I've already stated what old steem Vs new steem is, a marketing strategy. I used to work in PR, I know it when I see it. 

I'm not saying it's a bad strategy, but it is  bad when people start using a concept to label other people's opinions with added (perceived perception) weight to the positive or negative. I can get behind the idea of trying to improve people's behaviour with new steem but not trying to regulate how they express their views. This is meant to be a censorship resistant platform @steemitqa... neither you or anyone else gets to decide what is good or bad criticism. FFS, criticism is just that... critical feedback. Anyone can take it or leave it. As long as it's constructive, it's not trolling, or negative even if it's critical. Constructive criticism is part of the basis of finding true consensus and compromise.

I really hope people don't see this newsteem narrative as anything other than what it is, a narrative. Most of that narrative is good... but if the thought police are going to try and dictate what is against the 'newsteem' party line, then things are looking pretty bad around here. 

> Just pointing out the difference between NewSteem and OldSteem.

I'll make this clear as crystal, before this 'old steem Vs new steem' narrative you wouldn't have responded to my comment with such a delineated line in the sand:

> the difference between NewSteem and OldSteem.

With me potentially being on the wrong side 'old steem'. 

You might have told me what you found wrong about my argument, we may have had a discussion and possibly found some compromise/consensus of ideas.

Further to this you state:

> We want new criticism, not old criticism. Criticism is good as long as it's not the old criticism.

Another line in the sand, with me unable to fathom what 'old criticism' or 'new criticism' might be. A bit of a smoking gun to hold up don't you think? Don't say what I deem as old criticisms, or I'll blast you with the label of old steem. 

🤣🤣🤣

I think I'll just stick to speaking my mind, expressing my opinion, and keeping it as constructive as I can, like my parents brought me up to do. Thanks.

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Hi Dan

> I have zero issues with people getting on trending organically, I want great post up there. I am strictly saying if you want to promote on trending you need to pay. UNLESS proof of brain puts you on trending, it should never be free to ADVERTISERS.

That's the distinction that you missed and now have made, and I appreciate you taking the time to think about it and see that it might not have been clear. I just listened to you talk about your thoughts on 3speak as well.

From my perspective - and what I'm going to say risks my account with the possibility of destruction by vote sellers setting their bots on me - is that bidbots are one of the biggest forms of steem abuse. I've always held this opinion, and that ain't going to change, although I've guarded against speaking it in the past out of **fear.**

My problem with the newsteem narrative, and prominent people such as yourself saying 'bidbots are good', is that it lets the people who leached at least hundreds of thousands of dollars (collectively) out of steem over the last 18 months (bidbot owners), off the hook. The EIP reward changes have made things less profitable for a proportion of small accounts, while making curation much more profitable for large accounts. But what I see so far with most large stake, is a very focused, and narrow range of support from larger accounts who rarely curated previous to HF21/22. They aren't voting much outside the usual suspects, some of whom are creating great accessible content that might drive eyes to steem, and others who most definitely aren't (lol only steemians want to read about steem). I do see some positive out of the hard forks though, self voting seems pointless now (at least for us small accounts), which can only be a good thing.

I agree that targeting the bidbot abusers is a good idea, it has started to rapidly clean up trending. I also understand your point (even more so after listening to the 3speak vid) about how good it would be to have steem power burned, or returned to the pool by advertisers and promoters.

In regards to bid bots, I'm saying that continuing to let the same bad actors have a say in the promotion system on steem, or endorsing them, is like saying 'it's not a thieves fault they steal... they've just been brought up that way'. Not even a slap on the wrist? While we all spend all our downvotes on stomping the people who found this really useful tool to shit all over steem at the expense of everyone else and thought 'I'm gonna get mine'. They wouldn't have been able to take that dump on everyone's head if the toilet door hadn't have been open.

Leopards rarely change there spots. It seems like we're smashing down the easy targets (small accounts who've been using bidbots to leech value), which totally needs to be done, while giving a free pass to those people who made that abuse possible, and worse than that... profited from it. This seems at best a half assed approach, at worst a concerted strategy to distract us all from addressing the problem on all fronts.

Is this newsteem? Power will out, or as nietzsche put it, 'will to power.' Witnesses and those with more than a few 100000 SP can simply rock on with their operations and try to figure out what is the least noticeable way they can game the system, while we all chase down the shit posters together. Apart from the whale shit posters.

To address the question of promotion/advertising on trending, I'd much prefer to see a promotion service set up by stinc if possible, that is competitivly priced against bidbots and burns steem at the same time. Stinc sure have helped drive the price of steem through the floor with their monthly sell offs and overall slow development.

Would/could this be an option? I'm asking anyone who reads this. Lol, but I'm not really gonna put much credence on any answers to this question given by bidbot owners.

Steemit.inc sure has a lot of ninja mined SP, maybe that could be used to offset the discrepancy between the ROI bidbots offer through their promotional mechanism, and trying to make a service that actually puts upward pressure on the price of steem, while maintaining a true proof of brain culture.

Anyway, all just my thoughts. If even one thing I say sparks an idea in someones head how to balance all this I'd be pleased. I'm not critical just for the sake of being critical... I truly want to see steem improve and evolve toward a less corruptible POB system. But I can't turn a blind eye to the coruption at the highest levels of governance on steem.

Cheers for getting back to me Dan.