So much has happened since my last #FollowFriday post. The main events were that our established witnesses too some action to prevent the new owners of Steemit Inc from using their Steem to stage a coup. @justinstunsteemit was able to work around this by persuading some exchanges to power up and back some puppet accounts he set up. It all got very exciting when the Steem community worked together to get the witnesses they actually trust back into the top 20. The danger is that if a single entity controls enough of those then they can deploy any changes they want. That could include locking out users and taking their funds. That may sound like tit for tat, but the witnesses made it clear they were only taking temporary action until the situation was clarified. Justin issued a strange post that he has since deleted setting some conditions for witnesses he would support. The controversial points were:
- Scrap downvotes. This would remove any way the community could deal with those abusing the platform. They can be misused, but we need them.
- Reduce power down to a few days. It is thought he wants this so the exchanges can get their liquid Steem back. They have abused the trust of those who kept their Steem with them and made it difficult for them to execute the trades people want. Making it 3 days or less would make it possible to double vote with multiple accounts. This shows a lack of understanding of Steem.
For now the community witnesses hold enough positions to prevent such drastic actions. The yellow ones are those controlled by Steemit. You should not vote for them. You have 30 votes and should give them to the top witnesses who are not running version 0.22.5 of the software. I would exclude 
If you have any clarifications or questions regarding all this then please comment.
I will still do my usual suggestions for people to check out. I think we should keep posting about things other than this situation as it is important to keep our communities going.
has returned to Steem to give some opinions on the drama. He is skeptical about whether it is viable, but his arguments are worth reading. He has complained about lack of rewards, but we know they are not always 'fair'. You have to engage with people to build support. He posts more on his blog and other platforms.
- I have not been able to listen to the various discussions that have been going on between witnesses and Steemit or Tron, but various people are reporting on them.
has done a post on the latest talks.
- I recommend you use
rather than the Steemit site. One of their features is 'badges' that give a feed from selected groups of users. There is one for witnesses that is worth looking at. With this and communities you can get more focused updates without having to subscribe to lots of individual accounts.
is the guy behind the
dapp I use to log my running.
- I just saw
is posting again. Looks like she has been travelling. We have met several times at Steemfest and other events.
was head of communications at Steemit, but has resigned from that position. He is still posting and has another project called OpenSeed. I met him at Steemfest in Krakow.
is also posting again after a break. We need reporters and campaigners here.
As always you are welcome to add your own suggestions on the comments or do a #FollowFriday post. In the end it is people that matter.
Steem on!