RE: Improving the Economics of Steem: A Community Proposal

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RE: Improving the Economics of Steem: A Community Proposal

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danmaruschak in #steem • 7 years ago

I could be wrong, but it seems to me that the best strategy to get curation rewards is to "bet on" posts from people who already have a track record of having popular posts. If this is true then it's not clear to me that this works well as "proof of brain" so I'm not sure it makes sense to devote more rewards to it, especially at the cost of rewarding creators. Is there evidence that careful, thoughtful, content-based curation "works better" than dumb algorithms like voting for posts from accounts with good track records?

If the goal is to improve the incentive structure on the blockchain to encourage people to manually search for good posts based on their content then it isn't clear to me that this proposal does that. For one thing, since the share of curation rewards you get are still tied to impact of your vote most people won't see very big curation rewards since most users of the site don't have large amounts of SP. If the reward for identifying an awesome post is still tiny for the majority of users isn't it bad ROI for them to put in the effort? Or is the idea to try to incentivize big accounts to curate?

7 years ago in #steem by danmaruschak

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dana-edwards 7 years ago

Anyone can build a track record over time. It takes a while but it does happen.

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smooth 7 years ago (edited)

The highest ROI even for smaller accounts is to find unknown content that figures to be successful once it becomes visible and vote on it. You won't earn as much as a larger account in absolute terms, but you may actually earn more relative to your SP level (return on investment).

Voting mechanically for authors with the best track record doesn't work to generate the highest return because you have to vote earlier and earlier to get ahead of everyone else doing the same thing, which then reduces the curation rewards (the system docks them back to the reward pool for votes before 15 minutes).

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valued-customer 7 years ago

The ROI available to such small curators is so insignificant that it is ignored.

Curation rewards do not create incentive to curate good content.

All they do is create financial incentive to corrupt curation for profit, and only for substantial stakeholders. They are a drag on Steem and basically a tax on capital gains.

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iflagtrash 7 years ago

I flag trash. You have received a flag.

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12 votes

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kawaiicrush 7 years ago

Dear @valued-customer

IMO I see the present issues with whales circle jerking, downvoting as a hole in the bottom of the bucket. These solutions only appear to widen this hole. I wish I had higher SP to give you larger upvotes Sir. Your comments are fantastic and you really hit home with every point.

Great work.

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2 votes

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iflagtrash 7 years ago

I flag trash. You have received a flag.

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danmaruschak 7 years ago

The highest ROI even for smaller accounts is to find unknown content that figures to be successful once it becomes visible and vote on it.

If there are N low-reward posts the odds of finding one that will be a hit are very low. Is there an effective method for finding posts that "figure to become successful"? If there is why aren't people using that mechanism today? Is the argument that they're not but they would if curation rewards were ~2X what they are today?

Voting mechanically for authors with the best track record doesn't work to generate the highest return because you have to vote earlier and earlier to get ahead of everyone else doing the same thing, which then reduces the curation rewards (the system docks them back to the reward pool for votes before 15 minutes).

Do you have some kind of evidence or analysis for this assertion, or is this speculation?

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smooth 7 years ago (edited)

Is there an effective method for finding posts that "figure to become successful"?

Well, that is the competitive skill in curation, and there is no cookbook approach to it. There are different methods that can get there from just being a good judge of content popularity to things like machine learning.

If there is why aren't people using that mechanism today

A few are, and if you look at the highest ROI accounts by curation that is generally what you will find them doing. A big reason though, is that with 25% curation it is very hard to overcome the natural 4x advantage of just self-voting or delegating to a bid bot. The change from 25% to 50% base curation share is a step to rebalance the system back toward better ROI for curation.

Do you have some kind of evidence or analysis for this assertion, or is this speculation?

Yes, there have been numerous posts analyzing voting times over the years. I don't have a link handy but the analysis has been done, and it agrees with the game theory (which is itself not mere speculation, it is a theory that is shown to be predictive).

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novacadian 7 years ago

... the system docks them back to the reward pool for votes before 15 minutes).

My understanding is that since HF20 rewards from votes prior to 15 minutes goes to the author and no longer back to the reward pool. Can anyone confirm or deny that?

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svamiva 7 years ago

It's the other way around, before HF20 to the author, after to the pool.

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2 votes

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smooth 7 years ago

False.

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1 vote

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novacadian 7 years ago

Thanks @smooth.

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trafalgar 7 years ago (edited)

Just quoting myself from earlier:

Curation is about incentivizing stakers to actually vote on content which they believe others would agree is appealing by rewarding them for it. It's true that established authors can become very 'sticky' but this is also true for all other platforms. It can incentivize people to build a long term reputation.

Curation is a zero sum game which forces voters to compete with incrementally earlier votes over established authors and at some point you'll likely lose more due to the 15 minute curation tax timer than if you were to seek out less established authors with appealing content

Some amount of free downvotes is one mechanism that can further serve to increase mobility away from established authors, as people will be more liberal in their use to bring down posts that are overpaid, and curators over time will need to adapt their behavior if they wish to maximize their rewards.

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3 votes

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danmaruschak 7 years ago

It's true that established authors can become very 'sticky' but this is also true for all other platforms.

So because you can't figure out how to improve the situation you want to double down on it?

It can incentivize people to build a long term reputation.

And it can incentivize giving up if it looks like becoming successful is an extreme long shot.

at some point you'll likely lose more due to the 15 minute curation tax timer than if you were to seek out less established authors with appealing content

The current proposal doesn't change the 15 minute thing, so whatever effect you think it has should already be in effect, no? Also, in response to someone else in the thread you said:

The 15 minute curation tax timer are one of many other secondary issues that deserve another look at, but they're not what I call core economic issues, that is I don't believe they'll materially affect the content indifferent voting behavior problem we have

So which is it, it doesn't have an effect or it's the solution to the problem?

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1 vote

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trafalgar 7 years ago

The current proposal doesn't change the 15 minute thing, so whatever effect you think it has should already be in effect, no?

Currently we have pretty much complete system wide failure as the vast majority of active SP are just winding up back into the staker's pocket via some form of content indifferent voting (self voting vote selling).

The 15 minute timer has an effect on the issue you're raising: the mobility of votes when it comes to established authors. Currently, the focus is on avoiding the near complete failure of votes to reflect content on any level, which it doesn't have too much of an effect on.

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2 votes