Trash topics, trash tags
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. This is true. Just as one man's trash is another man's treasure, but there is trash that is trash to everyone.
How do we arm ourselves in the war against SPAM?
SPAM officially stands for Solicitations, Pornography, Advertisements, and Marketing, but it has come to encompass so much more. On Steemit we get;
Solicitation (Begging)
Follow for follow, upvote for upvote. BUY MY VOTE TODAY! If you send me money I'll resteem you.
Pornography and Plagiarism (and plagiarized pornography)
A recent cornucopia of posts that say"DISCLAIMER: This material was found on the web"
Advertisements (and Asshattery)
"Nice Post, upvoted"
"I upvoted you, upvote me"
"Very good photo"
Mooching
Posting a comment on someone else's post and self-voting it.
The best armament against SPAM is creating quality
Take time to write thoughtful comments when you read people's work. Take time to read people's work.
I can't begin to describe how many time's I'm upvoted just for being me. Don't get me wrong I love the money, but the last few weeks I could have posted 200 bananas and made $1200. Read what people post, then show interest by creating thoughtful comments that spark discussion (or better yet inspire more posts of equal or better quality)Post about what you love! Forget trying to find what other people love. Post your passions and it will show. People will share in your passions and upvote you for being human and a little vulnerable.
Quit begging! Seriously just stop. Now, saying "upvote and resteem isn't begging it's a call to action and that's fine. Begging is JUST saying upvote me or resteem this. Don't post crap just for money.
Don't be in it for the money. The money is here (lots of it) but if you're in it for the money you won't see much of it at all. Instead be in it for your passions. Seriously, simply do what you LOVE to do and share it with the community. The money will follow!
Don't support spammers
When you see SPAM, don't upvote or resteem it!
Paying for SPAM tells the spammers this is ok. Instead of supporting spammers, look for posts about things you love and upvote the authors that bring you value.
What is Value?
Simply put a valuable post is one or more of the following;
- Entertaining
- Educational
- Scientific
- Literary
- Artistic
- Emotional
So yes, your memes have value. Your opinions have value. Your garden is valuable. Your SPAM and lotteries are not valuable.
As always, I steem for my Kids...
Please share your comments on the #waronspam
It's good to see this movement begin, or at least start to get some momentum. #WarOnSpam
The only exception I would take with your examples of spam would be what you call mooching. I see no problem with liking your own comment if that comment is a genuine, thoughtful comment. There is something that rubs me the wrong way when you see a comment like "Great post. Followed. Follow me back?" and they upvoted that. However, that is more because of the spam comment then the upvote. The upvote at that point is just icing on the spam cake.
#WarOnSpam
#mmmmmSpamCake
Yeah the self-vote is still something I'm on the fence about. I've heard great arguments from both sides...
I'm still new but my eyes are opening quickly. I will just keep writing what I love :)
Good plan! I'll drop in and see if I love your blog too.
Just upvoted you! Keep up the great work @timeshiftarts
By your low reputation I'm going to guess you have not been practicing the principles in this article.
How do you think the #waronspam can help you to be a better Steemian?
It's almost like we all knew a comment like that would show up. #waronspam
Right? ... it was the very first comment too ... absolutely amazing
Nice post. Upvoted. Followed. Resteemed. Retweeted. Shared. Followed. Follow back? Upvote back? Resteem one of my posts? Send me 100 SBD?
Or you even get those people who comment something not even relevant to the post! Can't be any more obvious! @timeshiftarts
Nice sunset.
Oh I mean yeah I get all of those and more. It's sometimes disheartening how much of a swarm of idiocy there is.
ok
I do upvote several of your posts because I like them :) but thank you...
Not asshatery! LOL! Thank you for listing the things that make a quality/valuable post.
Absolutely. Quality isn't just super long diatribes of well researched information. So I thought it would be nice to give people a jumping off point.
seems a well principled argument you have here
hope it builds steam
Slowly but surely quality is winning the war.