I am soon to reach my 20th day as a member of Steemit ... and have the hubris to feel that I have on an opinion on this matter - isn’t that the wonderful thing about this platform?
And you get to decide whether this opinion matters!
Forget about the metaphors for whales, orcas, dolphins and minnows, quaint as these are ...
It is a feudal system that best approximates the social relations that exist between members of this platform at present.
Image at .
Before you turn off because you think I am going to use this comparison to throw mud, hear me out. It is not my intention to foment revolution or throw stones at the designers. Far from it, after all, where was I when the design page was bare? My intention is to make an observation, and to suggest a possible solution. Perhaps you have heard this before, in which case this article may stimulate thought again; perhaps the suggestion I will make is new; perhaps it may invite a paradigm shift.
Under a feudal system, a privileged minority class (the nobility and knights) controlled access to land (fiefs), the principle source of livelihood for the masses (the peasantry), who were obligated (if they bought into the system) to turn it to productive use and pay rents, in exchange for protection, food and shelter, and limited other rights.
For Nobility read “whale"; for knights read “orca" and "dolphin"; and for peasantry read “minnows".
The “fief" is the Steemit platform and it offers a livelihood to the minnows; but in turn, minnows must produce articles of respectable content. This is the primary form of rent, but minnows/vassals are also expected to curate and vote. The compulsion to produce posts is driven by the financial incentive offered and the human need to be recognised. The protection, food and shelter offered is in the form of money payouts, the accumulation of followers and a respectable rating. Given the relative irrelevance of a minnow’s vote, it remains primarily in the hands of the whales, orca’s and dolphins to offer this.
Imagine the vassals attempting to raise one of their own to the level of a noble ... it was completely out of the question. It is equally impossible for minnows to elevate a newcomer (or an old-timer, for that matter) through the power of their votes.
Some resort to more active means of catching the eye of the nobility: strategies emerge to promote oneself. We engage in courtesy, improve our formatting, develop apps, report on statistics, get involved in the growth of tools that are useful for the community. Like me, you may join a writers’ guild and find yourself featured. You may originate a lottery and solicit participants. You may pursue being obnoxious and asinine in the belief that it may boost your followership, the idea being one, no doubt, learned on other social platforms, that any noise is better than silence.
Some become bitter and cynical; and these grumpy vassals turn on each other; or against the dolphins, orcas and whales.
Worse, others leave, never to return.
It is much harder to win back a convert once disillusioned, than to retain him/her as they deepen their understanding of the commitment required and the larger objectives being pursued. It is hard to control the bad press from a witness who testifies that he/she has been there, done that, got the T-shirt, but didn’t really enjoy the ride.
The reason for the departure of the new sign-ups, and of the unhappiness among the vassals, is that minnows quickly learn that they are thrashing about in a tiny puddle that does not have a meaningful canal joining it to the main ocean.
They realise that the space and comfort of the open sea is beyond their reach in the short, medium, and, if they do the maths, the long term. They correctly assess that acquiring the body-mass necessary to graduate from being a minnow exceeds a commensurate level of effort.
Let me illustrate: I haven’t found data reporting on the minnows (isn’t it interesting that we report on the top 50 or 100 to keep the coveting going, rather than the bottom 100 who we should be striving to develop and keep), but I am confident that new joiners (lets take those who joined in the last month) whose experience is ordinary (i.e. they have not had any lucky breaks), find themselves at the end of an exciting ride with a sense of deflation.
Image at
I doubt, very much, that in spite of posting at least twice a week or more, commenting frequently and curating regularly, such minnows have more than 500 units of Steem Power. That leaves them with a voice that is less than a whisper.
But Minnows are the very lifeblood of the platform. And don’t tell such a minnow about early adopter's advantage. That is an own-goal; that is a concession that you see this program as nothing more than a sophisticated ponzi scheme.
My uneasiness can translate into worn cliches about the rich getting richer etc, but that is not my purpose. My interest is in correcting what (in my respectful submission) may be a design weakness.
Whales, orca's and dolphins have a vague to clear appreciation that there is something wrong. It seems to me that most recognise that something must be done; but they aren’t too excited about doing it when it affects their stake. The recent reaction to the proposed hard fork illustrated this all too well.
Some of them adopt a philanthropical approach, manifest in efforts to reach down and lift. The Curie project is an example of these efforts.
Noble as these top-down efforts are, they are not going to staunch the haemorrhaging of new users that we are experiencing.
While these philanthropic efforts may help, a successful program of building a middle class or more complete class transformation through the generosity of the nobles, has no precedent in history; it is unlikely to be created on this platform. What we need are bottom up driven interventions.
Of course we could continue in our present way, telling ourselves that we are culling the weak to ensure only the strong survive; that those who leave were not who we truly wanted in our community anyway; that adversity breeds character; and so forth. But all of these platitudes do not address the fact that our primary goal must be to grow the user base of this platform.
The problem is that the minnows don’t have a sufficiently strong voice. It is perfectly plain to see - even to a relative newcomer like myself.
Leaving voting power with small teams of powerful curators, no matter how dedicated they may be, can never cope with the influx of large numbers of contributors. This quasi decentralisation will never be able to unlock the creative and participative potential of the numbers we hope will come through the door. It is instructive to note that feudalism originated in Europe in the wake of decentralisation after the collapse of centralised empires, and the resultant inability of these decentralised collectives to establish effective administrative beaurocracies that could maintain the structures of state.
The only way to limit the debilitating influence of feudalist structures is to trust the newcomers with greater power to score and up vote there peers' work. More eyes that can actually have an influence throughout the platform has a greater chance of delivering the popularity result that drives the reward system than concentrating this in a narrow group of elite.
Feudalism played its role, stabilising European society during the middle ages. But it was self-limiting because it limited the fair recognition of human potential. When feudalism came to an end, Europe emerged from the dark ages.
It gave birth to the renaissance and the reformation. If it had not come to an end it is unlikely that we would enjoy the freedoms or advances of the technological age that we do.
Feudalism has not left the earth. War lords continue to operate on its raw methodology. Even societies in a state of relative peace, like South Africa, can show features of feudalism. The African National Congress government under Jacob Zuma can be best described as a feudalist system at present. Zuma has created an entrenched network of party “chosen ones” who dispense patronage within their class, while offering interest groups within the masses access to state resources on conditions of fealty. Societies can slip easily and almost unconsciously into this state.
We should not think that Steemit is immune from this possibility. Feudalism is a result that presents itself as a consequence of unequal power distributions.
It has very little to do with the idealogical views of participants within the system; it is the crude product of power relationships that flow beneath all ideologies.
There were several factors that all played a role in the destruction of feudalism in Europe. War, disease and the spreading of ideas are all listed as contributors. What is clear is that in those instances where feudalism was replaced by a more successful order, societies grew up that were premised on an equality of liberty.
So I am surprised by the apparent shunning of this principle in the design features of Steemit. Steemit is fundamentally different to other social media platforms that each operate on a recognition system that is premised on equality.
Successful democracies, for all their other failings, are premised on the fundamental principle of the equality of the vote. So too are Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms.
Steemit is badly out of step on this score.
I can see how a stake based weighted system may have been chosen for a variety of idealogical reasons, but as we have already seen, it has produced a result whose curating features are cumbersome and clumsy, but more importantly unfair.
Let the people govern in this matter, rather than a small group of nobles and lords.
For the people to govern, they must have a meaningful voice; we have to strike greater parity between the power of those on top and those on the bottom.
Present proposed solutions to the problem all appear to be driven by a top-down perspective. However, It is more effective to drive interventions from the ground up. A combination of top-down and bottom-up processes is needed.
If we accept as axiomatic that the objective is to grow the steem community, by rewarding content, then, the present proposal underway (to reduce whale power) will not undo early adopter preferential position with respect to voting power. Given the size of their head-start, the gap will only widen over time - perhaps not as fast. This does not speak to a retention of new entrants; it only appeases the consciences of those who have got out ahead first.
Voting Power as a function of the contribution of work
At present, one’s voting power is a function of one’s stake (how much steem power is held). In my opinion, this is a design error because the weight of a stake does not bear a necessary relationship to the contribution of articles for the site. A bot is a perfectly good example of this: it is an account that has a heavy weighted vote but that has never contributed an article.
Those who contribute content to the platform should have the voting power, since it is they who contribute the product.
A revised system should disconnect voting power from stake, and should give new entrants a greater weighting in their curation roles. My up-votes currently count for nothing. It is pointless me reading critically for content. I can’t reward the author meaningfully.
One should still have a weighted voting system, but the relative difference of the weight of vote has to be more balanced, and simpler. This cannot be achieved by linking voting power to stake because of the massive differences in stake.
Image at https://assistly-production.s3.amazonaws.com, demonstrating an amazon award system.
Lets rather learn from other tiered reward systems that give status as bronze, silver, gold or diamond participants, for example. In keeping with those systems, the attainment of the status on Steemit should depend on production of work for the platform, and translates directly to the weight of your vote.
This can be achieved through providing status recognition to participants after writing say 20, 50 or 100 articles of longer than 1000 words (60, 150, 500 comments/replies longer than 20 words), that receive the approval of the community in a set number of up-votes; rewards being allocated when you reach 50, 100, 250, 500 up votes that are not bots; rewards for stimulating debate and commentary of 10/20/50 comments, and so forth. The thresholds have been arbitrarily set by me; there is a more scientific algorithm that can link this to the mean number of votes cast per person as a function of the total number of votes, or something along those lines.
A new entrant can have a voting power of 1, while a diamond has a vote of 5. All persons have, say, 40 votes per day. But all persons can through active contribution to the content of the platform, reach the status of diamond. Under the present system in place, newcomers can never catch the leaders; instead they remain second rate citizens, no matter their efforts.
We already have something like this in the concept of a rating score, although I still only have a vague understanding of the principles that inform the algorithm that determines this. But it would be a better proxy for determining voting power than weight of stake, as is presently applied.
Stake as a reward for excellence and rights to the capital growth of the platform
The concept of a stake must remain.
One’s stake should grow as a consequence of consistent rewardable participation in the promotion of the Steemit product. This occurs when your product is good (it receives a high number of votes); when you spot good product as a curator, early on; and when you make other decisions that build the platform, like investing your earnings in steam power, rather than cashing out.
Image at http://st.depositphotos.com
The reason one grows one’s stake in steam power is because of an interest in the capital gain of the stake that arises from the increased market capitalisation that is driven by the number of persons joining steemit and the demand for steem dollars. By ensuring new users keep joining and staying on Steemit, stakeholders ensure the appreciation of their capital gain. That is to say nothing of the capital appreciation of their stake through market innovation and technological advances made on the back of the Steem blockchain.
In summary
The achievement of content milestones should increase one’s voting power.
The relative equality of power of a vote ensures a better chance for the recognition of quality of work across the platform.
The relative quality of work is rewarded by income in the form of SBD and SP.
Other considerations
Of course one must exclude the possibility of sock puppets and sybil attacks. A single account for a single user is at the heart of equality. Second and further accounts must be outlawed, with the stakes of the accounts concerned either consolidated or auctioned off. This will necessitate user verification of one sort or another.
And why don’t we have an internal sharing system? You can share to members of platforms other than steemit. Here, for some reason, we can not create a viral effect.
Put a ceiling on any single payout an article can earn. Say $300 SBD for the sake of this discussion, which is more than any article needs. Earnings above this are at present a demonstration of the failure of the system due to over concentration of voting power, and should be treated as a reinvestment into the community. Members of the community can bask in the reinvestment by receiving an "after-glow" distribution of steempower, provided you have been active on your account in the last week. Otherwise, less radically, let it be given as SP to the author. Our objective is to grow the community, not make a few individuals wealthy.
Conclusion
The single greatest obstacle to the retention of new signups is the irrelevance of their views. This occurs at two levels. Firstly, because they have no reputation score, exposure or track record, it is unlikely that the content of their post will be valued for its worth within the period that matters. Secondly, their curation inputs are relatively worthless. As a consequence, generations of new users must wait increase of their SP, which, unless money is invested, depends on their recognition. Its a vicious cycle.
Why should there be a change? because a competitor will implement a fairer system and steal away this platform's first mover advantage.
Please consider following @vuyusile.
The old feudal system was upheld by the threat of violence, and so modern tax-based feudalism.
Steemit is NOT.... you are free to enter and leave. And you can start your own blockchain based social platform of your liking any time you want.
you are dead right; and somebody will; and if it works better, it will be the end of Steemit. Your comment does not explore how to improve the platform. Do you think that it is good to see so many people join and then leave?
I do not judge decisions of people i do not know. When Steemit has 100 mill users, things might look different. Minnow votes may be so numerous that they keep the best newcoming posts up. Everyone can work towards a high reputation and then start to make money. It just takes time and skill. You wouldnt want it any other way.
It just takes time and skill. Fair comment but also part of a consciousness that may be an illusion. Time will tell. Thanks for your comments!
Naw...it won't be the end. Who says more than once blockchain based system can't operate. In fact why not use more than one?
@vuyusile
Very, very good and thorough. Well written and zo the point. I especially agree with:
About the vassals / working class. We are just cannon fodder. We are replaceable. Nobody needs me or you. They just need numbers, a fresh influx of disposable no names...
This statement is intentionally harsh. But tell me that it is not true.
To conclude - Steemiz is not a democratic system. Period.
We don't have equal rights and equal possibilities.
Good ideas, but here are the flaws I thought in logic. Lower ownership of steem power: a powering down would instantly occur, as the value of SP has diminished and cannot be used in curation. Selloff =increased supply and low value.
Shitposts: putting reward based on content of a certain amount of letters and frequency could cause people to shitpost just to hit those numbers, clogging the blockchain with useless diatribe that no one wants to read.
Thoughts? Yes, if someone is putting out great content and saving steem power, that's a guy that should be rewarded (or gal). A combination of reputation, posting and curation regularity along with a bell curvish reward system could solve the problem.
Thanks for pointing these out. Lets have a debate around the flaws or improve the ideas.
I see the continued driver for ownership in steem power as being the interest in the capital gain. A sell off of steem power by accumulated holders is a good thing: it allows for a better distribution of SP. As the value of the blockchain grows because its user base grows, the value of SP will grow. Only now, SP reflects better value.
Quality of posts is a problem. But I trust people, all people, not just SP heavy people, with the power to discern rubbish from good posts.
I agree that a different algorithm is required.
Is there much difference between our social and economic system today with taxes on wage and property? If Steemit is going to be truly revolutionary it will have to find a new way of distrupution. I see this not happening right now, no matter how hard we try, our good intentions fall back into the roles we have played for centuries. I do not expect much from this system right now. I am very curious on its evolution though. I did make $38.00 on my last post. I had some weighted curation behind some votes....
Let's say the minnows gain power in mass, who's to say they will not start acting like a king? Lots and lots of philosophy, experiments, books, and articles written about this kind of human condition. Right now I am following the model given for success on Steemit. I am a horrible writer and a beginner artist with talent so I don't see any big time rewards coming my way unless I improve my skill set. I loathe handouts and crave mentoring. There is a lot of mentors to be found on Steemit. Don't know if that will help the distrupution of funds though. I am just beginning to understand crypto currency and block chain.
I want to set up a store with Steemit, that's got me excited!
We need more curators, right now I haven't marked any post down. I suck at editing and I still don't understand the roles being played here. We need whistle blowers without the trolls. We need honest curation, if I understand the role correctly, that votes up or down for the community and the individuals worth.
What I've noticed dealing with our conditioning we act according to the role we take on from past experience. We need to let go of the past while learning from it, most of us can't do that in our own lives, let alone in our jobs and places in our community.
I thought of the potlatch society whilst reading this post, giving away ones wealth as a status symbol and power. "The word “potlatch” is the English version of the Nootkan word “p’alshit'” which means “to give.” Material wealth is important among the Indian nations of this area, but by giving things away at the potlatch, families and individuals gain status. The potlatch functioned as a means for passing around among the members the surplus wealth of the society; the only thing that changed was the status of the individuals. Some people feel that the potlatch was the functional equivalent of taxation in modern society. Vast amounts of goods and wealth were distributed through the potlatch." http://nativeamericannetroots.net/diary/631
I also have read serfs and peasants of the feudal system were better off than the people are today. They also had more time off than us modern folk...
"During Europe’s Middle Ages even the lowliest of serfs had their own plot of land with which they could use for just about any purpose... This access to land acted as a buffer, providing security for peasants who otherwise were mostly subject to the whim of their “Lord.” Not only could they grow their own food, or hunt in the relatively plentiful forests which were still standing in that era, but connection to the commons also gave peasants territory with which to organize resistance movements and alternative economies outside the control of their masters.
[Land Enclosures laws in Europe in the Middle Ages] were a process by which land was taken away – closed off by the State and typically handed over to entrepreneurs to pursue a profit in sheep or cow herding, or large-scale agriculture. Instead of being used for subsistence as it had been, the land’s bounty was sold off to fledgling national and international markets. A new class of profit-motivated landowners emerged, known as “gentry.”
... The chief creation of the [Land Enclosures laws in Europe in the Middle Ages] was a property-less, landless working class, a “proletariat” who were left with little option but to work for a wage in order to survive; wage labor being one of the defining features of capitalism." Rebel Witches and the Creation of Capitalism book review of 'Caliban And The Witch: Women, The Body And Primitive Accumulation' by Silvia Federici, 2004 by Alex Knight .
Crypto currency is taxed as property? I don't know, I haven't looked into that, but taxation on property means we don't really own what is taxed. Bureau Of Land Managment has been confiscating commons, look up the "Bundy Ranch." I grew up herding cattle on commons land, which is now locked up and clear cut or mined, natural resources owned by transnational corporations and the Federal government.
These are some fascinating ideas - thanks.
For me, feudalism, whatever the apologists might say, left the world in the middle ages. When the system collapsed we left it and the enlightenment commenced.
Trapping ourselves in self-limiting social relations is the problem and the weakness for the platform at present.
Real progress started for societies when we pursued concepts of substantive equality, including in equality’s operation in the sphere of freedom.
Good idea, but how to communicate it to the community. Like most of the writers who follow to Feather author initiative don't use the award for its development and simply withdraw them. Including due to this they are driving themselves into the framework of feudalism.
Yep, we don’t have a share button so that we can’t create a viral surge. We are in the dark ages ....
But I want to note that not all people there to make money, idea of a decentralized platform for communicationfor is important for many people, and that's cool.
Of course. But most people are introduced to the idea that this is a way to make money off blogging rather than, this is a way to blog with the occasional prospect of a monetary windfall (oh and by the way, while you are keeping the platform running, some are going to make huge windfalls).
I hate being a Serf in Steemit. It is discouraging.
You are not alone, I am sure
I think all users should start with $100 sbd.
That way their vote does show up and the whales are getting less money for nothing.
That would help. Its frustrating seeing a few cents being added when you vote on something that is really worth your best shout-out.
It would benefit the top, too. They get the most votes.
#whalebate
These are good ideas. I hope at least some of them get implemented. This platform is a steep learning curve, but ideas such as these are powerful. Let's keep working on this as a community
thanks
I agree. The main thing is to build a following, but that's kinda hard when there's a big incentive for people to vote only on popular individuals, no matter what the content is. We look to these popular individuals to share the love that was given to them, but a lot of them seem to be powering down or voting on other steemit celebrities, which is kinda demoralizing for a mere minnow to see, as it means that even the popular are giving up their voting power for something. It's amazing how many hours people spend coming up with content for this, treating it with more love than they treat their own jobs. I get a few dollars here and there and it's honestly a privilege to be able to even earn money for posting content in the first place, but I still do remember when that chick earnt 30,000 on a steemits makeup tutorial. Those were the days, oh yih. Those sort of payouts seem to have died out.
Those days are gone, giving the present decline in Steem Price. That particular example is an illustration of the distortions that arise because of the weighting of votes: many whales voted that particular author for strategic reasons, hoping she would bring a following with her. That effect seems to cut across the purposes of the platform.
Those same whales could put their votes into creating more steem celebrities rather than focusing in on big curation rewards - they almost have enough already. I bet they enjoy the power though and the cash. Human nature, playing out on steemit I guess. All in all, the voting kinda reminds me of the stockmarket in a way. People place their bid (vote) down on something if they believe others are gonna see value in it - not entirely based on whether they personally like or even looked into the idea. The more value the post gets, the more curation rewards they get. They have the potential to kick the average joe's post into thousands of dollars basically. But, like a strategic chess player, voting on a celebrities post will yield a much higher curation reward at the end, as they have many more followers who will vote them up, simply for the same reason.
Unless you're really money hungry, working on something for steemit for 10 hours only to receive 3 cents sucks. And it's happening, a lot. People figure "what's the point, 10 hours gone and I got 3 cents.' At the same time, the new comers haven't seen those 30,000 dollars payouts to keep them excited over the potential. A few thousand is a dream enough, but 30,000 is nuts. Followers are the main reward for a minnow now it seems.
We shouldn’t let exceptional examples dictate how we see the normal. But unfortunately the problem remains a normal one. Notice some good articles that get huge up votes but no payout while some get few votes but massive payout.
your comments illustrate that we’re rewarding for the wrong reasons.
Thing is, if people understand that they should vote for the stuff they like, not the people likely to receive whale votes, the voting patterns of the whales are likely to change. Right now there is no incentive for that to happen.
enjoy the ride and writing ....good article !
There is something to be said for the stimulation of the creative juices!
Curation rewards: what is that? I've never earned any.
Why would I care about voting after 27 minutes, in the first 24 hours or 30 days after? Makes no difference to me.
Precisely
Oh yes, and there goes another meaningless up vote for your comment!
The useless upvotes festival is on! Here is mine!
I think the vote is a ''being friendly'' commodity for the minnows. It's only one way of signaling one's sympathy toward a fellow Steemian. Mutual good intentions is the only thing to gain from it and there is nothing to lose by it. You can toss it around like you don't care. It's no different than the thumbs up feature on Facebook or the favorite star on Twitter, except here unfortunately you can't bookmark the post you voted for.
And that is another way in which we should be improving the platform. I am sorry that I can’t bookmark and store links to my favourite reads to go back to later. Its like doing research the old fashioned way, with research cards on which you annotate interesting information - only the links are so long!!
Look at the Evolution (button in the upper right corner above the graphic) curve of the Posting rewards versus the Curation rewards on SteemWhales.com. One has evolved in the last 10 days, the other hasn't. Guess which is which.
its undeniable - I hadn’t used the evolution key but now see its full implications.
While I agre, that it would be really nice to have a force multiplier for the upvote, that is what we need. Force multiplication for low stake, but good contribution users. That would level the field a bit, but leave the current system intact, and facilitate the decentralisation of stake, that is part of the design, as I understand it.
The difference between the system as described in White Paper, and how it exists in reality is realy interesting to see, and explore. I do hope the system moves towards the model as presented in WP, because it is wuite good.
A lot of things I assumed about the system were incorrect vs what is in the White Paper. While there were some changes to the implementation, it would be nice if there was a place that describes the current settings for the site logic, without delving into the code. :-)
I think that your logic is flawed. How would a fairer system be? A system where those who invest more get less? Good luck with that!
Those who are on top right now are there because either they had the money or the knowledge to invest at the right time.
I've seen the design of the competitors...frankly I am not impressed.
So if you had a someone interested in joining, you tell them to join an exciting platform where if you’re lucky someone may see you otherwise your work is destined to oblivion ....
The point is we must pursue growth of the platform, rather than reward to the early adopters.
I see your point. At this stage the platform should not be sold for the posibility of making a buck. Rather it should be promoted as a place where you can show your stuff to the world and maybe make some money out of it. In my opinion the main problem that we have is that the Steem Power that a user holds (AKA your influence on the platform) is totally skewed in favor of the large stakeholders. If you haven't yet read the post by @nonlinearone:
https://steemit.com/steemit/@nonlinearone/highlights-on-the-n-squared-voting-law-from-the-steemit-whitepaper
@vuyusile, Thank you for putting together this excellent and thoughtful post. It must have taken some heart to believe in Steemit enough to put your ideas out there. You trusted us and I'm glad you did.