How important is community versus Whale's Steem Power for post visibility? RANT
I've only been a member of Steemit for a little under a month, but something doesn't quite make sense to me; If the whole point of Steemit is to give visibility to QUALITY posts by creating a decentralized power structure where the community is motivated to upvote quality content, then in a way, doesn't Steem power corrupt this ideal?
To me, someone who is new to the platform of Steemit and still trying to educate myself on the core principles as well as the technology itself, it appears quantity of upvotes by the community (decentralization of monetization) ultimately does not create post visibility. What does create visibility, is the number of upvotes by those with the most Steem power, those who got in early regardless of post quality, or their ability to accumulate steem dollars through trades that is converted to steem power.
THE WHALES RULE ALL ON THIS PLATFORM. Doesn't that completely undermine the community and core principles of a decentralized blockchain, by aggregating the power into the hands of a select few?
Another unfortunate thing that is making me skeptical of steemit is that this blockchain is so filled with scam-ish feeling posts (get rich quick schemes) and post boosting services, that I assumed services like minnowbooster, upvoteme, and others were required for post visibility. I've used a few and quickly realized that this isn't the case and I don't think I will use them again, unless someone comments and gives me a good reason to.
I'm not trying to spread FUD on steemit by any means, I think the ideals behind steemit are amazing and the functionality of steemit and dTube is surprisingly on point for any beta type of website, but I still think that the power structure is a little jacked up.
Please Steemians let me know what you think of these problems with the platform or conversely let me know why these aren't problems, I would love to have my concerns vanquished!
TLDR: Trending appears to only be filled with posts by whales, the power on steemit is disportionately centralized, and this platform has a very vocal minority consisting of scammers/shady business practices.
Most people arrive at the same conclusions after a while, will you give up or will you persist?
The title of your article actually answers all the questions you raised, with one word "community". You need to find like minded people and build your community, that way you can all build each other up and stand together. To use the sea creature analogy, smaller species of fish will band together to create massive schools, where the larger animals don't need to do that as much.
There are a few things wrong with steemit and I thought it would be different but as in life the money has the power.
Don't get dishartened it's just how it is at the moment and most of all don't give up just keep plugging away you never know who is reading and even who may become a whale in the future.
Good luck all the best.
Thank you for the kind words! I guess, I did answer some of my questions in the original post itself hahaha..I just needed the community perspective, the reassurance that what I was thinking was correct, and that I wasn't just being presumptuous based on my lack of knowledge or inexperience on steemit. I suppose you're right that if the minnows keep on swimming together we can really shake up the waves and perhaps create some waves of our own. Consider yourself followed!
It's hard to know what to think sometimes, even with 6 months under my belt there's always new things to learn. I am sure everyone thinks like this at some point Im glad I could help you out with a different perspective.
After only two days of in-depth research, I've come to the same realizations as you. I also see @gyro's point though, the community is there if we look for it. Despite the lopsided power issues, it is still an amazing platform. I'm seeing more and more of the journalists and bloggers I follow on mainstream platforms moving here, so I'll stay for that alone.
I'm also noticing all of the sleazy, self-promoting posts, but amidst all the dross are a lot of gems. Take your post for example ;) I hope you keep at it. I'll be following you.
Yes, mainstream platforms why anyone would prefer getting a like over getting upvotes I'll never know. The more legit people who move over here the better the place will be, good to hear your seeing these people move over. My attitude now is Steem first if its not here I don't really care about it.
I see a day coming soon when that will be true for me :)
Well, that's good that professional writers as well as some profession Youtubers (switching over to dTube-I've seen a few at least.) are making their way over to this platform. Hopefully quality content and perhaps a more decentralized power dynamic might add to a better overall user experience and a stronger community as a whole. I truly appreciate the follow and have followed you back, have wonderful day!
This post is quite old but you are speaking out what I'm thinking for some time. The whole selling point of steemit is to reward quality content but it doesn't. not with reach, not with visibility and not with money. I wonder If this could change when there is another interface that employs a different algorithm to curate the posts according to your interests like medium. of course that would be gamed by the whales as well but it can adapt. It's sad to see that the current team does nothing to limit the power of the whales but gives them a platform to distribute their spam. personally the currently employed curation algorithm gives me no benefit for my usage. The potential financial loss trough limited reach compared to medium makes it hard to justify posting here on steemit, even if i could earn 10 cent in steem dollars.
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