I have a few suggestions to improve the user experience, and subsequently member retention, especially among newbies.
The initial frustration is that you feel invisible, which is normal and expected for any social network. Add to it the feeling that your post had a shelf-life of 30 seconds, and it is lost forever thereafter, you can begin to understand why many abandon their accounts.
To solve this, Steemit would benefit by having a column on the side, like Dtube has, which shows related posts. This would extend the shelf-life of articles, and reduce the feeling of invisibility. This would certainly translate into improved member retention.
A new user should not be made to feel like they need to know all sorts of programming, bots, schemes or apps with additional learning curves to operate, in order to make it on the platform. This has a negative psychological effect, and hurts retention as well as content quality.
I am also deeply put off by the presence of the flag, and its consequences. This has a chilling effect when you envision that someone who may have worked years to cultivate their blog could be wiped out in a short amount of time, and all their hard earned income lost by someone with malice in their heart towards them, has a grudge, or holds differing religious or political viewpoints. This is the elephant in the room. I believe that this community can address offenses just fine by use of the written word. LET truth rise to the top. This is my deepest concern for the Steemit platform. It would be a far better platform if the flag was removed completely, and not replaced with anything similar - not even a thumbs down. Let people address problem members by shaming them with the truth of their miscreance. Censorship is always bullying; it is always cowardice of the truth. There is never a justification for censorship. It is a BIG turn off.
Keep it simple.
Thoughts?
Very insightful, my friend! :)
Are you using busy.org sometimes? I tried but still reminds me very much of facebook, which I deleted for the 5th time and have no plans to recreate account again... SO there is a column with recommendations for posts in busy.org
As for the rest of your notes, Steemit is still in beta... AND it is really up to us (regular users) to improve our experience...
Bots, poo, money, domination are part of the corrupted human culture :)
I guess this platform is going to evolve a lot in the next years, just because the steem blockchain is amazing new technology, which can relief life of anybody.
Best crypto for me EVER :)
I love Steemit and think it is the best. I also think it has the potential to overtake all the other social networks. It can be a beacon to the world of how liberty works. The FLAG OF OPPRESSION is the elephant in the room.
YEAH! just perfect! ;)))
we have wallets we have power of lightning! :))))))))))))))
Upvoted, followed and re-steemed.
Good points. I think the problem with all the complexity is partly just an impression created by the fact that many of the most active and popular people are trying to game the system to earn rewards rather than just posting what interests them. Maybe this is just a phase the platform has to go through - I'm not sure what you can do about it apart from wait for more ordinary users to come on board. The bots are particularly annoying, some comments that seem to be from users who say they followed you and when you check they didn't - it's just a ploy to gain more followers. It's almost as if the financial incentives are just causing everyone to turn into crazy gold diggers.
On the flagging point I asked the Steemit content director about it:
https://steemit.com/steem/@chaunceytinker/re-andrarchy-i-m-steemit-s-content-director-20180524t174939922z
... and he replied:
https://steemit.com/steem/@andrarchy/re-chaunceytinker-re-andrarchy-i-m-steemit-s-content-director-20180525t135753479z
He's delusional. Its a real war with real money, people's time and work, loss of future income. Its punishments are brutal and unforgiving. It will cause violence if it cuts seriously into the incomes of the more unsavory types in our society and it could spill over into violence between real people outside of the platform in the real world as with rival gangs fighting over turf. Its just asking for trouble. He is not only reckless with your investment of time and money. Its worse, he is reckless with peoples lives. There is no good that can come from the flag, neither can it be justified. It is a tool of cruelty which comes as oppression. There is no other plausible reason for its existence.
And yes, I agree that the bots are annoying and create the impression that it is the only way to succeed. It just muddy's up the playground. Those who use them should be made aware that being a pest won't get you any upvotes. Let free speech work. Let the truth rise to the top.
Its why I left Zuckerberg's playground. No wonder Steemit has only one million users. It should have half or more of Zuckerberg's friends by now. Perhaps if andrarchy would wake up in time it could!
Exactly right, they are risking missing a huge opportunity with so much discontent about Twit and FB now. Flags will lead to real bitterness as you say. I truly believe a reward based system that is not vulnerable to state interference is the future of social media, and someone else is going to come up with a rival system now the idea is out there.
As I'm a writer on controversial subjects there's not really much point my being here if all that will happen is I'll get flagged by some rich person objecting to what I have to say. Investigative journalism will not have a future here for the same reason. So it may just become another platform for awesome kitten videos and the like.
I am gathering info. as I go - examples of bad flagging and ideas for alternatives, and will put it together to make a case against the flagging system, feel free to share anything you come across if you want to. Problem is I'm not sure if they can change the underlying system now, I only have a sketchy idea of the technology so far.
I really think it has to go completely away. Any compromise is a compromise with evil. Steemit is an oligarchy because of the flag. It is the tool of oppression. I'd like to see steemit be the sunrise of liberty. The only way that will happen is to remove the flag. No thumbs down either. If they let freedom ring here membership will go through the roof with unprecedented optimism. They have an opportunity here like no other. I like how Daniel Webster put it. Steemit could be such a miracle.