Downvoting Proposal on POB - Why I vote No to the Proposal
A recent proposal from @trostparadox has brought about another solid discussion regarding downvoting.
This proposal relates directly to the Proof of Brain tribe and proposes the following rules for downvoting:
Valid Downvote -- downvote of a “Proof of Brain” post or comment for any of the following reasons: [1] plagiarism (requires documentation), [2] failure to properly tag NSFW (not safe for work) content, or [3] any action defined as ‘bad behavior’ via a tribe-approved ‘community consensus’ protocol. For a downvote to be considered ‘valid’, a comment must be placed as a reply to the offending post or comment, explicitly stating one of the above reasons, and providing a link to any necessary documentation (e.g. evidence of plagiarism).
Malicious Downvote -- any downvote that does not meet the definition of a ‘Valid Downvote’.
The proposal then suggests rules to govern downvoting:
RULES -- (Proposed Rules to Govern Downvoting within the “Proof of Brain” Tribe)
Malicious Downvoting of any “Proof of Brain” post or comment is hereby prohibited.
First offense will result in a warning (which will be issued as a comment to the downvoted post or comment -- the offending account will be directly tagged in the comment).
First subsequent offense (after issuance of a warning) will result in the downvoting account being muted for a period of 10 days.
Second subsequent offense (after issuance of a warning) will result in the downvoting account being permanently muted. However, if the second subsequent offense (after issuance of a warning) occurs before the 10-day mute period begins, the 10-day period will be skipped and the downvoting account will be permanently muted.
Alt accounts will be muted as well (after a detailed review of each suspected alt account).
I find this a really difficult proposal to support. For example, If I downvote using my account to remove HIVE and it is also attached to POB I would be 'breaching' the proposed guidelines. If I don't have an alt then using my downvote would breach these proposed rules. I have always said that it is your stake and you can use it whatever way you want. This proposal is essentially telling stakeholders how they can use their stake in respect to downvoting. I often see some posts that are on trending and are going to receive a large payout for a post and perhaps the quality of that post doesn't deserve such a large reward but gets autovoted by accounts? Do these types of posts deserve such large rewards? It's probably not my place to decide but as a stakeholder, I should have a choice to decide.
If I breach these rules or want to legitimately remove rewards from a post I feel is over rewarded.... I could have my accounts all muted from the POB tribe and not be able to receive any POB from posting.
As a stakeholder can I continue to receive curation rewards and downvote users regardless of being muted? If so, muting someone could just create a huge downvoting vaccuum of sorts. Pissed off stakeholders could do some damage and maliciously downvote users and do some real harm to the tribe.
If downvoting is such a concern, why not just remove downvoting all together? If an account keeps breaching the rules and plagiarising, etc. then those accounts should be muted, not those who downvote others.
I see why the proposal is being made, but can see how the mechanics of the DPoS system could easily be then manipulated to create more chaos.
These are my opinions.
Thanks for reading.
Posted Using LeoFinance Beta
Bold italicized words added on 7.13 at 10:20am Seoul time: (I am visible on all front ends) Thanks @leovoter
I had similar thoughts about this. There is a whole list of things I don't like about Steemit but somewhere near the top of that list is the trending page posts that aren't worth. Yet hundreds and thousands of Steem pumped out for them.
A downvote can be a way to use your stake to represent the true value of a post. This can get pretty subjective and even look malicious.
There was a definition of valid downvote:
Perhaps spamming the reward system and sitting on trending can be considered "bad behavior" by a "community consensus’ protocol". In that case if you wanted to help straighten things up with your downvote it will require community consensus. That community consensus will not always be easy, but there will be a possibility to be given permission to correct the reward unbalance.
Was this downvoted or something? Why is it hidden due to low ratings?
I don't get it. It is a really simple comment. I'm not changing it.
Maybe the word Steem*t triggers an automatic hide.... spooky.
Yeah totally spooky.
Maybe it was downvoted on the Leo side. I will check there.
How did you know it was Leo? I checked LeoFinance account but didn't see a mute list there? Was if from another Leo account?
The original post I tried to comment on was posted in leofinance.io
I looked at the comment from several front ends and it was strange.
It turns out Leo cannot mute on their own frontend but they can mute people who use their tag on other front ends to prevent spam.
https://leofinance.io/@leo.voter/re-mineopoly-qw5lxk
I was muted by Leo.
And today I was unmuted by Leo.
https://www.proofofbrain.io/proofofbrain/@mineopoly/qw5s6k
I had no warning, but I do remember a post I made where a contentious Leo user @badbitch tried to help me.
https://www.proofofbrain.io/hive-150329/@mineopoly/as-humid-as-a-leech-on-a-hippo-s-butt
Yeah I remember her comment. Leo is pretty protective about their tags. I’m glad you got unmuted.
Me too^^
Posted Using LeoFinance Beta
Thanks for your input. You raise some good points.
Some revisions to the current proposals are likely needed to address your concerns.
The DV for plagiarism really needs to be in play, imo. Tribe-wide mute is too blunt a weapon for plagiarism, especially for minor violations.
I got feedback from Hive-Engine that it would be technically feasible to disable DVs tribe-wide except for a "plagiarism team". That could be a viable alternative, but would require some development work.
I would appreciate some elaboration on this. We have tried to think through various alternatives, in an effort to limit 'unintended consequences' and 'adverse incentives' -- but we certainly may have missed some. In order to achieve a robust result, we definitely invite others to help with that process.
My questions here relate to the ability to receive curation rewards and still use downvoting whether muted or not. If I have a large amount stake and don’t post or comment, technically muting me won’t have any effect if I don’t follow any proposed or agreed DV rules. Muting a user could cause them to attack the tribe if they had the power and inclination to do so. This could be an issue.
I’m happy to discuss and look at any and all options but we must flesh out all the positives and negatives before taking any path or making any significant changes.
Thanks for opening this dialog @scooter77.pob,
A couple things happened to me since yesterday to see first hand what it is like to be muted. That's really serious business on the social aspect of this blockchain.
I also see that one user may in fact download a post on the Hive front end not knowing they are downloading a #pob post. If these rules are ratified then that downvote may be considered "malicious" by the POB community even though the downvoter is not aware of it.
Apparently the Leo community should have gave me a warning before muting me. Somehow that warning got lost and I caused Leo a little bit of bad publicity. I'm just a tiny fish in the sea. On a large scale this can be whale vs. community.
And what if the whale on Hive didn't agree to POB's rules? They still have the right to downvote whoever they want because they are outside of the POB community. Then one day they make a comment on a POB post and they find that their comment disappeared.
This is not really a hypothetical scenario but a very likely story.
Every day my vote is leaning more toward "no" to the proposal @trostparadox.pob
and @scooter77.pob.
This is a genuine concern indeed. My first thoughts are to limit the downvote moderation for posts published in the POB community and not just with #pob. Doesn't matter what tokens were rewarded, if the post is in POB, it is a community concern. That's best I could think of for now, couldn't come up with a better workaround.
Also, yes over rewarding is a problem. But I don't think it is something to be judged in individual capacity. Who are we to determine the degree of relevancy of a post to the readers. May be it's obvious for some posts with low word count, value, efforts and everything else. But for that sake, downvotes are not completely discarded. The 'POB moderation team' is taking care of over rewarding as well. So, I don't see there is a harm tagging one of the members of the team. And if the downvote is intended for good. They won't let you to take all the baggage and will support you instead - win, win for both. So the proposal is not about discarding the downvotes and not let people do it, but instead to moderate the intent behind it. if people really want to use them with good intent, I don't understand why they aren't ready to collaborate? Does their thumb pain to tag a third party, who can present an unbiased opinion? Or maybe they want to use them for different motives?
Now, let's leave this. And let us suppose we let everyone do what they want. But then can't they downvote anything in the name of over rewarding? How do we ensure he is not doing it out of spite for a particular member or against certain ideas? How do we ensure his downvotes don't have a political agenda or if he doesn't lack tolerance to contrary beliefs? Because he can simply say "I felt this shit was over-rewarded".
@shubhwaj, you are exactly on target here.
@scooter77 raises some valid concerns.
Removing the downvote option at the tribe level, except for a team of 'content moderators' might be the best option (would require some development work from the Hive-Engine team). Those content moderators could then be required to follow explicit community guidelines regarding plagiarism, spam, over-rewarding, etc.
I am open to alternative solutions, as long as they provide adequate protection against the behaviors you highlighted (e.g. DV'ing "out of spite for a particular member or against certain ideas").
I vouch for this. It will be a comprehensive solution indeed. But also we would need to retain the downvotes in the accounts of heavy stackers to actually utilize it for moderation.
From what I have observed in my short tenure here, most of the POB top line is responsible, and I haven't seen any downvotes flying from their accounts even in some controversial contexts that were pointed at them. Well, this can always be discussed further, if it gets carried forward for execution. But yes, I feel this is a resourceful alternative.
I really appreciate such a healthy conversation here. @trostparadox coming up with rules and people, if not agreeing, saying it out loud and trostparadox spending time and effort to resolve people's queries and accepting some sane ideas. Such posts encouraging healthy engagement are meant to be trending on the page. Do you agree @mineopoly?
I support your reasons big time
This is actually great sir for going this deep to check the consequences this may cause with out proper standards set to check mate the actions of participants in then platform.
I believe @trostparadox.pob is actually doing a good job to revisit and edit the voting rules and other means to keep the POB community safe but I think more thoughts have to given in other to avoid chaos in the platform.
Some of your reasoning definitely rings true, and you touch on one of the issues I have with it all: Most people don't have "autonomous" accounts for each tribe they belong to... which creates the situation in which you might be downvoting something on Hive for an unrelated reason, but because that post happens to be using the #proofofbrain tag and your account also happens to contain staked POB tokens... suddenly you could find yourself inadvertently breaking guidelines.
Hi @denmarkgy,
My little run in with Leo opened my eyes about how intertwined each community here on Hive really is. I haven't been able to sort out everything in my head yet, but I've been thinking about what a friend said about this whole issue.
He has a lot of good points and compounded with the interrelationship of communities on Hive I'm not sure if POB has the right to mute users for downvoting at least without plenty warning. That warning part is so important.
I didn't vote at all. And I explained that here Proof of Brain proposal with Proof of Stake vote !. I wish you read it. In fact I hope everyone will read it and answer me why a proof of brain tribe should work based on proof of stake concept.