Steem is a Blockchain that can facilitate many types of content, voting for various reasons and there are many different views of how this can play out.
Do people want to compete to have the best article on Steem each day?
I would call this model Content Discovery.
This is one model I hear talked about often. When I imagine it, I invision people working hard to make the best post and having the expectation that curators are judging which posts are the best and voting accordingly. There would never be agreement, the concept is that via consensus a top article would appear each day. A wisdom of the masses type of content discovery. If a post was on the top of the heap it would be assumed that most people thought that was the best article of the day.
One challenge with this model on Steem related front-ends is of course stake-based voting provides a bias towards certain people or types of content as we see demonstrated on Trending. I personally don't have a problem with Steem related content and announcements being on Trending. I tend to think it happens because the only thing we all have in common is an interest in Steem.
My concern is that it is too limiting. I prefer a more casual platform, where people can do a variety of different styles of content based on their time and attention each day. Let's face it though, I do have a bias in that I've never considered myself a content creator. So, maybe a casual platform is my preference because of my own personal interests.
Social Networking:
On a social network, people can feel free to post a variety of things. End Users can post a long detailed opinion post, or a picture and a story or share an article. After all most websites focus on engagement, page refreshes and transactions. If the intent is onboarding the masses lowering the barriers for participation allows more people to feel comfortable engaging posting and interacting on the site. I am not saying that these casual posts should be at the top of trending or that people should bidbot them up. However, if you post a picture of your dog and a sentence and some of your friends enjoy seeing the picture of your dog and upvote it, I think that is beautiful. Realistically though that also has its weaknesses due to autovotes and the size of our current community.
Soon we will not have to choose. We are seeing this progress already in the Tribes and soon (who knows what soon means) we will have the ability to create all different types of Communities and various reward configurations with SMTs.
Do you prefer a moderated community or a free speech community? Why not both.
Short form or Long Form? Let's have both
Obviously once Communities and SMTs are here everything will be smooth sailing on Steem.
All conflict will end, the price will skyrocket...
:) Obviously I am over selling it, but I do catch myself arguing sometimes and then remind myself to relax most of this will sort out without my input... one way or the other.
