It's not that downvoting doesn't have downsides, they are considerable. It's just that without a modest amount of free downvotes, we don't really have a realistic chance of turning this place around at all.
Currently, we're paying content indifferent voting behavior (self vote, vote selling) 4x more than curation. When we bump curation to 50%, there's still a 2x gap. The modest amount of free downvotes are further designed to bridge that gap.
I'm one of the ones who recommended these specific numbers for the EIP and I can tell you I'm very aware for the adverse effects. Let's say that at any given time, under the EIP they'll be around 5,000,000 SP worth of whales consistently being abusive with their downvotes on purpose. 25% of that is 1.25m SP out there making everyone's lives miserable.
Now look at the flip side, instead of next to nothing, if everything works out, you could have 100m SP worth of upvotes being cast in a relatively honest way that is reflecting their appraisal of the content. And half that money will be finding its way into the pockets of good content creators.
Maybe my numbers are a little optimistic, especially the latter, but overall it seems like a good trade off. We can't focus too much on the negatives alone without looking at the positives.
Thanks for not (yet) flagging me - just kidding. :)
Actually, I like your reply and partly agree with you.
Used in an appropriate way, flags are essential for the success of the community.
'Cheap' posts with huge rewards on tranding are a problem, together with the bid bots.
However, I also know that many users have suffered under unjustified whale flaggs, left (or will leave) the platform and spread that information. Even only just watching 'flag wars' (without being involved themselves) is really deterring for (potential) newbies.
What do you think about my suggestion (if interested you may read more in "My STEEM Vision.") to institute a committee of respected users elected by the community and equipped with sufficient delegated STEEM power, which could be called in such cases of flag abuse and then decide whether the flags were justified or not?
Unjustified whale flags are going to happen with or without free downvotes. Sure, they get a little more juice proportionally, but I don't think of it as breaking (and it's also in fact why the % is not as high as what some people have been pushing for, which is 100%).
The downvote committee can happen today. Don't see what's stopping it. Good luck convincing enough people though. Actually, the downvote committee has a better chance of forming with free downvotes, and funded accordingly.
Crimes will happen with or without police ... Nevertheless I think it's good to have one ...
In my eyes it's already now way too much. I know people who left STEEM because of unjustified (at least in their eyes) flags, and I know people who didn't want to join after observing how people got flagged (often in an automated way) only because they spoke out their opinion.
(Just see how many comments under this article were flagged again ...)
... and I already wrote that I think the 'hybrid solution' would cause less damage than two completely separated pools.
It won't happen if not supported by someone with a huge amount of SP (for example with a delegation of Steemit, Inc.).
Otherwise it's members either wouldn't dare to flag accounts with much SP or didn't care to write here anymore anyway.
I'll go look for your thing, but this isn't two separate pools (since that is yet another idea).
My main point was that the abuse is going to happen anyway. And we need crowd sourced downvotes. Maybe your hybrid has the same problem, maybe not.
Then you might consider a downvote reversal committee as well. We have some of those around even today but could probably have more support.
Edit: oh, in fact that's what you were proposing. I misread the first time sorry :)
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Actually, it's @vandeberg's "hybrid" I am talking about (he is using this term in his article). I think his hybrid solution is better than two separate pools of equal size, but I am still not sure if it will have a positive effect.
No problem at all, I like your constructive way of discussing!
In case you are interested, you may (or have already?) read "My STEEM Vision.", where I illustrated my points of views more extensively. Then, even if you may not agree with every of my suggestions and ideas, at least you understand where I am coming from.
Good to hear about your downvote reversal committee (I didn't know about it, as I am not very often following the Discord discussions because my time is limited, and also English isn't my mother tongue) ... but isn't the problem that without significant SP you (the members of the committee) can become 'whale victims', as well?
Ah it's not mine, and it's not significant enough. Just been watching steem flag rewards and company and they have some upvote countering on a trail. These kind of efforts should be getting more support in general in my opinion.
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I am not sure that bid bots are really a problem aside from creating envy. Someone's 2 minute blog of junk may earn 1000x more than an 8 hour blog of well researched findings, and of course there is a risk that anyone who bids too much could be crushed by a whale and lose their investment-while the bid bots still benefits. The few whales who come in the name of fairness wanting to help crush the bid bots I doubt will achieve the results they want. It may prove just to be the death knell to the block chain and their own investments.
I am not sure how this help makes things more fair if the bid bots disappear [supposing the price and floating circulation of steem remained unaffected, which it wouldn't], those of us who don't use them will still get about the same amount of votes and earnings.
Those who operate the bid bots, I presume, are keeping a big chunk of the Steem out of circulation. To shut them down would likely cause these bidbot owners to dump their Steem and flood the marketplace...for 13 weeks. If there is a mass dump it is going to hurt steem as an investment....for 13 weeks. One can't blame the people who have started to powerdown, it's is going to likely make steem extremely cheap to buy in the future for the companies failure to protect market value. Maybe this is what the whales want is to buy more on the cheap and have an even greater influence. The abusive whales, who likewise can buy more at a discount, will try to purge more and more people from the platform for an ideological differences causing them to be a greater problem than they are now. Sure the little guys could buy more too, but the little guys aren't earning 6 figures a year and could still be swallowed whole by the abusive whales off the platform. Even if an ordinary person had $10000 extra to spend during the crash, steem would be too much risk as an investment and depending on how low steemit went when they bought in they could still be swallowed whole by an abusive whale. For people in the 3rd world, they stand even less of a chance.
There are threats on the horizon; What steem cofounder Dan (Now of EOS and MEOS )says can kill steemit. Who knows if there is any truth to what Dan says, other than the current [lack of] leadership of steem. If the [lack of] leadership allows such changes to destroy the market value of steem, the MEOS (or whatever it is called) can ensure that by buying enough steem at a discounted rate they can destroy steem's primary utility internally and basically kill steemit.