I've been noticing an increasing lack of transparency regarding the algorithms driving the platform lately.
Posts and comments will often cite directly from the Whitepaper, analyzing a specific mechanism or aspect of the algorithm, usually raising valid questions about the efficiency, sustainability or economics of Steem; only to have other users point out that the most recent hardfork has revised the algorithm as described in the whitepaper.
For the sake of transparency and constructive dialogue, could we have a continuously updated page detailing the specifics of the current build? Ideally with a change-log, either on steem.io or somewhere easily visible on Steemit?
I realize that it is open source, and a diligent coder could dig into the nitty gritty; but there are certainly bright minds in this community that don't come from a coding background. There is a wealth of knowledge here in the fields of economics and mathematics that could contribute value to the ongoing development of the platform.
I agree, but I think it will have to be a community-driven project - the Bitshares devs (who are also working on the Steem backend) are notorious for hacking their way around problems without documenting their changes.
I spent about 10 hours the other day picking through the curation and posting reward code (not an easy task, since it's barely commented and I dont really speak C++), and I think I have a pretty good handle on how it works.
I might be interested in helping document it, but my spare time is pretty limited. You?
Thats a shame about the dev team. My coding its limited to C# and some python. Although I want to learn, and definitely in my free time will try dissecting it a bit. I must admit I feel disincentivized to do so when the algorithm changes so rapidly, would be a full time job.
I like that your post is simple and to the point. I think the Steem operation would get a boost from service and website growth. People need to start making their own webpages that use Steem, if only to take some of the load off Steemit.