How could it be abused? The abuser would have to risk their own SP. It would require everyone to passively support the abuse because if their was clear abuse most people would recognize it and stand up against it.
The only risk is the "lynch mob". A lynch mob could gang up on someone and take all of their SP. Those who are afraid of being lynched by the Steem Power Mob should not fund their bond (power up). This could have the down side of creating a self-reinforcing echo chamber.
Collectively the echo chamber has financial incentive to be tolerant and grow the user base. Anyone who acts in such a way to devalue STEEM will hurt their whole portfolio.
The problem of Lynch Mobs exists under the current system too.
I think you are asking people to always act rationally. They don't. If we put aside the first point and just look at these:
Those who have most to gain from doing the above are those with the highest SP balances. Using your reasoning these people are destroying the value of their own SP investment in the long term as people will move away from the platform.
As for the rage flagging issue I think the community can come together and act on that. I have myself (when hearing of it) gone back and upvoted posts that have suffered this kind of abuse. It might just be simpler to have some kind of formal appeals process to reverse flags and some kind of punishment such as loss of the ability to flag for those who abuse it. This could be incorporated into the blockchain.
I would guess the majority don't collude to harm, but a large minority might attempt it. If the majority is corrupt then it is game over.
Today we have a situation where a minority can harm the system.
I suppose through not voting for people who are bad actors and the reputation system and flagging - obviously it is not perfect, but neither is the proposed solution here.
I'm not saying we should not consider refinements - I'm just saying we need to be very careful that we don't just replace one potential problem with another one.
The whole idea of having a complaints system that is voted on seems to be asking for abuse. It might actually put certain people off joining, particularly if they are people who have attracted controversy or suffered online abuse in the past.
It also does nothing to deal with the bad actor who is intent on destruction and no longer cares for their investment in the platform - the "burn the house down scenario". It could be someone who is wealthy or just outright crazy, maybe a bit of both.
That said I am not someone who doesn't change his mind based on rational arguments in favour of something and it is not for me to impose my opinion on others (sorry if it might sometimes seem that way).
Anyway I know you won't make any decisions without careful thought and taking community opinion into account. Just wanted to add my thoughts - you probably understand these issues more than most of us.
The one thing you stated a whale could do is "not vote" on their stuff. That is doing nothing and presumes the abuse is from content of post.
Those who abuse without posting do so with impunity. Even if they did post they don't lose anything.
If that were true then bigger whales would already be shutting down the problems in the current system that the OP suggested and we wouldn't need the change in the first place.
Like I said people don't always act rationally. We don't necessarily understand their motivations. Sometimes people (even whales) may be afraid of aggravating other whales or retaliation - or they might just want to avoid the drama. That pressure may be even greater when we are dealing with people who have power/celebrity in the real world.
Substituting one form of abuse for potentially another is not fruitful and I suspect in your position it is something that you are all too aware of when you came up with the ideas for the economy behind Steem/Steemit.
I suggest that @trevor.george may have a better means of dealing with some of these issues. I still need to think about it more but have a look and see what you think.
Thanks,
Arif.
How can whales shut down problems in current system?
I'm not saying we can't improve the situation. I just don't think the suggested solution would not be open to abuse in itself.
As we have often seen in online communities (and life in general) popularity and fame can trump logic or doing the right thing.
For example:
Let's say I am famous figure and I don't like someone. What is to stop me from filling a complaint post (which incidentally my own vote could give a head start to if I am whale) and then getting my followers to upvote it. You could destroy any criticism/rivals or enemies this way.
Add in things like curation trails and it could get out of hand very fast. Perhaps I am missing some important thing here (entirely possible) - if so please let me know.
That's exactly what I was alluding to, smaller users would be shut down by a fraudulent claim, lose their SP, and the only recourse is to hope that some whale or group of users bigger than the bully notice and take action to stop it. The bad actor or actors would also be able to create multitudes of complaint posts.
This system also assumes the bad actor isn't just trying to bring the whole system down.
Yeah, that could happen but others would cry foul and even bigger whales will shut it down.
Absolutely I wasn't saying that the current system is perfect.