# Upvote this: https://steemit.com/free/@bible.com/4qcr2i

yes this is very great to promote effort of people @steevc

Fabulous one!!!

> ### *"Now is a good time to build a following of genuinely interested people who will stick with you."*

True AF! It's only in times of hardships and failure do we make genuine friends and companions who have our backs and believe in growing together instead of those who only pretend to be your friend when in reality, all they're doing is following the other fishes.

I have been using those tags for a couple of weeks now and I really haven't seen any difference between using them and not using them.  I was hoping eventually I would start to pick up some more followers, but I don't think it is happening.  I think people are still just chasing after the whales.  Maybe my content is just crap :) who knows...

I stopped visiting trending page on any topic because the content of the most trending posts was really disappointing. It never occurred to me that the function could be used in a good way as you describe: to find "nobidbots" content. I will check that out. I am a strong believer that best way to find good content regularly is to find Steemians that are covering content that interests you with quality blogs and they often also mention other Steemians and so "guide" you to other bloggers with high-quality content... so you slowly build the network of people who write well about what you like or share similar interests. Here I would like to thank you @steevc: your posts Follow Friday revealed many interesting Steemians that I now follow.

Maybe, if we try hard or come up with some great hashtag like #steemitvillage or something we could remain a great local feel neighbourhood in the bigger city of steemit? If steemit becomes A large city then we are that quaint neighbourhood that feels like a small town where people know your name or ask, "how you doing" and mean it. ;)

muy buena informacion

>Now is a good time to build a following of genuinely interested people who will stick with you.

This is what I'm counting on @steevc. And one of the big benefits of the drop in Steem price I see is there seem to be far fewer spam accounts posting.

That means it's much easier to find decent accounts to explore while browsing the new feed.

A couple of weeks ago it was full of accounts with 25 rep and plagiarised content. Now i'm enjoying having a look around again. 😊

The trending page is awful, I stopped reading anything that is there after my first two days on steemit. And after a while, when you've subscribed to people you like to read, and some curation users like @curie, you tend to get resteemed interesting articles/people.

While I understand why people use the nobidbot tags, it feels strange to me, link they would want upvotes based on the fact they don't use bid bots... It _feels_ like they are trying to get attention because of that, whereas it should be the norm, in my opinion.

Again, one thing I think you're right about: good articles will be resteemed among users, whether they use bid bots or not.

Ya mon, some excellent points of view here.  I actually like the idea of the #nobidbots tag....Even though I'm actively experimenting with them under the steembirds account lol.  

So far we have definitely found them to be unprofitable in terms of making overhead beyond the approximate initial investment. It's definitely a huge risk especially if your content sucks and gets downvoted.  

The benefit has been that many more ppl see our content (songs that we've work extremely hard on and that we feel actively point out steem/steemit topics that probably should be addressed & discussed. Perhaps many people are either scared to talk about them or, just unfamiliar with what's actually going etc & it seems like through music and comedy, it makes it easier somehow for ppl to engage once it's brought to a large pool of ppl :)  

In this respect, bots have been quite useful in inciting such epic discussions & I must say, it really does feel good to have something that you've worked very hard on and spent countless hours on actually get seen...  We're talking about a few hundred extra views per song and maybe a 100 actual humans engaging and offering tangible commentary. 

It takes artists hours sometimes days to actually write and rehearse an original tune and then to get a good take...that also (as you probably know) can take just as long lol 

You're right, this is a very interesting time/phase for steemit.  I for one am really excited to see how it all plays out.  I personally find that these "low Moments" are the best times to engage and post consistently, when many ppl seem to be dropping out bc the currency seems low to them.  This is really a great time to get real support and attention from real users, bc those are the ppl who are being active through the thick and thin.  

It's been great to get your humble opinion on this topic these past few weeks, especially as someone who's been around the block"chain" (lol sry about that) as long as you have and who has seen a few of these "interesting times" first hand.  

Hope all's well Steve
JB

Good move!

I toyed with bidbots and promotion bots for a bit. Specially when some malicious flagging causes my reputation score to go negative.

The numbers just didn't add up. Why pay $25 for ~$25 upvote? Yes, it may make you more visible. But to who? Most sensible users of STEEM will avoid the trending page anyway.

Human behaviour is fascinating. There are loads of people complaining about missing out on steem when it was cheap and look at whales and dolphins as those who got lucky. Will those same people take the risk now and invest in steem while it's at historical lows? Nope.

As for the growth of STEEM. It has its flaws, but all things considered, it's a fascinating platform. But for me, what's more important is the chance to connect with some true crypto pioneers. As they say, Rome wasn't built in a day. 

that's actually a great idea. using #nobidbots tag takes up 20% of someone's tag limit.  and i agree, promoted content is fairly useless. I was just trying to find out about steemcleaners and how I can report really useless content, profitable or not. but having a section 'nobidbots' like, trending or hot, is really worth it. I have stopped looking at the trending page totally. when there are no new updates from those i follow, i go to tags that are of interest to me and check out the hot content (sounds so wrong). but i really like your idea. i think it will be really useful and will see serious acceptance. And i think it will also allow new users to find an audience.

PS. Thank you for the upvotes on some of my comments btw, has helped restore my rep.

It is kind of many villages lying in the outskirts of the known internet. You are like the travelling musician who visits a lot of villages, while I seldom have capacity to do anything but mind my own little community these days. Commenting takes too long for me.

I find bidbots stupid and destructive - it will only move value to the top of the pyramid, and I do hope we could get a larger middle class.

Nowadays whoever I am asking how to increase my reputation either they say better you buy steem power or take the help of bots. What bots do exactly I don't know, sir please guide if I take the help of bots will it affect my blog reputation in the future.

A "no bit bot" tab would be great. I have been using bit bots for a while now and they do have their percs. I don't think that I want to keep on using them from this point onward though. It does feel somewhat cheesy overall and seems inefficient in the grand scheme of things.

Spending my income on steem/steempower might be the better idea in the long run.

Mm you strategy is to just keep on chipping away.  Trying to earn out of Steemit feels too much like a second job and I already work hard enough on the one I one I have already.  

I don't visit the trending page at all as there never seems to be anything of interest on there.

Agree with all of that. I've used the tag almost since starting on here a couple of months ago. I've found some interesting posts and people also by checking it out. As for the trending pages, I'm not sure how useful they are at the moment. Many are saying they don't look any more and I've had a number of posts get a curie to go on to be trending for some time often with seemingly little or no further impact. It seems logical to look at the best performing nobidbot posts to find some good stuff.

I think tags should be everything and it would lead to the concept of #hivemind, but then you find so many bad content under them...

My main (almost the only) interest is #music, but there you can find ANYTHING...

Of course what I'm saying has no relation to the "bots or not bots" discussion, but I had to write this because you mentioned it as a way to find the content that  sould be interesting to each of us.

I still think the voting bots are not the problem on the platform as long as the algorithm is the way it is - implement a new reward system and they would be gone. The big boys make use of it and this is the issue why it will not change. I have used some (or mainly one only) too - recently not a lot though - maybe the declining crypto prices will also stop usage of them. I do not know - I hear you and understand where you come from. If all agree no one uses them and they do a mirroring HF all is fine - however I would love we get rid of shitty, scummy witnesses before this is possible.

The trending page is nothing more then a 'Bought Add's".  I never look at it because the posts that are on it are often not interesting.. I do look often at the NEW posts. The NOBIDBOT hashtag can be a cool one to use I guess.