▲▲ THIS! ▲▲
I'm fine with the underlying idea of bots existing, but let's call a spade a spade: If you are buying bot votes, it's PROMOTED CONTENT. As @fyrstikken said, it's advertisement.
So, when I buy placement on Facebook, twitter or anywhere else, it's clearly labeled as "Advertisement" or "Promoted post." So why don't we do the same thing here? That way there's no stealing of anyone's "freedom" and there's no "censorship," there's simply truth in labeling.
Of course, some are going to say "But then people wouldn't read my posts!"
Where's your loss? I see a bunch of posts with $50 in rewards, 13 upvotes... and 8 of them are from voting bots. Nobody's reading your stuff anyway.
Imagine the ratings and revenue a television network would get if they flip-flopped everything.
Just imagine: all of the late night infomercials(paid programming/promotions) get placed in the primetime slots and the actual programming gets pushed into the late night slots.
That is how you set yourselves up for failure in the entertainment industry.
That is what Steemit is currently doing.
That is why people are failing.
It is painfully obvious.
That is exactly what is happening.
...and unmarked advertising is what is convincing people this entire mess is a good idea. They promote their promotion services, disguise them as helpful blog posts, and people get duped...
Nearly every goddamn day.
Yeah, and to expand the TV analogy... the gleefully rub their greedy hands because TODAY the ratings were really good, while being utterly blind to the fact they will have no network on which to even run their stupid ads, a few months from now...