RE: The Value of Downvotes Explained
Great post as always Kevin. One of the ways I look at it is that it's basically impossible to solve the problem of "How do you know someone on the internet is real?" so effectively what we do is we say that someone's "realness" is proportionate to their stake. You prove your identity by acquiring stake. Of course, you can still acquire other accounts, but again they only influence anything if they have stake. If they have enough stake, in the eyes of the Steem Blockchain that account is real too. I do think there will be interesting opportunities with SMTs to introduce different types of identity verification measures that enable different schemes. If one can develop an oracle system which guarantees that one real individual is associated with only one account, you could alter the distribution mechanism and take into account that information. But IMO, there will always have to be a stake-weighted upvote/downvote system in place for the cryptoeconomics to work, one just might be able to alter the parameters based on additional information.
Nice post! What will happening, if someone resteem your post?
I think it really changes the face of discussions and establishment of trust when stakes are involved. Will be interesting to see oracles that can successfully tackle the problem of identity well enough without being too intrusive when it's out!
Well, why not 2FA? It's not like you'd have to reinvent the wheel. While some folks have more than one phone (I have... umm.. 5?) that at least is dramatic limitation on bots.
Then we'd need your phone number.
You got it when I signed up. The same as every account created through Steemit.com.
Bots just use fake, or temporary numbers, which 2FA would end.
Yes, you're right that was a brain-fart. We do ask for your phone number. My assumption is that the engineers determined that the costs of requiring that every user enable 2FA before being able to get an account (in terms of increasing barriers to entry and adding an extra step to the sign up process) outweigh the costs. Most people want us to be decreasing the friction in the sign up process not increasing it. But thanks for your feedback.
This might be an opportune time to examine the results of that decision, as but ~11% of accounts opened in 2016 - including bots - remain active.
Most people have been leaving. I'll take fewer signups, in exchange for a better retention rate, if that's the cost.