Can We Design Steem Applications to Display Content Better?
Disclaimer: This are just ideas and not meant to be taken as technical advice on the Steem Blockchain.
Despite the little experience I have in working with the Steem API one thing that completely stands out with most of the applications like DTube, DLive and dMania is that all of that content from those applications appears in the blogroll. It is obvious why this is happening. The Steem Blockchain is essentially one large database where all these applications store their information and hence it is accessible by sites like Steemit and Busy.org.
Steemit which is probably the main platform for all users seems to value either videos or written quality posts. Where does that live content sites such as dMania that basically involve posting a couple of memes with zero text? Can we have the next Instagram or Twitter on Steem? Is a single image worth hundreds or thousands in rewards?
dMania and Others
You will probably agree with me that a meme despite being funny should at least be used in the context of a post. An picture may be worth a thousand words but on Steemit most people prefer words that we can see.
It is, therefore, no surprise that most bidding bots have since banned any posts from dMania because in the true sense of things those posts offer almost no value to the platform. You can only imagine how chaotic the Steemit ecosystem would be if suddenly everybody was pulling hundreds upon hundreds of rewards by just posting a single image.
The question is, is there a place for applications like dMania on Steemit? Of course, there is. Therefore, if there is a place for these applications what can we do to give priority to text than to bare images?
Improving the Wheel.
One of the biggest strengths of traditional blogs that Steemit has overlooked is the way in which we compartmentalize and deliver information to users. In traditional blogs, you have the ability to create new pages which host different information that you would like to highlight and give priority to.
Social networks like Facebook and Twitter do this very well. On your profile page on Twitter, for example, you have a page for your media.
Having a page that only hosts your content from dMania, DLive, DTube and other such applications would be very helpful because this allows the posts with written content to take precedence on the main blog page. I think that the primary place to interact with content from other applications on the Steem Blockchain should be on those very applications.
This will also help push people to visit these other applications and interact with them rather than just giving them a passive glance on the Steemit feed. That will help build stronger communities around those applications as well.
I believe this to a be a genuine way to improve the way we use Steemit, Busy and other similar sites. While I cannot speak about implementation due to my little understanding of how the data is handled on the Steem Blockchain I would be very interest to get an insight into whether this is even achievable or maybe other ways we can go about this same issue.
Thank you for getting this far. I hope you all have a nice and profitable day on Steemit and see you in the next one.
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This is one of the most important things that need to be developed at the moment. Especially for services like Zappl that otherwise easily become spammy when viewed from the classical interface. Until this issue is addressed, awesome services like Zappl are useless in my opinion (or you have to make a second account just for them)
I think you just hit the nail on the head. I had a quick look at zappl and that is exactly what I am talking about. Viewing that on Steemit just looks horrible. If we all could make hundreds on a single 'tweet' and in this case a zap nobody would even bother on the quality of what they post.
Nice post
Thanks
I agree. A lot of quality content has been neglected or left unseen by the masses. Mainly because of those poorly written ones get on the top. Don't get me wrong, I mean those guys work hard for that following but I just wish there is a better way that we can do about promoting quality content too.
I think so as well. I always find it strange when I see a single image post with no single text with over 300 in rewards. That is a bit unethical and not giving those posts priority on the feed should be on of the ways.
You got a 6.03% upvote from @postpromoter courtesy of @deniskj!
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Beatifull. Good job very good, unfortunately invite you to vote me!! Awesome upvote
These are really good ideas. I hope someone is noting them.
Thank you. I am sure many people share the same thoughts as well.
This is true. We are all visual creatures and improving this will ensure that people spend time reading and seeing what a post is about.