Sunday Reflection: RELEVANCE, Network Marketing and What Bid Bots Remind me of

Many moons ago, I used to write for a weekly publication called "Emerald Coast News."

As I was perusing various topics on Steemit, Facebook and other places, I grew very aware of the great number of complaints and accusations of scams, shady businesses and the way people "manipulate their way" to the top of success ladders.

So many people feel they have been "wronged," somehow.

History repeats itself

With some resignation, I realized that I have been writing (mostly "analysis" pieces) for what we might call the "Opportunity and Entrepreneurial Press" for longer than half the people on Steemit have even been alive: 33 years and counting.

You see, "Emerald Coast News" wasn't a regular newspaper or magazine, it was a periodical for "income opportunity seekers" and those interested in network marketing, as I was, at the time.

I realized that the more things change, the more they stay the same. I know. That's not my saying, but it fits here.

Although vastly different to look at, the landscape of Steemit isn't all that different from a circa 1988, or 1998, or 2008 "income opportunity."

At least not from the perspective of examining the inevitable "Cast of Characters" that seem to congregate anywhere someone opens a gateway to freedom, income, wealth, a better way.

The Dichotomy of "Good" and "Bad" Actors

Just like it was true 30 years ago, much of the "energy" of our beloved community focuses on the eternal "conflict" between what we consider to be the "good" and the "bad" actors.

Of course, good and bad are pretty nebulous terms; we could also call them "heroes and villains," or we could have "the light side" and "the dark side."

"Come to the Dark Side! We have cookies!"

Kidding aside, all these venues have good and bad actors; and they always have had. It's an inherent part of the human condition: Someone "invents" something; some people legitimately want to develop it; some people want to manipulate and exploit it. 

To even think that Steemit could be exempt from such things "because we're on the blockhain" is folly. 

But is Steemit REALLY an "Income Opportunity?"

Well, no. And yes. No more or less than Amway, one of the world's oldest and largest network marketing organizations — in business since 1959.

For many of us here, Steemit is a social blogging platform where we can publish and share a variety of content, using a growing number of front end applications. That we get paid is a sort of cool — but ultimately secondary — consideration.

Similarly, for many people involved with Amway, they are a manufacturer and it's simply a line of products they buy and use in their daily lives. The fact that they sometimes get a royalty check because a friend ordered some products is a secondary consideration. 

On the other hand, many get involved in either project purely for the money.

What's more, both are legitimate aspirations!

That Cast of Characters

Without identifying the structure within which they are operating, the "cast of characters" tends to be consistent, whether you're dealing with Amway, Steemit, or a great other number of "ideas" that involve people coming together and using some kind of "system" or "method" to attain an objective... that's usually a "reward" of some kind.

You've got the Central Structure; you've got the Builders; you've got the Early Adopters; you've got the Sincere Hard Workers; you've got the Peripheral Service Providers; you've got the Eternal Idealists; you've got the sketchy Snake-Oil Salesmen; you've got the Scammers and Users; you've got the "Churners;" you've got the Tireless Promoters... and then you've got everyone else. MOST of whom are struggling to reconcile their pie-in-the-sky dreams and aspirations with a somewhat harsh reality.

Oh, and "everyone else" is probably about 95% of "the population."

"95%??? You've gotta be kidding!"

Because most people who will read this are likely to be fairly active here, odds are you don't give a lot of conscious thought to the fact that more than 800,000 of Steemit's one million accounts are pretty much "dormant." 

Some were never used at all; some were created and used for ONE day and then forgotten; some where used for a little while and then abandoned as "too difficult to use" or "disappointing." Which leaves maybe 10% who are tiny redfish and minnows struggling to find any sort of traction.

So, About Those Bid Bots...

Yeah, I'm getting to it.

The Bid Bots remind of those people who were constantly sending us ads about their "service" which was a "secret system" that would help people succeed in the main business. 

"Just $39.95 for our amazing system!" they'd say.

Of course, the "secret" consisted of becoming an affiliate for their system, which basically entailed persuading others to spend $39.95 to get the "secret" system. 

There actually WAS no "system;" the system was persuading people to buy the system; an endless "resale" of the same dollars... what we loosely labelled the "Churners."

When questioned, Churners always had the same two responses: One, that the people they were selling to were making sales they wouldn't otherwise have and two, it's somehow "better" to make $100 as a result of $5,000 in sales than to make $100 as a result of $250 in sales. 

The logic, of course, is faulty. 

In reality, it takes far more effort and risk to process $5000 worth of sales than $250 worth of sales... all to make $100... and ultimately, the only people actually making "more money" were the purveyors of the service. Not the people BUYING the service.

With Bid Bots, you give them $25; you get back the equivalent value of a $25 in votes; some people spend as much as $500 to get $500 in value... the only way YOU are better off is in creating the illusion that a lot is happening... and your rep score increases faster. 

Meanwhile, the Bid Bot operator is collecting CASH money for something most users are giving away for free... that's a pretty sweet deal! If you're them...

You Mentioned "Relevance?"

Yes, to close the loop here... a couple of days ago, I wrote a piece about the difference between "Quality" and "Value" when it comes to Steemit content.

The word I didn't include was "relevance."

When we use the web, we tend to gravitate towards content that's relevant to us. Relevant content adds value to our online experience... but "value" is a general concept, while "relevance" is very individual.

So we can't plan the "total community" around relevance. For example, I can recognize that posts about motorcycle repair add value to Steemit, but they don't add relevance... for ME. 

So when we talk about adding "value" to the community, it may take many different forms... many of which may not be relevant to a lot of people. But the value is still there.

As a curator, I come across a good number of posts that don't really have much to "offer" me, but they still get an upvote because I see they offer value to a group of people with a particular interest.

How about YOU? Do you recognize the different "players" on Steemit from the "Cast of Characters?" Do you think there will always be "good" and "bad" actors in any system? If there were no rewards involved, do you think people on Steemit would behave differently? Do you agree that something can have "value" without being "relevant" to YOU? Leave a comment-- share your experiences-- be part of the conversation!

created by @zord189

(As usual, all text and images by the author, unless otherwise credited. This is original content, created expressly for Steemit)
Created at 180520 16:50 PDT