I've been frequenting Steemit for 3 months now. My initial flush of excitement has waned and disappointment is setting in. This post may be my last.
I've posted a wide variety of content in the last 3 months - long, short, specialized, technical, general, personal.
My most successful (by earnings) was the technical statistical analysis. Some of these analysis posts took me literally weeks of effort to compile. To be frank, the earnings didn't justify the effort but the insight I gained was invaluable.
I've curated content, carefully selecting posts and crafting constructive and hopefully insightful comments. I've rewarded quality posts with my votes and in some cases, flagging with down votes. Day by day this becomes more difficult as the wave of junk just seems to grow. Hot and Trending is full of mostly garbage (if you're not into Food Pics or Bible and Motivation Quotes).
I've delegated my SP to worthy communities like Utopian and seen very modest (and frankly disappointing) dividends. I've learned about Beneficiary Rewards, how high they can be and how poorly they're publicized.
I've invested SBD in Promoting my posts and learned you need to spend A LOT to make this worth while. I've even moved fiat into SBD via blocktrades and coinbase to see how it all works and who’s taking commissions.
I've reposted things I've liked (and one I didn't) and still haven't figured out the utility and value of this functionality.
I've tinkered with public domain code like dsteem and steem-js to query the Steemit API. I've opened up and poked around the guts of the block chain with steemata.com. I read the White and now Blue papers and followed the blog posts of various core developers.
I've engaged in Discord channels both with humans and Bots. It's through Discord and the statistical analysis that I began to understand the role and extent of Bots. This lead me to explore the workings of the reward pool and the inherent advantage enjoyed by early-entrant members (Whales and Witnesses).
I've watched with fascination the battles being played out by high $$ users (e.g. @Berniesanders, @Haejin, @sweetsssj and others) and their use (abuse) of automation (bots). I've read various discussions on reward pool rape and manipulation.
I've come to the conclusion that the majority of content is increasingly optimized for Bots rather than humans. This enables competing publishing and social platforms like Medium.com to maintain a competitive edge in content quality.
Unfortunately the founders at steemit.io are either not listening or don't care, instead preferring to tinker with mobile interfaces (!?!). In my mind, their engineering debt needs paying down sooner rather than later.
Humans with high technical skill (or assistance) are optimizing their content and automating their posting and voting schedules to maximize earnings. While not an illegitimate strategy, their content ends up being somewhat soulless and frankly, not that interesting. Yet their critical mass and momentum garners more and more votes and followers.
The earning gap between Whales and Minnows continues to widen in what I think is an opaque, disingenuous and underhand way.
Minnows are told to invest in building relationships and high quality content creation, while successful users are investing in technical skills, APIs and Bots. There is an automation arms racing taking place in the shadows of the Steemit platform.
Steemit is fast becoming an ecosystem for bots with humans being marginalized and sidelined. Earnings from following the community guidelines don't come even close to those of the technically skilled willing to bend the rules.
While my education has been most enjoyable I don’t feel Steemit can be a viable income stream for me unless I'm willing to engage in underhand practices. And I' not.
Return on my effort doesn’t come close to my day job. I acknowledge I may be an outlier and this may not be the case for users living in other parts of the world. I’m just saying, it’s not viable for me at this time and my interest and effort will earn a better return elsewhere.
Thank you Steemit it’s been fun but I need to go make a living IRL now...
I understand all your points. Some things worse than others, but for me it’s still too early to stop. If you look back 12 months, there are lots of posts with people saying similar things and quiting just before the huge run up. I can only imagine what their account balance would be today had they stuck with it. This time next year it’s my guess we’ll be seeing the same thing. That’s my thought anyhow! It is tough to keep going with these prices though. I truly understand the loss of excitement. Thanks for the post!
Thanks for giving up on something worth not giving up on .
I'd upvote this if it wasn't whining about problems that can be remedied by participating and contributing to our very much open source community and effort. But it isn't.
I think it’s fair to say I have contributed quite considerably to the Open Source Community over the years. Upto and including Steemit. I’ve done quite a bit of work analyzing Steemit and feel quite qualified to hold these opinions.
At this time, this platform is not viable for users like me. If it suits you, that’s great. There are plenty of bible quotes and food pics to go around.
You know, your use of @smartsteem, @byresteem is kinda what I'm talking about. You resteem heavily (which is ok by me) and the content you do create is short, cryptic and spammed to all sorts of unrelated tags...
Clearly you're aware of the shortcomings of this platform as evidenced by your wallet. How are you personally helping to address them. In my case it seems all I can do is "whine". What are you doing? Show me a better way pls...
@matt-a is a smart early investor who is making the most out of the current version of STEEM by utilizing smartsteem.com . And no - as far as I can see - he is not using byreresteem.
Look, it's always easy to critize and to find flaws, but the truth is: the current version of Steem is much better than what I've ever seen before. Everybody can earn serious, serious money - just by participating.
Is everything 100% fair? No.
But life isn't either - at least for the individual: some people are born with more money than half of humanity will never earn in their lifetime.
It's not easy. It's hard work but we should do it for the pursuit of educating our fellow cryptopians. Getting paid for the work is definitely a reward, but is it really about getting paid or is pursuing the higher calling a better reward? Don't quit because the next person you help next might be the whale that brings bitcoin up and your investments to new heights. Anyways. Good luck!
UPVOTED | RESTEEMED | FOLLOWED | THANK YOU
I also noticed that you are not using the tags to your advantage like crypto, cryptocurrency, altcoin, money, finance, trading, bitcoin, etc... it might help get more exposure and drive up the upvotes.
This post wasn't about crypto and using those tags would be "Tag Spam". I discussed this in the three deep data analysis posts I undertook. Tag Spam is a significant flaw in the system and being exploited and abused by Bots, which explains why Trending and Hot are full of such random stuff.
While I agree it's not about the money, I'm concerned about the direction the development is going and the abuse that's happening behind the scenes. It's not a level or fair playing field and currently, the cheaters are prospering. The fact so few are aware and those that know aren't speaking up, bothers me.
I have only been on Steemit a short time but I agree with you. Somehow I was led to believe it was a platform for 'freedom of speech' people and other creators. But when I look at Trending or Hot posts, it seems obvious.
The vast majority are about Steemit itself or other cryptos. It's like site masturbation. Yet other creators are ignored. I think the bots and the people behind them are playing Steemit and other creators.
Unfortunately, @morningtundra, you're spot on in your dissection of the Steemit platform. "Proof of Brain" hasn't been working well on Steemit. Upvotes are not necessarily awarded to top content, and bad content can consistently get higher rewards if written by someone with higher SP. There are no incentives for curation and rewarding better content, because of the way the system is built (you get a higher yield from running an upvote bot). Good and smart authors realise this very quickly and either leave or lower the quality of their posts.
Steemit says it wants to be Medium, except better. But it's built to be like Facebook, except with the greedy, ugly side of human nature brought out for all to see.
Thanks, a very eloquent description...
I agree that the utility and use case for Steemit is novel and currently unique. Unfortunately Human Nature will sink as low as the current design allow.
After 3 months I get no sense that Steem.io is serious about moving the platform forward at a pace that will close the gap with competitors like Medium.com
While engaging the community for development priorities is good, there's a distinct lack of overall and long term vision. It feels like the road map is meandering along aimlessly.
I agree. Although new to Steemit I noticed my longer researched posts get no special attention. What is the point? Already I have posted lower quality posts to save time. It seems Steemit has become about Steemit itself and other cryptos. Looking into an infinitely reflecting mirror on mirror.
I fell out of love after my fourth post, but still mess around with it. I have to stay in long enough for my coworker to pay me back the $57 it cost me to get his account. He posts Bible posts, so you never know, he could make it back tomorrow. Haha, not really, he is posting the whole Bible. Real original content. I'll probably have to wait until Exodus before he gets that coin back.
Anyhow, I'm following you now, in case you do post more, and I think I'm going to post here, but after the week is up, copy them to my regular site where I make the rules. Some of the community here is good, so I will sort of stick around for a bit.
Thanks for sharing your view, and know you aren't alone in it.
Ah! He’s one of the cut and paste bible guys huh? Can’t say I’m a fan but if he’s persistent I’m sure he’ll make $$ to pay you back.
Yeah, but he's doing it for the right reasons and he won't resteem anything so as to not break up the continuity of the Bible. The weird thing is that he's only started reading it himself and is set on posting the whole thing. He doesn't understand much of it, but I guess he's trying to.
Anyhow, good to meet you and I will start picking through your posts. Cheers!
Is he typing it out by hand? Starting at Old Testament Genesis? Gotta respect him for that... what’s his userid?
@fromthebeginning. No, he has a pdf and copies it over, but then he has to reformat the whole thing because it's in two small columns and he's putting it into one. I was talking up Steemit when I first got on here and he got all excited when I said that nothing could be deleted from the blockchain.
He doesn't have a cell anymore, so the only way he could get an account was to buy one, but he also doesn't have a credit card, so I used mine and told him he could pay me back in Steem. I was going by the money I saw on Bible posts, not thinking he meant the whole Bible. After converting from US to CDN money it came to $57 and then the price of Steem dropped in half. Haha, I think it will be a while. I upvote every one for him, but that's only .02.
Oh and his computer crapped out, so he borrows mine to do it all. I admire his dedication so far, but he's only in Genesis now. There's a long way to go. I hope he can make a bit of $$$ at this. He's talking about Lord Of The Rings next, but I told him it probably won't be in the public domain for a long time.
By the time he finishes the whole bible it probably will :)
Hahahaha, probably.
What’s his username? I’ll upvote him for his sheer dedication (or madness)
It's in the reply above. @fromthebeginning He'd like that.
You raise many interesting points morningtundra, as do the replies to your post. I shall follow you in the hope that you return soon and that Steemit improves as it grows.
Unfortunately , I agree with u. This platform has some serious problems.
I hope you don't go but can see why you are frustrated. I'm new, so have not lost the newbie glow (yet). Gonna try to stick with it regardless. Good luck and I will follow you in case you stick around!
@morningtundra
I liked the posts I read from you, and even though I am not any kind of analyst, I would like to learn more about these things...
It always pisses me off when cool people leave the platform...
Maybe just wait a while, I have this feeling things might get better real soon...
@friendly-fenix thanks for the kind words and support. I'm not leaving forever, just don't think I'll post anything that takes any real time or effort to write. Certainly not until the platform and ecosystem gets cleaned up and organized a bit better. I know it's still "beta" so perhaps I'll be back when it hits "1.0".
Yeah, I believe it will, just chill... See you later then I guess!!!
I'm following you.
you're awesome @morningtundra and I'm glad to have met someone like you. I would'nt have met a great personality as yours if it was'nt for steemit. think about it. follow your heart. I will miss you.
I have been on here for a day and I agree with you. Much of what is being put on here is clickbait. I have a friend who thinks it will replace Facebook all I can say is good luck!
Need to remember it’s still “beta” and only been around for just over a year. First version of FB was rubbish too.
If it’s going to replace FB it’s got a long way to go. And let’s face it, the cool kids dont use FB anymore.
I have to agree with your points. If I had been here as long as you have my post would be strikingly similar to yours. I can poke holes in just about anything but this post is sound. I didn't come here for the money as it is not a motivating factor for me, fortunately. I came here to play with something built on top of a blockchain but the new user experience is shit. There's nothing good about having bots run the site. Discovering new people to follow is awful. It took me 3 weeks to find you and it was a complete accident. So, I hope you keep posting because I like following people on my wavelength. Don't leave just yet.
The Steemit team is technically subpar. They aren't focused on this platform, they are focused on their SMT token which is just a load of crap. The next phase of the web will not be so social as they think. The follower model and upvote model do not work well together. If you want new users to have a good experience their needs to be a level playing field. The number of followers is directly related to the number of upvotes. This means high user rank + high follower count can shitpost and still receive massive upvotes and rewards. The best comments are not rising to the top.
Steemit is not going to intervene and stop the bots. They want as many developers as possible building on their platform. Perhaps they just don't have enough daily active users so they like what the bots are doing for the site. It's kind of like when reddit started, the team posted stories and fake comments day and night until they achieved a userbase. Unfortunately, these bots are don't care about post quality. Just making money. I don't know if people believe in Steem. Most just take money out and buy other coins with proceeds.
We're in agreement. The concept is sound but the execution is awful. If you check out the charts on blocktivity it's clear Steem has big transaction volume. I don't believe the ~200K current Steemit users can out-transact Bitcoin Cash. The high transaction volume is driven by bots. Who frankly don't care about Tag-Spamming. Honestly, I think you get better community development in old fashioned Forums. Tapatalk is a testament to this.
no no no no! don't just focus on the "earnings" @morningtundra! think about the family you would leave behind if you go. we need someone as creative as you are here bro. please think about it.
These are very kinds words and thank you (sincerely) for the feedback @gideonchu. But to be honest, I feel the systems inbuilt earnings incentive is driving behavior for 99% of users. My Blog Feed is filled with junk even after carefully curating the users I follow. Hot and Trending have Posts that are obviously (to me at least) designed to harvest Votes. Something novel, insightful, entertaining is just so rare and I'm not finding it through all the noise. I need to step out and return later after a few (major) updates to the Steemit platform.
you're awesome @morningtundra and I'm glad to have met someone like you. I would'nt have met a great personality as yours if it was'nt for steemit. think about it. follow your heart. I will miss you. think of other many great people you'd get to meet through steemit.
same. except you obviously tried harder. I know its not supposed to be about money but when you earn .01 on a well written idea its awful disconcerting.
Whales say, "focus on the community not the earnings" while collecting big $$ for garbage content. And like you @garyfire, I can make more $$ per hour working a MacJob. The earnings promise is what motivates us to put up with the crappy User Experience and the buggy content Editor!
online magazines are clamoring for more authors and pay 20 bucks(at least) for 600 words of drivel. Check out The Independent Republic. he pays in LTC
Thanks, I’ll check it out....
great post. dont forget to follow me back :)
Yeah, the bots are worrying. I'm not going to give up though. Good luck on wherever your path leads.
Oh oh. Got it @remind.bot
Thanks for your words :) You spoke honestly and truthfully and your message will differently help me and others asses their actions and time slowly and carefully as this is only the beginning! It's still early stages and I'm sure things will get better and change accordingly, as they always tend to... If I'm thinking long term and maybe a little too optimistic ;-)
I totally agree with you. I'm a new user and I've already noticed the widening reward gap. I see good quality posts with very small rewards; I see the whales just rack up hundreds of SBD for every post with ease, which they fully take advantage of by posting frequently. I'd imagine it would be very hard for a new user to build up a following.
Witnesses in particular are pulling in crazy $$ running nodes. This gives them enormous advantages too.
Few whales get successful without bending the rules. Some more than others. Some discreetly and others blatantly.
i definitely feel like i've seen an increase in spam and bot content since i joined, rather than the increase in quality content and relationships i'd hoped would come from this model. thanks for explaining your experience
Great post @morningtundra. I resteemed it in the hope more will read and things will change for quality posters.
As a newcomer, I try to post subjects which should interest a wide section of worldwide audience who would like to know about what happened in my motherland in the past, what is happening now and anything and everything else we ordinary human beings would like to learn. MONEY IS DEFINITELY NOT MY AIM.
I'd be very interested to know why you choose this platform over say, FB, Medium, Wordpress etc. Are you willing to share?
Great post tnx for sharing I just upvoted check out my new post upvote resteem comment @glclipse
https://steemit.com/marijuana/@gclipse/stoner-on-indica