Ep 4 of 4 - Upvote Bots and the Future : Interview with a Top Curie Curator @carlgnash.
Welcome back for episode 4
Earlier this week I headed down to Springfield, OR to meet up with @carlgnash.
For those who may not know, Carl is one of the top curators for @curie and has recently been elected as a Curie community representative. We met up at Plank Town Brewing Company for beers and a great discussion about steemit content curation.
Our talk is broken up into four episodes:
Episode 1 is about curation and some tools to use to help you find posts. Click here to watch it.
Episode 2 we talk about Curie. Click here to watch it.
Episode 3 @carlgnash talks about his current curation projects. Click here to watch it.
Episode 4 we talk about upvote bots and the future of curation.
Episode 1... Episode 2 ...Episode 3
Thank you for watching this series and a big thank you to @carlgnash for talking with me. I hope that steemians out there were able come away with some more insight into content curation and the role it plays related to the health of steemit.
If you would like to learn more about @humanbot, This post will get you started.
https://steemit.com/curation/@carlgnash/what-human-certified-original-works-means-to-me-a-totally-unofficial-mission-statement-from-just-one-person-in-a-decentralizedIf you are interested in what kinds of posts are considered good content, I would suggest reading some of @carlgnash replies in the @humanbot link drop post.
Carl gives some great advice.
https://steemit.com/curation/@humanbot/the-humanbot-curator-incubator-and-link-drop-v2-0
Here is the link to a step-by-step tutorial on how to join the @humanbot curation trail at steemauto.com - the process is the same if you want to join the @r-bot vote trail:
https://steemit.com/curation/@humanbot/join-the-humanbot-curation-trail-on-steemauto-com-step-by-step-tutorial-support-human-certified-original-works
If you are interested in Curie, You can drop into their steem chat channel and meet some folks.
https://steemit.chat/channel/curie
The SQL query is a great way to find posts that you may have not seen before. After trying it out briefly, I can see already how it would be a great asset for a curator to find the kinds of posts they would like to find.
If you would like to set up your own SQL query, read these two posts by Carl:
Curate like a Boss - A Beginner's Guide to Querying SteemSQL (by a complete SQL beginner)
Curate Like a Boss pt.2 - A Beginner's Guide to Querying SteemSQL (by a complete SQL beginner)
A special thanks to @fronttowardenemy for filming and editing video
Keep being Cool Steemit!
Fantastic job guys! (bit low on the beer count though).
Not sure I agree with the flag concept in general(let alone flagging people who use the bots - but I'm new to this stuff);is it like using a built in feature to stop a built in feature which is ...err indirectly being abused, hiding the true abuser (I'm confused)...I kindda feel like bots might need to go via some form of vetting process, where they are officially accepted by the community
Is it possible to have some sexy coded 'bot on bot' action, and create a bot to seek out people who transfer to known and widely accepted bad bot and drop a message on their post to say "hey everyone" the content you are reading may not be worthy due to excessive bot use...caution!!" hehe. might even suggest, a possibility this be flagged my human whale and scare minnows a bit more as they may not know it's so bad..
I think for sure bad Whales need to stop and think a bit (but pretty sure some might consider this paid bot thing a different way to achieve pump and dump result & couldn't care about platform) and personally, I choose not to use the paid bots after watching this (so well done Carl, a converted viewer)
As someone new to Steemit (and still limited understanding)I perceive the platform having two major issues that need tackling/understanding/work.
Yeah the use of paid vote bads has almost become de rigueur. To be clear about where I think flagging is appropriate, I don't think it should be (or usually is) directed at small users who are getting a few dollar upvote at most. There are serial abusers of the vote bot services who continually pay large sums to get their content featured over and over on trending pages of categories - check out @stellabelle's recent post summing up exactly this. These large bidders are the ones who make the vote bid service profitable for the owners, and unfortunately until/unless the risk of flagging, consequent REP loss and loss of capital that was being recirculated through the bid bots becomes a real and persistent danger to these serial abusers I doubt they will stop. I don't necessarily care or think it is a huge deal if new users want to use a service like minnowbooster for small upvotes - I don't think it is actually doing them any good, and I would discourage it, but I wouldn't advocate a flag there.
RE Steem being perpetually created - how is this different from Bitcoin being perpetually created (mined)? Each system of course has its issues - but I personally feel like the centralization of power in the hands of large coalitions of miners is a much more worrisome issue that faces Bitcoin than anything I am aware of that faces Steem because of the reward pool mechanism.
Cheers now I understand the flag thing a little better, I didn't know it makes the REP go down as well.. so thats also good disincentive. Nice that targeting the worse users to make example, but even as a small fishy I will avoid now as well as don't want platform to suffer. I will probably still use resteem bots (giving curators a chance first), for some exposure though as this seems less bad and its tough out there.
So before I joined Steemit I mined a few alts with my GPU & I have dabbled with trading a bit. Basically by virtue of the way new coins are made i.e. Steem there will be no ceiling, unlike bitcoin where pretty soon, you will not be able to mine anymore. Hardcore investors (who don't care about mining and who has the power) want to invest in coins that are rare and just make money. For instance there is only 17 million bitcoin in circulation and can only ever be 20 million, where with Steem there is already 240 million. These investor who are use to dealing in silver, gold etc, perceive worth in this way...this one I'm not newbe at and trust me it is effecting Steem price. It maybe as the market matures people will realise its about what you get vs. the number, but for now, it's not seen this way by many hardcore investors.
Not sure, but I think these posts would be really interesting to investors who patrol the steemit tag as well
Great point RE the tag, just commented such to @doctorcrypto.
I see what you mean about the steadily inflating reward pool. To me the key is going to be if the number of onboarded users here can increase exponentially from the current figures or not. This is somewhat of a chicken/egg thing - perhaps the steadily increasing total sum of STEEM is discouraging some adopters of the platform, but I think most likely that would just be for the folks looking at it as a crypto to invest in, and not necessarily interested in the social media platform itself. The more people that join, the more people the reward pool is divided out into and the more the relative value of each STEEM unit. I read somewhere that absent of outside market forces, the user base would have to double each month to counteract the inflationary forces. In the short term that seems totally possible. And in the long term, by the time the user base is large enough that this kind of exponential growth is no longer possible, it would likely be a moot point anyway! Once the user base is in the millions and millions of active users, I don't think anyone will care that the total supply of STEEM is steadily increasing. The use case isn't necessarily as a store of value, but as a way of REWARDING value :)
I really appreciated your well considered thoughts on the video, and here in comments too.
While Sybil attacks are worrisome on BTC and other PoW blockchains, they require boots on the ground: at least 50+% of hashpower. Steem has a different vulnerability.
Witnesses, not miners, control the Steem blockchain. Witness votes are stake weighted, meaning that whoever bought at least half the Steem extant would completely control the Steem blockchain, including SMT's. You can just buy control of the blockchain, and probably wouldn't really need anything like half. You'd only need half if there was completely united opposition.
If you were sneaky about it, bought accounts with substantial holdings without fanfare, and voted in new witnesses quietly, who introduced subtle changes gradually, you could probably do it with as little as 25% of the stake currently supporting witnesses (I guestimate about 20% of extant Steem supports witnesses now).
Whoever's stake was sold would haply float off into the sunset on their golden parachute, while the rest of us tried to cope with @zuck, or whoever now owned all our content.
@lukestokes phrased it a little differently commenting in the hubbub on @blocktrades recent post on making curation more profitable, talking about being able to force an unwanted fork with enough stake.
Same idea.
Yeah this is indeed a real issue and part of the problem with concentrating more and more of the total Steem pie at the top, which is what vote bot services do. If Steem can grow to have fewer (in relative proportion to total user base) whales but more (engaged) dolphins and big minnows, it will be a much more secure platform. Check this out:
I pulled those numbers about a month ago (11/5) but I am sure the picture is still largely the same. 32% of SP supports witnesses. Of course there are many large stakes accounts associated with steemit inc employees that aren't allowed to vote for witnesses, which while it seems to make sense on first blush (to avoid the look of impropriety, centralization and insider control) also serves to keep huge sums of Steem worthless from the blockchain security standpoint. Those employees have a vested interest in the long term success of the blockchain. Should they be allowed to vote their stake toward witnesses who are doing a good job? Interesting question.
I reckon in the event of a Sybil attack, they sure as hell should! Super informative bro, I was way low on my estimate.
Thanks!
While inflation does decrease the value of tokens, it also decreases all currencies, and that doesn't keep investors out of them, unless it's like Zimbabwe level. The real problem for investors is that inflation isn't countered by growth. ~11% of accounts from 2016 remain active, and that includes bots.
Unless Steemit grows the market for Steem, which it can't do if it sheds users faster than a white dog sheds on black pants, the only reason for investors to touch Steem is to profit from delegations and vote sales. This isn't an industry common to the genre, and Buffet warns not to invest in things you don't understand.
Investors aren't familiar with vote-selling services. Investors are intrinsically familiar with capital gains, which user retention would potentiate. Inflation isn't really the problem IMHO.
Gave me a chuckle.
Thanks!
@doctorcrypto @carlgnash, really enjoyed the whole series... it gives me a sense of comfort to see that there still is a strong "content based" population on Steemit.
(I'm going to toss an upvote at each segment, but I'll limit my comments to this one...)
I've been doing the "content-for-rewards" gig since 1999... and this same story seems to play out, over and over.... and even though each new platform claims to have the "secret sauce" to make theirs the one that's the exception, every single one seems to go TU.
There are always the same two groups of opposing forces:
Short Term money vs. Long Term investing
Content Creators vs. Money Makers
Of course, those are gross generalities... but I'm sure you get the picture. And you probably already recognize it. But it always turns out the same... the short term/make money group threaten "The Goose that Lays Golden Eggs." And it's tough. Carl, you talked about how it's bred into us to reach for the short term carrot... and VERY few people are able to recognize that "$100 a month for life" is actually a LOT more money than "I give you $1000 right NOW!"
I do have a soft spot for @curie... I think maybe it was my 3rd or 4th post here that got a huge boost-- which was awesome-- but I'm otherwise one of those weirdos who lives on 100% "organic" content; everything in this account was built through interaction and manual curation.
This is all a complex issue, but on the whole I agree 100% that paid upvote bots have the potential to cause Steemit to cave in, unless something is done.
I have no issues with mega whales wanting to make money, but why can't they rent our their 100K SP delegation blocks to known manual curators rather than to sketchy upvote bot services? Heck, even with 20K SP, I could do a lot of good... and so could a lot of other people who both read and create content, every day.
And then there is the darker shadow that looms... does STINC even care much about the Steemit front end? Or is this just a sort of glorified sandbox for the greater scheme of taking over the world through SMTs? Sometimes I feel like we're not getting so much attention, here... which I bring up because I feel that would be a huge MISTAKE, since Steemit is basically the "mouthpiece" for all other Steem projects... and if the mouthpiece "wilts" and becomes a hoarse whisper... wouldn't that doom pretty much the entire show?
Anyways, I will stop rambling now... good show, enjoyed it!
All great points.
I think a whale delegation to @carlgnash s @humanbot project would cause some good ripples in the pond.(or any other curation project for that matter)
There will always be someone trying to milk the system unfortunately. Letting it ruin the system is the problem and there are quite a few people trying to figure it out right now. Let's hope the solution comes before it's too late.
Thanks for commenting!
I really have to say kudos for this prescient comment. I have been online since the 1980s, and everything you say here about other platforms is spot on. It's so true I long ago gave up on them, and even social media.
Steemit has potential to be different, which is why I bother having an account here. The indications are presently that the inexperience of the whales with creating a market for their currency is causing them to fail miserably at creating that market, and instead concentrate as much of the token as possible in their own wallets in competition with each other.
You point out that these guys are milking the platform for a couple grand a month, but destroying millions of dollars of value in their wallets by killing the platform, and I agree. All they seem to be able to realize is that they don't have to fill out TPS reports anymore, and all the n00bs suck up to them, so they're just living in the moment.
There is no vision, no attempt to graduate Steemit - or themselves - to the next level.
I really hope you are at the Steempanel this weekend, as your experience and lucidity might offer the only hope Steemit has of reversing this dive into the mass grave of misfit creator reward sites.
Thanks!
Hey really nice to meet you here @denmarkguy and thanks for the thoughtful comment. Yeah these general issues are not unique to Steem and will undoubtedly follow humanity into future endeavors as well. What gives me hope about Steem is that it is decentralized enough, and there are enough cool people here, that real change can and does happen relatively quickly here. People can identify a problem and have the tools in front of them to create a solution all within the basic mechanisms of the blockchain. It is all a two-edged sword. People can use that freedom and these tools to scam and scheme and wheedle or they can use them to create and love and share. It is my honor to contribute to Steem the gift economy, not Steem the paid-upvote economy.
Thanks for these interviews. I enjoyed watching them and learnt some stuff too.
Thank you for watching and commenting. <3
A rare voice of reason on Steem. Thank you!
But of course :) We need to make that voice louder so all steemians can see the big picture.
Thank you for your support. That means a ton.
Great talk guys. Very well explained!
I wish that I was as articulate as @carlgnash. He has a way of explaining things well.
Thank you Carl!
It takes two to tango in an interview. Thanks for doing it!
Resteemed by @resteembot! Good Luck!
Curious?
The @resteembot's introduction post
Get more from @resteembot with the #resteembotsentme initiative
Check out the great posts I already resteemed.
You were lucky! Your post was selected for an upvote!
Read about that initiative
How Ironic. :P
The post deserved a vote. It is a good post.
This video practically explains why my prices are so cheap, and not really related to upvotes. The upvotes are bonuses, not the product itself.
I didn't want to work with whales, and I didn't want to sell upvotes.
The problem is that I am a lot less popular thanks to that, and I actually earn less money because of these upvote bonuses. (Because I don't have the free SP to upvote my comments)
This is also why have the newbie promotion.
Users with < 30 reputation only need to pay 0.001 steem or SBD
I was a newbie as well, and know well how hard it is for new users to start.
I wasn't knocking your upvote. :) I just thought it was ironic that this was the post I get randomly selected. HA!
I like your bot concept of helping the new folks out as opposed to "give me one dollar and I will give you two even if what you are saying is garbage."
@resteembot lets the power stay with the people.
I love human bots! Good to speak to the person behind the mask. I can tell you that @doctorcrypto specifically asked me about your service, because he (obviously) uses it. I told him that I approve :) I used resteembot for a while myself, and I thought the way you set up the requirements and pricing structure was very elegant. There will inevitably be a lot of spam in the feed of a service such as this, but some very minimal hoops to jump through cuts down on a lot of that. Resteem.bot didn't have those requirements and was a pure "pay what you want" service but it was absolutely crammed full of junk.
I think a service like this isn't even really in the same category as selling upvotes. There is no limit on resteems that I am aware of, except for the limits of your willingness to bury your own content in your feed and your willingness to inundate your followers with resteems. Honestly I see a service such as yours which kind of takes on these negative aspects while resteeming your post to a wider reach as a nice service to the beginner on Steem.
there is a limit to resteems as well.
If I do too many, my followers would leave, becouse I'd flood their feeds.
I have to balance them.
Maybe I should put in a big bid to a bid bot and get this puppy on the trending page, huh?
Heheh Nah. Gotta walk that walk. :)
Hi @carlgnash, @doctorcrypto.
Please read my comments in this post and give your opinions.
Actually - maybe you can help with some advice.
I want more newbies to use my bot. People with almost no money, who just started steemit. People who can basically just use the 0.001 given by @bottymcbotface and start using resteems immediately.
// I'm even considering changing the program to return this 0.001 after they send it, but... I'm a bit afraid of spammers.
It's a win-win-win.
But... How do I reach all the newbies?
That is a good question!
And i'm not sure I have an answer.
Other than the same way everyone else tries to gain notice on steemit. posting, commenting...etc.
For new people there is such a learning curve that you don't want to overwhelm them.
DM me on steemit.chat @carlgnash
One more thing.
I didn't realize that until now, but thanks to your videos I know it now.
My bot is good for experienced curators.
The curator finds a post, gives it an upvote and a resteem, and then resteems it with @resteembot as well... that would make the post more popular and eventually it could earn the curator some extra money, right?
Thank you for your videos!
I guess I'll start thinking about marketing to curators as well...
Those are two great points.
#2
"Not only that, but curators can also find newbie posts in my feed of resteems (posts that might not be upvoted yet)"
Very True. I'm going to give that a whirl tomorrow.
Yes, at least theoretically. Although the more likely scenario is a handful of extremely low weight votes come in as a result of the resteem. Not that this is a bad thing - I hadn't actually thought of using resteembot as a way to resteem posts that r-bot and humanbot upvote, but I will do this going forward. I don't like to resteem posts on either of those two feeds because I want visitors to be able to see the relevant blog posts which tell the mission statement and progress reports. This would be an easy way to increase visibility on some of those good posts that are upvoted through humanbot and r-bot.
In the beginning @resteembot actually had an upper limit for reputation. Users with more than 45 reputation weren't allowed to use it.
You also weren't allowed to resteem somebody else's posts.
The idea was to limit the abuse from whales and spammers.
I changed that when I realized that experienced users could give resteems to minnows, without polluting their own blogs.
@doctorcrypto, @lordnigel made a good suggestion RE the tags for this post - I think you could swap out "life" for "steemit" as this is very definitely a Steemit related post and "life" is pretty generic
Yea I wasn't sure when I first started posting this series. I know steemcleaners are sticklers on that one. Changed