RE: Steemit Retrospective for June
I very much appreciate the improvements that have been made and the progress being shown, great work on that.
One thing I think that is still an obstacle for us as a community is communicating with our user base in a way that is not only understandable to them, but embraces them. I know I’ve mentioned this a few times but after recent frustration brought to me by some of the community I feel like I need to bring it up again.
Much of the community feels ignored, talked over, frustrated and isolated due to most of the communication not really geared to the average end user. Things are confusing, scattered all over and generally are written for individuals who already understand the tech and logistics behind the discussion, which leaves out quite a large group of our user base.
This leaves them confused, and confusion leads to misinformation, fud and an overall low morale. The may not have any interest or desire to know the algorithms of a curve, as an example, they could just get a explanation of what these changes mean for them and how it is beneficial for the longevity of the platform and therefore them.
We have a very diverse community with all different levels of tech knowledge. This is what we want, and we need to embrace that by offering different forms of communicating imo.
We need end users for all these wonderful things we are developing, we need “normies” and we need to communicate to them as well as give them what they need to understand and thrive here.
I truly believe most of the frustration and outrage from the most recent hardfork discussions is due to how it has been communicated and therefore is resulting in low morale.
It is pretty common practice for any company to have some sort of community manager or liaison, as it’s such a simple role that prevents issues as well as ensuring voices are heard. Even block.one is hiring a few as they see the need.
A strong community that is in love with a platform is about the best peer to peer marketing a company can ask for. Everyone becomes walking advertisements.. and I believe the lack of communication to our current user base as well as the future user base we want to attract is holding us back.
That would be my feedback on what needs to be worked on. To me it’s such a small thing that could have a huge impact.
Thanks and keep up with the forward momentum!
Justine
I don't think that steemits user base exists in such solidity to form it self as community. It is too scattered and wide bunch of people. I think "communities update" is going to help make more clear who wants and what here. Currently it depends on post topic whetever steemit inc is going to be bashed or not. It is that those dissatisfied are most eager to leave comments overall.
There was one problem with communication though. The way that the EIP was originally represented could have been better. Rewards curve change was especially one that I think didn't go to well in terms of communication. It should have been mentioned from the beginning that the non-linear part was targeted to very low amounts of steem-power hodling accounts. That caused alot of angst by defenders and opposers of the "EIP".
I understand what you mean and that diversity is pretty special as well. I guess I think of it as we have this “Steem community” followed by all these sub communities that thrive as well.
The communities feature will really take this to a whole other level and help lift and empower communities of all types while giving them the tools they need to thrive. I really look forward to that and do think many issues will be solved when they are implemented.
Completely agree with you about the EIP aspects, many things were/are just not understood which leads to unneeded backlash and frustration.
Communication is actually pretty powerful and can have huge impacts on many things we don’t even consider.
I don't consider myself technical but I have understood every piece of communication Steemit, Inc put out. There will always be people who get lost... It's the internet! some people on here don't understand English very well, so that's a big barrier.
But Steemit Inc needs to scale before hiring marketing people and people who can communicate in different languages. All the community seems to want is a company that communicates with 0 engineer behind. Think practically. Best ROI for Steemit, Inc now is to hire devs.
They have devs, some pretty amazing ones.. and the upcoming SPS will help pay for project work of community devs as well. I don’t believe I implied they should be a company without engineers, as I’m pretty aware where we are.
The fact of the matter is that how things are being communicated with the user base as well as the outside world is holding us back.
I’m not suggesting they fire all their devs to hire a translator, that would be some crazy internet antics...
I was just giving feedback on what I feel they could still improve on, which is what the post asked for.
Thanks for your reply!
https://steemit.com/steem/@pagandance/what-languages-do-you-need-to-build-a-working-steemit-alternative