RE: Ep 4 of 4 - Upvote Bots and the Future : Interview with a Top Curie Curator @carlgnash.
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.
- Paid for bot as discussed here (it's almost sold to you as this is how the platform works - this view needs changing..sux if flagging only way), and
- The way Steem is perpetually created on the platform. This makes it perceived as something not finite and therefore unable to reach the $ value of other crypto like bitcoin. Do you guys have a view on this? Cheers
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!