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RE: Redeem and Forfeit - A Steemit Story
I'm so glad you wrote this! Not to say that this could be about Steemit but this is almost exactly how I felt when my accounts were downvoted by several insignificant trolls. And the fact that people just said that their vote doesn't affect my reputation. That's not the point! The point is that how that could even happen? It's not about what can be done afterwards but what could be done before.
But I'm sure this was just a story and not about Steemit. By the way, where's the other valley? I'd like to know, just in case. ;)
Thanks for commenting, Insaneworks! Yes, this story is indeed inspired and directed towards the flag button here on Steemit. It really doesn't have much other effect than giving the trolls a weapon, and to give the rich the right to censorship for whatever reason they want. The story is meant as a warning. I strongly believe the flag button is a threat to the whole Steemit platform, as most of us have no interest in people flagging our posts, especially when the flags can take our income away, even for no reason at all.
About the other valley, there are other alternatives out there, and more will come for sure, although Steemit is as far as I know the first and the biggest. I've been publishing some links to my posts on Steemit and my wordpress site on Ong.social lately, which is a very interesting decentralised platform similar to Facebook where the users gets the payment for advertisements. It has a blog function as well although I still haven't really started with that. The bad news is that it has been down for several days now, probably because they are having trouble with the launching of their own cryptocurrency which should be up and running quite soon. Time will show who'll win, but Steemit would have a lot better chance if harassment weren't a part of the system.
You can also check out yours.org, although it does not generate crypto, people use bitcoin cash they have invested. Not the same, of course ;)
I'm not sure if the flagging thing is all bad, it sure has it's bad aspects in the wrong hands, but with it people can also clean Steemit from those accounts that harass other accounts or who just fill Steemit with stolen text / photos.
But what's really an idiotic thing is that someone can flag so that that account can't be flagged back. I think no account shouldn't be able to flag anyone else if they didn't have a post (a blog post or a comment) that could be flagged back.
P.S.
Again I really liked the story and the artwork too, not only the subject. :)
I see a point in being able to flag comments on your own posts and such, but the effect of taking away potential payment is just horrible. I don't see the point in giving any rich guy the right to cencorship either, it seems like a step back into the middle ages. If there has to be cencorship, there should be clear rules about it, not simply 'do not offend the whales'...
That's true. Clear rules. The flagging option was maybe created with good intentions but it has it's extremely ugly side too.