He made a contribution to adjust SBD payout. He answers every question even if he doesn't have a good answer whether it's on chain, on slack, or on GitHub issues. He is good at getting his face and username everywhere.
It's more than his name though, he answers questions, acts as a liaison for those of us who don't speak tech.
All over this thread you have mentioned participation in slack, but you don't seem to value actual communication on the blockchain and in a manner that people can understand it.
There are several orcas and many many dolphins who don't participate in slack and would still like to know what is happening and why.
This is not a complaint towards you, just sharing a perspective you may not see. Thanks for doing what you do.
He was also one of the first commnity devs to get some work dropped by SteemIt, inc.
Hi Bernie. Believe it or not, I do appreciate / enjoy it when you start these discussions. It is an important topic that we need to keep talking about, and you are one of the main people who can actually get a good conversation going on the subject.
I'm not going to try and make the case that I'm doing "enough". I would agree with the sentiment that I should be doing more, and I feel the same about most of the other top 20. I will at least make the case that I'm doing something though. It is up to the voters to decide if my work is worth their vote, or if there are others who are doing a better job and are more deserving of it.
I actually am in the camp that would love to see more new witnesses come along who do more than the people currently in the top and work their way up. I recognize that it is not easy to do, but there are many people (myself included) who are in the top 20 today because they have done just that. If the bar is low, then hopefully that encourages others to step up.
Before I go into what I have been up to though, I do want to talk a little bit about the time commitment involved. I'm by no means trying to make excuses for a lack of accomplishments, but there is only so much a person can do with the time they have. I did take a risk a year back and tried to support my family by doing Steem witness full time. I accomplished a lot during that time (including the development of a few changes that made it into the last hardfork), but unfortunately the price went below a level where I could continue to do that long term. I am now back to having to balance my Steem time with a "real job" as well as still spending some time with my family. With 24 hours in a day and multiple things I need to balance my time between, I am not going to be able to do Steem 100% of the time. Again, I'm not trying to make excuses - I am just being honest about what I am realistically able to give to the project.
Despite not having 40 hours a week to devote to Steem though, I do still try to do what I can with my time to improve things to the best of my ability.
I am very active in terms of discussing potential changes with other witnesses, Steemit, Inc. and community members / stakeholders. I know this isn't doing much to move the needle on the STEEM price, but I do consider it one of my most important duties as a witness. If I do not have a good understanding of what all the potential changes being discussed for the blockchain are about, or I am not able to make informed good decisions about what is right/wrong about them - then I am not doing my job.
I tried very hard (unsuccessfully, unfortunately) to try and negotiate a "deal" between the stakeholders+witnesses and Steemit, Inc. with regards to the use of their stake.
I am one of the main people who review all the questions in the steem.chat #help channel every day and ensure that everyone who is there reporting an issue there gets directed to an answer.
I also do run a full node.
There have been lots of other projects that I have worked on, and I do put my energy into various things as I see needs pop up.
I don't really have a good solution to your problem, as I see things continuing very much as they are today.. One thing that could help would be if enough of the larger stakeholders started communicating what their criteria are for voting on witnesses, and then updated their votes accordingly. If becoming (and remaining) a top 20 required witnesses to live up to certain criteria, then hopefully we would see more witnesses strive to meet that criteria. You would need at least 20 witnesses willing to do enough to make it in in order for it to work though - not sure if it is possible to motivate 20+ people to put in a large enough effort with the current STEEM price.
I am also hopeful that the "Steem Proposal System" that is part of the next proposed hardfork can help to incentivize more innovation and improvements. In it's current form, it will have an inflation budget equal to the current combined witness pay across all the witnesses. It remains to be seen whether it will just turn into another tool for people to exploit or something that actually generates value, but the potential for it to work will be there. I am hoping we see better accountability in terms of whether we are getting enough "bang for our buck" than we do with the current witness voting system.
That's fair. I do do other stuff too. I should probably do a better job at "selling myself" as a lot of things are done behind the scenes and people don't really see the impacts. Again, I'm not going to try make the case that I am doing "enough" - I agree, I should be doing more, but the list I gave is not exhaustive of everything I'm up to.
It is hard to quantify a lot of contributions, when it is a lot of little things. There are a few other items that I didn't mention which came to mind though:
Reviewing all of the seed nodes and keeping the blockchain code up to date with the nodes that are still active
There are more too. I don't expect everyone to keep up with all the miscellaneous things that I am up to, or know what conversations I have with various stakeholders in private - but I am not just sitting on my hands and collecting money for doing nothing. I do try to find ways to add value in the time that I have, and sadly - I consider myself to be doing quite a bit more than many of the other witnesses in the same position.
I find Tim to be incredibly articulate and knowledgeable when it comes to the steem blockchain.
He has come into steemspeak to explain things to us and it's always great listening to him break things down.
He made a contribution to adjust SBD payout. He answers every question even if he doesn't have a good answer whether it's on chain, on slack, or on GitHub issues. He is good at getting his face and username everywhere.
He does participate in steemit slack
It's more than his name though, he answers questions, acts as a liaison for those of us who don't speak tech.
All over this thread you have mentioned participation in slack, but you don't seem to value actual communication on the blockchain and in a manner that people can understand it.
There are several orcas and many many dolphins who don't participate in slack and would still like to know what is happening and why.
This is not a complaint towards you, just sharing a perspective you may not see. Thanks for doing what you do.
He was also one of the first commnity devs to get some work dropped by SteemIt, inc.
what's slack?. removed all my votes. might start again
It's a communication platform that the top witnesses discuss, blow off steam and plan the future for us minions. :)
lol, ta
Hi Bernie. Believe it or not, I do appreciate / enjoy it when you start these discussions. It is an important topic that we need to keep talking about, and you are one of the main people who can actually get a good conversation going on the subject.
I'm not going to try and make the case that I'm doing "enough". I would agree with the sentiment that I should be doing more, and I feel the same about most of the other top 20. I will at least make the case that I'm doing something though. It is up to the voters to decide if my work is worth their vote, or if there are others who are doing a better job and are more deserving of it.
I actually am in the camp that would love to see more new witnesses come along who do more than the people currently in the top and work their way up. I recognize that it is not easy to do, but there are many people (myself included) who are in the top 20 today because they have done just that. If the bar is low, then hopefully that encourages others to step up.
Before I go into what I have been up to though, I do want to talk a little bit about the time commitment involved. I'm by no means trying to make excuses for a lack of accomplishments, but there is only so much a person can do with the time they have. I did take a risk a year back and tried to support my family by doing Steem witness full time. I accomplished a lot during that time (including the development of a few changes that made it into the last hardfork), but unfortunately the price went below a level where I could continue to do that long term. I am now back to having to balance my Steem time with a "real job" as well as still spending some time with my family. With 24 hours in a day and multiple things I need to balance my time between, I am not going to be able to do Steem 100% of the time. Again, I'm not trying to make excuses - I am just being honest about what I am realistically able to give to the project.
Despite not having 40 hours a week to devote to Steem though, I do still try to do what I can with my time to improve things to the best of my ability.
I don't really have a good solution to your problem, as I see things continuing very much as they are today.. One thing that could help would be if enough of the larger stakeholders started communicating what their criteria are for voting on witnesses, and then updated their votes accordingly. If becoming (and remaining) a top 20 required witnesses to live up to certain criteria, then hopefully we would see more witnesses strive to meet that criteria. You would need at least 20 witnesses willing to do enough to make it in in order for it to work though - not sure if it is possible to motivate 20+ people to put in a large enough effort with the current STEEM price.
I am also hopeful that the "Steem Proposal System" that is part of the next proposed hardfork can help to incentivize more innovation and improvements. In it's current form, it will have an inflation budget equal to the current combined witness pay across all the witnesses. It remains to be seen whether it will just turn into another tool for people to exploit or something that actually generates value, but the potential for it to work will be there. I am hoping we see better accountability in terms of whether we are getting enough "bang for our buck" than we do with the current witness voting system.
I would say that criteria is certainly more than answering a help channel and running a node you rarely have to touch.
That's fair. I do do other stuff too. I should probably do a better job at "selling myself" as a lot of things are done behind the scenes and people don't really see the impacts. Again, I'm not going to try make the case that I am doing "enough" - I agree, I should be doing more, but the list I gave is not exhaustive of everything I'm up to.
It is hard to quantify a lot of contributions, when it is a lot of little things. There are a few other items that I didn't mention which came to mind though:
There are more too. I don't expect everyone to keep up with all the miscellaneous things that I am up to, or know what conversations I have with various stakeholders in private - but I am not just sitting on my hands and collecting money for doing nothing. I do try to find ways to add value in the time that I have, and sadly - I consider myself to be doing quite a bit more than many of the other witnesses in the same position.
Tim translates for us nontechys.
I can't tell if you're being serious or making a joke about him doing nothing worth mentioning.
When i got questions he's the guy i ask, he answers most of them.
Wasn't he the first community pull request?
Our Jackie Robinson?
He even explained something to me once and I am possibly the thickest English speaking person on the chain.
Lol, he did the faq's.
Isn't he working on Steem code and running a seed node?
Running a seed node takes 0 effort at all...it USED to be highly encouraged for those in the top 20...
aye. pretty much 0 but it does cost a bit of money to run one. Or is that a wrong assumption?
Less than I'll spend on lunch today.
Damn! What you having?
Lobster.
Take pics bruh
This guy spoke to me a couple times. He's cool.
I find Tim to be incredibly articulate and knowledgeable when it comes to the steem blockchain.
He has come into steemspeak to explain things to us and it's always great listening to him break things down.
Certainly a very cool guy.
After the 10th comment like this I did start to follow you