Let me ask you this: who is currently curating? The rewards for curating are scant, so I know there are probably some things in place to correct this, but how many quality curators will want to do this daily?
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Not many people are curating at all - most votes come from minnows who are hoping they will receive a reciprocal vote, and not really understanding that they'll get a fraction of a cent as a result.
Here is a challenge for you - spend a day solidly curating - and be sure to try to find stuff that was not written in your time zone. Then collate how much you have made from the effort, and how many writers you managed to get to. And then write up your results.
Keep an eye on your Steemd profile: https://steemd.com/@stellabelle
If your voting power falls below 50% you need to take a rest. It is currently showing at 96.44% which means you haven't done much voting in the last five days.
You are a dolphin, right? It should be an interesting exercise to see how effective dolphins can be. If it turns out that dolphins don't have much effect at all, then it is up to the whales to patrol the site curating to make it work. But we won't find out until someone with proper dolphin power is willing to do the experiment.
We need to fix it. The platform is getting ripped off paying too few people too much money for too little work.
The ones getting paid too much must decide the formula for dispersing the curator funds. Voting is not rational or profitable for 95%+ of users. So hardly anyone is curating. I think we agree on this and I haven't explained myself well. Currently the rewards for curation do not encourage enough people to curate.
I think we both agree that the number of curators with a measurable effect on a post should be larger. Everyone wants this, then more content is reviewed and more users can make money curating so they don't have to post as the only option for earning income. This would create 1000's of income streams for users and free up room for serious authors to be reviewed.
And, let me repeat, blogging should not be the only form of income. We need to create more ideas on this, and then have the results of our efforts be in blogging form. Many of the top creators are professionals: programmers, video bloggers, artists.....the point is that THEY ARE DOING SOMETHING ELSE BESIDES WRITING. That is my main point here. The writing comes afterwards, as they are documenting their work. Not everyone can be a successful writer. More stress should be placed on different disciplines: teaching, outreach, parenting, running a business, programming, etc........... making films, you get the idea...
Yes agree 100% on same page, Curating should be a form of income for more users.
Those other avenues of income are not related to the platform. If some one wants to be a teacher or programmer this is not relevant to the discusion of optimizing the platform or payout of posts and curation. Unless they will be monetized by blogging or curating. Those are the only current mechanisms to reward income for any effort related to the platform.
We are left with two streams of income, posting and curating. 100% of users will have to derive any Steemit related income from those two sources.
There is only ONE discussion that matters and that is optimizing the use of those two rewards to facilitate growth of the platform.
I wrote a blog proposal about changing curation rewards but you can find it if you havent.
how things like running interest groups (i've been admin in a few over on facebook it's hard work so rewarding those who do it well would be amazing), a steemit version of instagram or a steemit wiki,
I'm so happy to see this discussion StellaBelle. I think blockcodes has explained the current problem with curation. As a minnow, when I upvote a post that I think has merit, it does little to nothing to reward the writer financially. Whereas, if a whale or two upvote the post, it produces a larger payout for the author and the whale benefits with a large curation payment. Aside from upvoting and commenting because I like a post, I have no financial incentive to do either. I just do it because I'm moved to by the content.
Steemit is promoted as a community where people can earn a payment for curation, commenting, and writing good content. If new members who don't have a lot of steem or steem power quickly realize curation and commenting don't pay off financially, they'll try writing content... or they'll leave. Good content can generate excellent payments, but only if it's noticed. And then the whales jumping on to upvote is what seems to result in posts being noticed and the higher rewards for all.
I think some of the ideas mentioned, like storefronts and maybe contests, could provide a form of payment that might keep people in the community. As a writer, I'm excited by the potential audience here and interaction with other creative people. Thanks StellaBelle!
@dragonslayer109 is just one example of someone who is already doing a great job with his/her Daily Pick of Hidden Gems which directly addresses the question of Minnows getting lost in Steemit's initial growth spurt 'Data Shock'.
I imagine in due course many more curators will organically arise in various specialist categories and sub-categories, becoming the gatekeepers of quality content. Creators via Curators to Consumers - Consumers 'value' the service/product in the marketplace via feedback (comments and upvotes) - Feedback loop back to Creators on what the 'market' needs/wants.
I suggest the 'market' in and of itself will determine the course of future content on the platform, rather than trying to second-guess what the market wants . In other words, fit your service/product to the Steemit marketplace rather than trying to fit the marketplace (Steemit) to your service/product/content. This is a fundamental mistake many make, and then having spent endless hours creating products/services/content; become frustrated to learn that the market doesn't actually want/need or highly value such items.
Watch the market. Produce accordingly. Give people what they want rather than what you think they want.
I worked as a Curator in the physical world (Wholesale distribution between Manufacture and Consumer). I believe if you are creating great content that the marketplace wants and needs , there will be no end of curators willing to distribute said content.
Rewards are not necessarily monetary.