support them. But without better answers and explanations, this particular outreach felt wrong to me. I will keep an open mind in the future, if it makes sense to me. Thank you!
You accuse @ocd of scamming when they do not post your content, just highlight the post they nominate in their roundups of under represented quality posts. It would take just one more click from the page you posted to see that. Yet you abuse #introduceyourself to get visibility and bots to vote on this, when there is nothing about your work in this post. The only one gaming the system here is you.
I've already explained my perspective and don't feel the need to do it again. I'm scamming the system for less than $2? Their page makes thousands per month. They also acknowledged that their representative gave me false info. Enough.
That's still unfair. They vote on the post they feature and five at least 20$ per vote ... that's around 100$ per day at the minimum. Maybe correcting or acknowledging your issues might be a good idea. I get your intentions were good, but you made a mistake, it's only human. Just notice it and that's fine.
Upvote and resteem and followed you. Thank you for this blog
I' am also new on steemit.
Welcome to Steemit @alanajoy, I have upvoted and sent you a tip. Check my blogs if you are looking for tips on how to earn more Steem and SBD.
This post has received a 0.78 % upvote from @drotto thanks to: @earncrypto.
Thank you so much, I appreciate this!
I just joined so I'll be sure to look out for those kinds of comments. Thanks for the heads up.
You're welcome! Believe in yourself and believe in Steemit, that you will get there without being taken advantage of. Welcome to Steemit!!
I can't believe that anyone would let someone else copy and paste their original content. That's just absurd to me.
Also, if they are copying original content (and photos) from others, then cheetah bot and steemcleaners should be all over it! But I bet they're not, seeing as how ocd daily has a 62 reputation.
Exactly! I can't believe this guy was trying to act like he was doing me some kind of favor! Not cool. Not cool at all.
This post received a 1% vote by @minnowsupport courtesy of @discordiant from the Minnow Support Project ( @minnowsupport ). Join us in Discord.
Upvoting this comment will help support @minnowsupport.
Thank you @minnowsupport! As a legitimate way to help bring attention to content I was happy to shout you out in this post!!
Hello, I have not had this experience yet, I'm probably not important enough for these guys.
But it's good to be prepared, just in case they contact me.
I see a lot of people just blindly following other, upvoting empty content because others upvoted it. Or falling for tricks like these.
Which makes it all the better that some of the steemians alerts the community to this kind of behaviour.
Thank you very much for that, I'll be following you.
Thank you, I appreciate the resteem very much. I will be sure to follow you back. :)
I am new to steemit too and one of posts which I thought would be quite 'hot' went kind of invisible to everyone. One of the curators from ocd approached me with the same message as you and I said yes and they added my post next day in their daily issue. My post went from $2 to $21 after that.
So yes it all sounds well and good here and they all look/sound like helpful people but I have exactly the same questions in my mind.
It all looks kind of shady and making $100 off posts which is not something you actually 'made'.
I would get over all this if the money was used for some project or for helping newbies but apparently all the money goes to the so called 'curators'.
Unless someone from @ocd actually explains what it is all about I will say this only looks like a clever way of making money.
Exactly. I feel like my questions were reasonable and instead of explanations, I got the attitude of that I should be grateful to let them make money off my content and as if they were doing me some favor by asking that had only something to do with my images and not my IP. Feels like a scam to me.
It sure does. Really require answers here.
I agree with you on this. I have seen these guilds, but never put much stock in them. Seems like they get all the fruits off of others labor. I myself don't use them. Followed.
Indeed! Thank you, I will follow back! :)
Welcome here @Alanajoy:) Nice post, i will follow your account, please follow me at @khunpoom
@khunpoom, I downvoted you because you are a bot who votes on something when it appears in the #introduceyourself topic and you post the same automated response every time. This is neither helpful or useful to the community.
This is very insightful and informative. I have never subscribed to any bot. I don't just trust them.
Thanks for sharing this. I will be on the lookout. Thanks
I totally got your point! I'm agree with you! I think they are taking advantage on people who work really hard to daily make a post... You have my support on that!