I read a funny milestone post by 
Maybe nothing, but since I like to connect dots even if I have to draw some in myself to begin with, I will.
Firstly, as I wrote in my own post earlier, I think the churn rate is potentially a good thing at this stage of the game as it leaves the dedicated and committed core users to go about the business of making this place something worthwhile.
But, this is more about
People will of course claim that it is unfair on the small accounts who are coming in trying their best but in my opinion, if they are actually looking to earn here, casting 1% votes with 100 SP (or worse, 15 SP they got from Steemit) isn't the best way to go about earning and growing anyway. New and very small accounts should learn about curation but, forget about earning a curation return if they want to make it here in the long term. People are trying to maximize their earnings in the wrong areas.
Although I don't autovote nor do I trail, I have trialled both methods for a short period of time. I personally don't like it as I would see my vote on content that is not what I would naturally vote but, that is not the main risk. The problem is that passively voting is not going to be a significant earner unless a) one has a significant amount of SP or b) there are many accounts voting in a curation botnet. Obviously, the accounts with significant SP aren't going to run into problems with HF20 rules. It is the botnets and tiny passive users who aren't engaging that are going to be largely cut out of the game.
This is the issue with retention as it seems many of the accounts feel that they can come in and with their 15 SP or whatever it is, earn enough by setting and forgetting it. How many just, forget to ever return? I am not sure how this can be calculated but I would say that if we could analyse all autovoters, a large number of the smallest accounts there will actually be dead accounts, accounts that no longer interact in any other ways. This is what is going to affect the churn and burn rates too right? It is also going to affect the statistics of active users that will be used for marketing purposes one day.
As I see it, it would be great to be able to purge the system of accounts that don't actually offer anything to the blockchain and HF20 might do just that in some ways, at least statistically speaking as it will be easy to identify the accounts that vote but, don't grow as autovoters and, not active in other ways.
The problem with autovoting for the small accounts who believe it will get them somewhere is that they aren't engaging, they aren't building their account in other was, they aren't reading or doing anything to be a part of the community. Their tiny vote might add up to something in combination, but in the scheme of one 
Ok, so how does
Using three of the examples he gave: 
All three joined in March 2018 and have respective account values of 14, 25 and 75 cents. All of them are resteem accounts and the highest value one has 120 "original" stolen image/quote posts that were spammed. These are the kinds of accounts that are making up a large majority of the resteeming accounts people have noticed lately targeting the people with high reps or in trending.
I don't know for sure but I would say that their follow and unfollow technique is a way to attract follows in the same way they do on Instagram. I might also make a large leap and suggest that someone is buying these accounts from users who aren't using them anymore to add them to their network. It is likely much cheaper than creating a new one and, it has the added benefit of already having at least some followers (retarded ones) meaning that half the work is done. They can advertise their resteem service to be seen by 100k accounts! Considering the estimate is about 60k active accounts out of the million and no active person n their right mind would follow a resteem service, what are those 100k accounts?
I have several accounts that autovote me often but, they haven't been seen on platform for a very long time. Unfortunately, they all only have about 5 SP and their vote is worth literally nothing. Some also vote at the time of posting which means not only is their vote worth nothing, they get nothing anyway. It doesn't seem like they really have taken the time to understand the platform does it?
People complain about the large account autovoters not being sensitive to the platform but, how much is being drained out of the platform by the small accounts or, being locked up by inactive accounts who will never come back. The massive botnet by DART/TARD was taking something like 22,000 dollars out in a 6 month period. Now, that is significant. Not only is it a significant amount of value, it is a lot of accounts that are doing nothing good for the blockchain.
As I see it, small accounts shouldn't be autovoting, they should be engaging and using whatever tiny amount they can muster to encourage other users. A 15 SP account should never be voting at 1% which is the reason that the slider originally had to be earned. Yes, 500 SP is too high but originally it wasn't, not that it matters because other interfaces enable the slider anyway or it is applied through the autovoter.
What this means is that accounts are being created hoping to earn but not actually be a significant part of the community. they want to draw from the pool without offering anything in return and as they realise it isn't going to work and what will is too much work for them, they leave. Churned.
I understand that the devil is in the details and all of these small amounts will add up somewhere but, for the most part the difference in curation return costs that will be lost by small accounts voting could be made up for multiple times with even a modicum of interaction with the community. Yet, they won't or they can't because they are bots. Should we spend our time worrying about a mass of accounts that are never likely going to try to be a part of the community or, should we work out ways to take the small amount of people who are trying and helping them grow more?
Perhaps the autovoters could adjust settings available based on SP so that no one can set a vote (easily) if it doesn't reach the threshold. If there are autovoter accounts who don't understand the new rules and adjust themselves, it probably means they are dead. Perhaps the small accounts that do trail could up their percentage but lower how many posts they vote on, perhaps every 3rd or 4th instead of every post.
Again, although these things are important, I don't think it is going to cause much harm to anyone who is actually active here as they will be engaging and learning and out earning their curation by magnitudes until they are at a point where their vote is significant enough to split or use to trail. As said and in my opinion, small accounts shouldn't be trailing and autovoting at all, they should be engaging as much as they can and, that includes with their vote as it will get them much further than any curation earnings.
So many of the churned accounts I would say are either alts that got tiring or people who thought they could earn here without doing very much. They got their Steemit delegation, set their autovoters and left. When they come back they should have no more than then because, they haven't chosen to put anything into the platform in time, energy, content or, investment. For the trails, the numbers from these accounts aren't going to be significantly missed.
It is hard out there for small accounts to be sure, but being drowned in shitsoup of inactive accounts that are resteeming BS isn't helping matters. Disincentivize poor behaviour and find ways to incentivize good.
Taraz
[ a Steem original ]