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I am liking what is going on here on the platform of late as it has not only brought voting stake back into the mix, the downvotes have increased the conversation from people who had not been engaged on the platform previously. Conversation is important in this world and while a post might be fantastic, if it doesn't generate discussion around it or inspire action of some kind, it is quite impotent in purpose. 

https://i.imgur.com/28HTlpN.jpg

What I am hoping is that once the discussions start, people will actually come to consider that perhaps a change in their behavior would be the best for their own personal outcomes, and that might just align with the best outcomes for Steem as a whole, and everyone who is on and set to come to Steem in the future. 

As I have spoken about at various times before, there are several alignment problems on Steem and for a very long time, the largest was that the maximization of earnings were not aligned with what was best for the Steem community health, but they were the tools we had to play with. For me, this meant that after fighting a losing battle where I watched stake self-voted, circle-jerked and trash get bidbotted up with no consideration of content while those who were attempting to do it well, failed miserably. 

I delegated my stake to @ocdb, the bot created by @acidyo and unknowingly to pretty much everyone on this platform, the bot was never made to turn a profit and Acid struggled with its creation as a manual curator himself. However, the way it was designed with a whitelist, and non-profit meant that it would attract stake and, that stake would be called to vote on actual users. Imperfect for sure, but many of the authors that used it would not be here if that stake had stayed where it was voting upon shit blindly. 

In the end it distributed the highest earning votes to real users at the cost of offering the highest return to delegators. This meant that rather than the maximization of Steem stake being through voting shit, the maximization came through voting something of somewhat quality and, something that the community might actually enjoy. And nearly all the time, @ocd was also running up front manually curating and supporting Steem users and getting them whitelisted *based on their content.* Proof of Brain. Again, this was an imperfect patch to a massive wound.

However, #newsteem has quickly changed the waters of Steem and it has forced many of the abuses and abusers out into the light and reduced the bidbot buy abuse to near zero and as a result, they have been forced to change their behavior. What I consider one of the worst habits on Steem are the circles that are designed to extract without adding any value back into the system - essentially they are place holders for votes and the content they produce isn't made to engage with and if they did want engagement, they would comment more at the very least.

These circles in their newfound spotlight are garnering attention, perhaps for the first time on their accounts and, many don't like it. Prior to the EIP they could happily stay in the shadows and no one would pay them mind and, they could just keep self-voting and circle-voting each other endlessly. Well, this is hopefully the end of it, #newsteem is here.

Again, while some of these circles have extracted hundreds of thousands of Steem and reaching into the millions, let bygones be bygones, but why don't they get with the program? With 50/50 curation and the convergent curve, these large accounts could be taking a good deal back of their vote in curation and while not the maximization that it once was, would still be maximization. 

As long as people are using their downvotes effectively, the best the average curator should really be getting is the 50% on their vote, but when they are self-voting their content and that of their circle only, they are still taking 100%. This is just greed. 

While I delegated to @ocdb, I have also delegated to various other people and projects and kept a good deal of my stake actively voting on others, since I don't selfvote very much at all. Not only that, the increase in my stake that I had at @ocdb came through *buying Steem off exchanges.* Likely the same Steem that the self-voting circles have been shipping consistently out to Bittrex.

Selfish of me?

Yes. I want to grow my account here too and the only way for me to do it is to do the work. Passive earnings? lols.

I don't have a great deal of disposable income to buy Steem with but did my best and, I don't have large stakes guaranteeing me votes on my content. This means that the work I do in life in order to be able to buy Steem, and the work I do on platform in order to attract votes *has to be done.* I do not take one single vote for granted that comes my way and for those who might have actually talked to me will know, *I expect nothing on Steem or from them.*

>Often enough, my expectations have been met.

But, I have also been fortunate enough to be able to attract semi-consistent support over the years from a few people as I have remained consistent myself and, always had the best interest of Steem in mind because, I am looking long. I still haven't benefited one dollar's worth from my crypto - and very few people would actually want my life if they were also required to perform the workload. 

If you are uncertain about what kind of work goes into my Steeming:
![image.png](https://ipfs.busy.org/ipfs/QmZeav6JdYpYYnDmh2oB8EjDMPJJvDZUrkCjArbtUi8rZ5)

I vote manually. I wrote every one of those comments and as you can see, take out the likely automated comments and you will find that I have answered the vast majority of all the comments I have ever received. As said, if one doesn't produce content that the audience engages *in some way with,* where is the value? It doesn't mean just comments.

In my opinion, if you want to get results consistently, the groundwork has to be developed in a way that is going to attract consistent support. While some people might think that being "family" is enough of a reason to maximize on a narrow set of essentially self-owned accounts, I don't play that game.

But, it is a game and while I was positive on the benefits of the EIP and especially on the downvoting function, I wanted to see how it would play out for a couple weeks to see what my next move would be. I mentioned this in the weeks leading up to HF21 when asked what I would do post-hardfork. 

The last few weeks have been insanely busy in so many ways as I completed a customer project with a deadline, but since I am travelling now and hope to have a little more time after, I took back delegated stake, so I can keep actively curating with more weighting. I am looking forward to it as while the actual value is not so high, this will be the largest voting stake I have ever curated with, even when I was for or had delegations. My voting behaviour won't really change much however, I will just be tripling the stake I am using.

This is an alignment issue coming into better alignment as while I might have had my stake active all this time, I do not think it would have benefited anyone as much as it will benefit them now that the platform is moving toward better health. What I am hoping is that if accounts start returning to *healthy* curation and supporting the people who *support Steem,* the other factors out of alignment will start to course correct too, things like the public opinion of Steem. 

For the accounts that keep maximizing their vote even though there is a healthier option out there *should* be inspected to see if their behaviors are in alignment with what people consider good for Steem. If not, downvote it. Pretty much every curator can get around 50% for their vote and that means that for the accounts that shoose to take more in the circles, the downvoting has to remove more than that 50% to encourage a shift.

If you don't want to be arsed manually curating, join a trail, delegate to a curation project and still earn passively, but the days of 100% stake return are over. At least for now. 

As said, with the new incentives to redirect Steem from posts, it doesn't take much to take more than the 50% you could get with no fuss, no hassle, no one caring at all - but I do know there are a lot of creators out there who would be grateful for your support. 

Get with the program and be part of evolving Steem for the better. 

Taraz
[ a Steem original ]