My response is going to be a lot different now that I know you're not quitting.. And hopefully a lot shorter! Though I still want to comment on a couple parts of your article and it might end up being rather lengthy as these things often do.
It is very hard to get someone who benefits from the way society works to admit that the society has issues as it would threaten their perceived benefit.
Would you be willing to make changes to your society if in doing so you thought you may be in a worse position as a result?
I felt like this was the part I wanted to respond to most.. You hit on a very important aspect of all this.. It is very hard to get people who are benefiting from the way things are to change their ways. And some people feel entitled to so much, that comes at the cost of violence and tyranny.
How to get them to stop wanting so much that is unjust? Not easy. Somehow you have to make them aware that morality and honor are important.. Somehow being honorable and caring needs to be popular like something like 50 shades of Grey is, or Harry Potter, or football.
To me it seems like it's cooler and cooler to be on the "dark side".
We'll be able to do nothing but consume and enjoy leisure time with friends and family or do whatever else it is we would like to do.
I also wanted to respond to this part.. I think there will always be many jobs robots just can't do.. That's my opinion, maybe I'm wrong.. But.. Especially in regards to arts and things.. I don't think humans will ever get tired of buying and selling artwork, the currency may not be in dollars or steem.. But, I'm sure we'll continue to find ways to reward each other with value in ways that don't involve the necessities of life if we are able to get to that point in the future.
Don't want an RFID chip in your right hand? Boom, basic credit denied for you and yours.
This is a valid concern, however.. Maybe it won't happen, and maybe it won't happen because people like you stick around and speak out against it. :)
As impossible as it seems to change things sometimes, it seems even much more impossible if we don't confront it all.
Glad to hear you didn't leave afterall! We need more skeptical people in general, but also here on steemit as well.. I do agree with you that there are a lot of people who are perhaps a lil TOO excited, and aren't asking more critical questions of what is all going on here..
Me personally. I want to encourage new better technology, and this appears to be better in numerous ways than what I was using.. So.. I'm still endorsing it and will continue to until I know enough to say no.. But right now, it could go either way.. It could be a scam, or it could be one of the most important technological/moral leaps for us in quite a while. To reward the people more who contribute to social media, I think that's good. We need more and more ability for the small artists and activists and whatever various kinds of people who contribute time and energy and effort to make more back for that.
So.. Until I find out this is a scam of some sort, I will continue to try to promote technology that appears to help regular people more.
Thanks a lot for taking the time to respond @apolymask. Your input and opinions mean a lot to me and I am always happy to hear them.
Of course I have decided to stick around and this is because as you say there is no way of knowing yet whether this platform is a positive or a negative in the long term and whilst my initial reaction was to walk away from something I couldn't trust, I have spoken with others about it and their positivity and dedication to ensuring that steemit is a positive has led me to the decision to stay and help make sure that this becomes the case but I must also admit that the initial outlook isn't good if the majority of the decision making power lies with only a few members at the top which seems to me to be the way it is now. Why can't someone just coming into steemit have the same voting power as anyone else?
Thanks again buddy! Wish I had more time to respond a bit more but I'm a bit busy today.
Hope you are having an excellent day yourself my friend!
Good question, I've been thinking about this for a while now. I'm not sure I understand all the dynamics enough and the model does concern me.. I see people making like thousands of dollars for somewhat trivial posts and I'm making like less than a dollar per post posting about some really interesting stuff.. It's frustrating in that respect.
Though it does appear as if they are moving toward more fairness, I hear the next hard fork which I think is in a couple days or really soon is suppose to increase regular peoples voting power. I think in time we'll be able to improve this system and make it better, though.. If there's a social media that comes out that is even more fair, I would use that one as well.
For now this is still way better than the other ones, and maybe it will become even more fair in time as well.
Thanks for the well wishes and same to you! Glad you're not quitting. :) You're one of my favorite people on here.
Thank you @apolymask! That means a lot to me buddy! You are also one of my favourite people on here because you post about what you want to post about and share your thoughts honestly rather than posting things that you think will be popular and make you lots of rewards. :)
Hopefully the hardfork will make everything at least a bit fairer. From what I am hearing it should do!
Always good to hear from you my friend and I understand how hard it is to keep up with comments and stuff. I'm starting to find it difficult myself and I don't have anywhere near the amount that I'm sure you have to deal with! :)
Hope your day is going great my friend!!
Look forward to speaking again soon!