<center><img src="http://i.imgur.com/IJQeMf9.jpg" /></center>

Today has seen some good activity with solutions to facilitate user interactivity. These are real solutions to a problem. At least to me it makes more sense, let me know what you think ;)

I already mentioned the initial reasons to not support a comment reward pool as a proposed solution to user engagement and interactivity issues, in my [Review of the Proposals post](https://steemit.com/steem/@krnel/review-of-steem-0-17-change-proposal-introduction). But I can explain a bit more.

The initial root problem I pointed out in my review, was that comments weren't being seen by actual people to value them, and that those who have the power to reward them aren't/can't see everything. The problem wasn't because of the reward pool. The problem is how things work through individual behavior that sets the way things work, or a lack of individual behavior.

In order to reward comments that we would like to be rewarded, human consciousness is required to spend time and pay attention to evaluate the content. This is how everything in life is supposed to work, where you are responsible for your evaluations of something and judge it accordingly. The reason comments are not being rewarded is because people who do the engaging outnumber those who have the power to reward. Hence, the appeal to bots.

But with guilds and the development of trusted people, they can be delegated access to accounts to apply certain upvote percentages to comments (like they do with posts) that actually engage in the content with relevant feedback. And better yet, with functionality to delegate percentage of power to trusted user accounts, that would easily distribute the voting power each day without necessarily compromising the posting key.

I also had mentioned the problem with trying to get people to engage in an area by trying to lead them with a carrot (i.e. reward incentives), and how that can often fail because the underlying motivation is not there. 

***How to create that motivation?***

**The functionality needs to be there.**

People need to be able to easily be aware of activity on the site in order to engage in the various content they pay attention to throughout the day. If it's a chore, motivating people with a carrot isn't going to motivate them where it matters because it's cumbersome to do it. 

**People already have the real motivation to engage and feed off each other's attention**, but they need the capabilities and functionality within a marketplace (Facebook, Steemit, etc.) to be there so that they can engage in that level of virtual interactivity.

What are the real solution to getting increasing interactivity and comments engagement? (*so far that I am aware of, with probably more great ideas I am ignorant of*)

1) [comment tabs](https://steemit.com/steemit/@krystle/incentivising-comments-on-steemit-with-a-new-display-option) suggested by @krystle
2) [notifications for comments](https://steemit.com/steemit/@ash/steemit-added-browser-notifications-finally) on your [posts or comments](https://steemit.com/steemit/@barrydutton/new-feature-activated-on-steemit-in-browser-notifications-for-mentions-replies-etc-short-form-post-w-explainer-graphic) (arrived today)
3) @stellabelle's [post on an engagement guild](https://steemit.com/curation/@stellabelle/engagement-guild-proposal-user-retention-solution-watch-video-explanation)
4) my github request for [notifications of comments for posts you "watch" or "follow"](https://github.com/steemit/steemit.com/issues/679) (because you want to engage with that post and the future commenters)

I'll add what I said on @stellabelle's post:

> The new reward pool will cut the bot economy in two and drive bots to the other economy, duplicating the root causal issue on Steemit of a lack of human consciousness that is the only thing that can actually engage in attention and comment/reward actual comments. Attention requires consciousness. We need to deal with the real issue, not just replicate the problem into another area.

The above solutions I am aware of will actually get people to be able to engage in comments, despite the concentration of voting power to reward the comments still being an issue. However, functionality to delegate power voluntarily would resolve this to some degree. 

I don't see cutting up the bot economy and driving them to yet another reward pool for comments as a "solution". Real people need to evaluate comments. Just blind autovoting trusted authors won't cut it. And it shouldn't be cutting it for regular posts either. The problem with comments is just showing us the underlying issue on Steemit and the way content is, or isn't, actually evaluated by human consciousness.

I'm not saying the reward pool shouldn't be divided per various forms of content type for various reasons that make sense. But doing so to try to fix a problem without addressing the root causal factor is why I don't support this proposal. Cutting the reward pool does not address the problem at all. The proposed solutions above do address the problem though. Human consciousness needs to get involved. Not more blind bot activity that will be driven by cutting the economy and driving bots to replicate what they already do. That's not a solution.

Human consciousness wants to interact, we just need the tools to be able to do it in the virtual Steemit world :)

Thank you for considering what I consider actual solutions to the problem of real engaging in content, and rewarding that real engagement and feedback with the content creator and other commenters.

*P.S./Edit: I upvote many comments at 100% for over the past week or two. Even though I can't reward much, it's still saying I appreciate the comment effort, so here is a 100% upvote :) That's one way each content creator can show appreciation for effortful, meaningful, engaging, etc. comments, rather than using all the vote power on posts.*

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@krnel
2017-01-19, 4:45pm