RE: On Voting Bots
Oh yeah, I feel like this needs to be a component of every discussion. Delegating to a bid bot is absolutely just self voting with the stake from the point of view of the delegator, but even more efficient. (Well except for shameless self upvoters that make sure they vote their own comments throughout the day to not"waste stake".)
I suppose a little goes to the bidder and the bidders gets some promotional value (questionable and even then, unpredictable), so it's better than the delegator actually self voting, but not by much.
One might ask, so what should they be doing with their stake anyway? Delegations to places that increase the value of the platform, obviously. Long term thinking and their own steem will explode in value. Making their bid bot generated SP look like dirt in comparison.
Hey, okay, otherwise we can build a better platform and let these bid bots rule over a drying pond. Shrug.
As I responded to Asher above,
So is it any wonder why people get confused? When the guys that own the system do one thing (whales), its kinda hard to complain about lesser people doing the same thing (every other fish).
Its kinda funny... when I use minnowbooster I see many of my friends in the vote totals because they sold their vote away to minnowbooster. But they will frown on someone who upvotes their own post. I don't blame them though, they are encourage to do such things on a regular basis (sell their votes that is)
Yeah I totally struggled with this disparity. Some people take the position that it's okay until your vote gets to a certain point, but I feel to be fully consistent you have to reject the behavior altogether. And the people that take such positions are really at a disadvantage vs the ones that don't. Oh well....