Interview a Steem Stakeholder Series - Interview with @steemed (500,000+ STEEM Stakeholder)
The Interview a Steem Stakeholder Series is a project to help inform the community about the views of the largest Steem stakeholders. The goal is to help "regular users" better understand the views of the largest stakeholders on the platform, so they can better align their actions with what the stakeholders are looking for.
In this post, @steemed (a stakeholder with over 500,000 STEEM) answered several questions about his views on the Steem platform and community. Below are the questions that were asked and responses from the interview.
Keep in mind that the stakeholders are individuals, and not all of them will share similar views. The views expressed in the interview are the views of the one stakeholder conducting the interview. They are not intended to represent the views of all stakeholders.
If you are a stakeholder with 100,000 or more STEEM and would like to participate in an interview, please reach out to me on steem.chat or Discord.
The Interview with @steemed
How did you become a part of the Steem project?
I started mining in the first hours of the first launch and the first hours of the second launch.
When did you join?
March 22nd 2016 or so.
How did you acquire a majority of your stake?
Mined it.
How many STEEM tokens do you currently hold?
Let's say I have 500k+ on the chain. Undisclosed amounts elsewhere and perhaps on the chain too.
Do you have a large stake in any other tokens besides STEEM?
Yup a lot.
What Steem apps do you use on a regular basis?
steemd
What would you say repels investors or otherwise discourages investment in the Steem blockchain and STEEM tokens?
Team leadership is weak. Ideas are weak. Steemit stake is too big. Team leaders misuse their steem. Team leadership can not properly manage internal conflict. Lack of promising ideas. Lack of leveraging user base and existing token supply effectively. Mismanagement of existing token supply. Poor PR. Ill-conceived and unaddressed posting reward pool exploits. See all of above for why investors see little hope in making any progress on central economic issues. Shall I go on?
What would you say attracts investors or otherwise encourages investment in the Steem blockchain and STEEM tokens?
Fast, feeless, censorship resistant. None of these properties are adequately leveraged by the team. They don't even get it. I've tried. Like talking to a rock.
In addition to holding tokens, how else are you involved in the project?
I support some projects with my vote proxy, like burnpost, creative crypto, and sndbox.
What types of things do you do specifically to get a ROI on your investment?
Nothing. My proxy earns a small income in the way of voting rewards.
What are ways that "regular users" have potential to affect your investment in a positive way?
Use the platform.
What type of contributions do you consider to be adding value to your investment?
See the projects I support. There needs to be better curation efforts, whales should support this type of thing rather than looking at steem as an income stream. All whales that got in early are rich from other coins. There is no need to treat steem as a revenue source for most of us. Why not just leverage your voting power to improve the content. That said, if the posting rewards were better implemented, then using one's proxy to improve curation wouldn't be entirely necessary.
How do you discover and reward those types of contributions?
Oh, you mean post types, not projects. I proxy to the above mentioned projects. Problem solved.
Do you delegate SP to any projects? If so, what types of projects do you support?
sndbox, creative crypto, burnpost
How "hands on" do you expect to be in projects you support?
0 after I proxy my vote. It is valuable enough that the people entrusted to it have tons of incentive to use it effectively.
What type of accountability reporting do you expect to see from a project that you support?
None. I trust the curators I have proxied. They do great work.
What do you look for when casting witness votes?
People who aren't suckups to steemit and the team. Humility. Understanding of what is important about the platform.
Do you have strong views on any of issues that are frequently discussed, or any upcoming changes?
I am drifting away from day-to-day interest in steem. I'm just going to proxy my stake and see where it goes. I have time. Lots of it.
What would you like to see more/less of from "regular users"?
More platform use. Regular users are great. Insiders suck hard.
What sort of profit margins do you hope to see for your investment?
For my proxy: I don't really care. I may never liquidate. I'll support the project with my proxy for a long time. I have no interest in taking profit now or in the foreseeable future. I have made enough of an exit to ROI many thousands of times over already.
Do you have a time frame for how long you plan to hold STEEM? Or a price target?
I have some bags no one can track to me. Looking for $6+ on those. On my proxy, visible to on the chain, no horizon at all.
Do you believe that the delegating of SP to bid-bots as well as self-voting/circle-jerking is harmful to long-term ROI?
Only if the early team, insiders, and steemit do it. They know who they are.
What factors affect your decisions to go after short term returns that may hurt Steem in the long run vs. decisions to take a longer term strategy?
I'm always long term now that I have ROI'd. I'm not a typical crypto trader. I don't look for stable income or quick flips except for some masternodes I have in other coins.
Are there other forms of obtaining a good ROI from STEEM that you think will be possible in the long-term?
Yup, sell when adoption and value accumulation is much higher than now.
What do you think is the biggest disconnect between stakeholders and "regular users"?
The biggest disconnect is between steemit, the early team, and insiders with "regular users". Steemit, the early team, and insiders all got cheap, risk-free coins, and are largely known abusers of their stake.
If you strike it rich from STEEM, what do you plan to do with your money?
I've already ROI'd plenty and have diversified. If I unload further bags, I will diversify that as well.
Is there anything else that you would like to add that wasn't covered by the questions above?
Yeah, the team should look at what is important in crypto and try to achieve it, not chase trends. The reward pool should be evaluated. Onboarding new users should be improved. SMTs is a silly name, a concept of limited potential, and may have been exciting in 2015, but not in 2018 (or 2020 when I expect the release). Sadly, I doubt it will increase adoption at all. There are plenty of token platforms. Steem would be a great platform for smart contracts or sharding of some sort, but the team is working on useless tokens. Unbelievable.
I've often thought about the "negative" side of Steemit Inc holding so much Steem tokens, and honestly, if I was to subscribe to the default position, that is, the "devs need to have less than % percent or it's a scam" mentality that many people on the cryptosphere shout at full lung capacity, I would feel this to be a point of concern, but I'm very far from there now.
They way I see it today, is that as long as Steemit Inc is using their huge stake to support projects that can help mass adoption, I'm completely fine with it. Because, relying on the altruism of people seems to be betting on the horse with a cracked hoof.
Do I think they are perfect? Of course not, but who is? Who on this platform, or in any cryptocurrency project really, can say... So and so is taintless, a perfect member that has never made a mistake. That is a unicornian persona no one has ever seen.
So, as much as I can respect this stake holder's opinion and I do, I think his critiques fall short of being constructive by a foot or two. Until I see a huge stake holder taking on the development side of things, not only saying "Steemit Inc sucks, they know they do", but also putting forth a solution, starting a dapp project with huge potential (they've mostly been started by devs, not investors, and sometimes not even backed by them) I think their position is too comfortable.
"hey guys... fix it.... i got my bags to sell.."
I mean, don't get me wrong, they got their right to sell anything they want, their stake, if its mined or not, it's not relevant. My point is that the position is too comfortable to be objective.
"someone fight my war for me... i wanna win too"
Now, I say this, not because I have something against this stakeholder or any other one, not at all. he or she (i dunno and that's ok) could be the nicest, kindest human being in the world, I would not know.
All I'm saying is that it seems to me that a lot of people who were dreaming about building a better future, maybe with the STEEM blockchain have thrown their hands in the air and said - "if we hit the iceberg it won't be my fault" - and that to me is somewhat tragic.
Sorry for the little rant.
Big stakeholders already put their stake towards development when steemit spends their ninjamine on development. When steemit spends their ninjamine, the sell pressure negatively effects the price. This is predictable future downward pressure, and the selfish thing to do in this scenario is to sell. By not selling, and by proxying to value-adding projects, a large stakeholder indirectly contributes to development in the amount by which the value of their holdings is diminished. It's perfectly quantifiable.
Furthermore, consider that @ned, a founder, was given what now equates to about 9M STEEM from the ninjamine in the first days of launch is now down to 2.5M. This means that he has dumped about 6.5M STEEM since launch. @ned demonstrates the selfish way to deal with sell pressure from steemit.
Also consider @dan, who is the same individual as @dantheman. Between these two accounts, @dan had what equates to 9M STEEM from the steemit ninjamine plus about 1.5M STEEM mined as @dantheman. Look at those accounts now: he is down to about 700,000 STEEM, meaning dumps of about 9.3M. That is insane considering 9M were given from the ninjamine and 1.5M were mined with insider knowledge at the time of mining. I won't go into what I mean by "insider knowledge", but insider knowledge of a project can create an enormous advantage when mining if that knowledge is witheld from the rest of the miners.
Non-insiders such as myself did not have this knowledge and had enormous risk with our mining. If you are curious about the sources for these advantages and risks, I can explain, but not here.
So I think that your criticism that I am too passive is completely misinformed. I think it is entirely reasonable that I would want @ned (who has sold over 2/3 his ginormous stake), @dan (who sold 90% of his ginormous stake--and abandoned the Steem project for EOS), and steemit to work more efficiently to add value to the Steem platform. The early dev team has been paid handsomely, without the risk experienced by us outsider miners.
I am proxying my vote, watching my investment get diluted by selling from both steemit and the team (@ned, @dan, and others). Don't you think this is enough and don't you think it entitles me to offer some criticisms?
On top of all that, the profits I forego to the projects I support goes into content that gets hosted on the platform, adding to its value. From my perspective that's a fine contribution, and it puts my money firmly where my mouth is.
@steemed first of all thank you for answering me, honestly never expected you to even read this, and I must confess and accept that a lot of the comments I made were not directed towards you per say, but more to some others who have used their ninja mined stake for bidbot delegations, or just straight out plundering activities, while at the same time attack Steemit Inc every chance they get.
So, for what's its worth, if you felt this was an attack on your persona, that's my fault and I take responsibility for not choosing my words more carefully. As I said, you could be the nicest person in the world, I would not have a clue, because up until my comment, I had no idea (on me, not you) that you even existed or that you helped sndbox as you have.
On your criticisms of Dan and Ned... When it comes to Dan, I must say they are well placed, because he seems to be repeating this confusing pattern of "i'm all in let's change the world" followed by "the community and i didnt see eye to eye, so i got out" - and its undeniable he has sold as much as he has, its all there on the blockchain.
I'm of the unpopular opinion (among my peers) that absolut altruism can never work, hence why I'm more accepting of Ned selling, since he is still here and trying (if he is doing awesome or not is another subject all together) to move the train forward, and of course this includes Steemit Inc.
I could not expect any development to be done, specially to this magnitude without it being handsomely rewarded since in the cryptospace all good jobs pay very well. A starting position for a blockchain programmer in a respected company is about 150k a year, and I personally know a few that make double that. (this reminds me of the .com era - overvalued, but I digress).
So, to make my point clear. Thank you for responding, for being civil about it, for even reading. Please know that the pulp in the drink I served was not intended towards you and it would take a second for you to know what characters do fall under that label.
This may not be the place, so I won't insist, but I would be interested in chatting with you regarding how you've not been able to convey your ideas to Steemit Inc with the hopes that I or people I work with can reach them in one way or another.
It is also comfortable enough to be honest.
Possibly, but it comes from a whole different angle... If I feel as if the possibility of the house burning down just means I will have to rely on the other homes I also have to my name, the value of the charcoaled property is subjectively lower from my position of "choices".
But, your point is valid nonetheless.
Well, there's some nice "straight talk" for ya!
Although I am just one of those "everyday users" plugging away at creating content, what @steemed shares here supports a particular perspective I keep coming back to, wrt to large early stake holders: "Odds are you've already made bags and bags of money on this project... wouldn't it be a better idea to try to increase the LONG TERM value of your holdings through community involvement, rather than worrying about how you can milk the next $200 out of the system TOMORROW?"
Maybe it's because I have a long background in investing that the short term perspective bugs me so. Worrying about your income tomorrow is not investing, it's basically gambling and opportunism.
It's nice to hear a large stakeholder share that kind of perspective.
And thanks @timcliff, for creating this.
I was reading this and thinking to myself, “Hmm...I don’t remember doing an interview with Tim.”
Maybe I was on the right track after all. Good to see other people (even a guy who can’t stand me) recognizing exactly what I’ve seen for the past year and a half. I do feel a bit...
Validated.
Now...if only people started listening to the invested and potential investors. Maybe then we could accomplish some amazing and truly revolutionary things here (with blockchain tech and social media, but mostly the former).
Great interview @timcliff!
@steemed has been absolutely instrumental for our community and public initiatives, and we're extraordinarily grateful for the opportunities he's provided for creatives all across Steem. We're doing our best to leverage the momentum he's afforded us and pass support on to others. The long-term vision is critical and we need more big-picture conversations like these to ensure the longevity and impact of this blockchain.
What an amazing kickoff to this interview-series, @timcliff!
Very interesting thoughts from @steemed. Will probably have to read through it one or two more times.
I also have a question towards @steemed, regarding:
I've written a post 2 months ago called Does STEEM need Smart Contracts? and I'd like to hear your opinion about it.
Thank you!
So much honesty in this interview. I like.
This is the kind of thing I wanted and didn't even know it @timcliff lol. I appreciate @steemed for not sugar coating anything. I'm already looking forward to the next installment.
Thanks Tim. This was a great read. Had me captivated through its entirety. I liked @Steemd’s blunt responses. No sense in sugar coating or beating around the bush. Who’s up next?
I love how he delegates almost all SP to 3 projects and trust them to use it to add value to the platform. Live by example. Love it.
Stay tuned to see ;)
@steemed - can you please expand a little bit on this ? what are your reasons behind this outlook on SMT?
Needless to say the bullish outlook on SMT is the prevailing consensus so interested to learn about your position.
Sounds like they have their head screwed on right :) There are definite issues with the leadership of Steem and that is scaring people away. I hope to see things improve soon. I'm speaking as someone who is still enthusiastic about Steem after 2 years.