I'm seeing more and MORE complaints about bots and I have to be honest, it seems for good reason.

I'm going to keep this short and very precise because let's face... reading a bunch of crap will lose the attention of quire a few and I want as many to see this as is possible with my minuscule reach-

"BAD Bots" Vs "Good Bots"

Are some bots "good"? Yeah, sure... I think so.

Does that mean we need them? Hell no it doesn't.

I'm not going to say that all bots should necessarily die but it's pretty damn obvious some should; at least I think so. I'm not necessarily one to say this or that needs to happen, I'm not really about censoring and controlling the will of others but once shit starts getting obviously out of control it's time to get proactive about it.

As the saying goes: "Where Zen ends, ass-kicking begins"

I'm not going to discuss what I think are "good" or "bad" bots, that would be for the people to decide. I am going to however talk about what I think could and ultimately SHOULD be done to keep this bot invasion bullshit under wraps.

HOW TO DEAL WITH BOTS!

Idea One:

I think there should be something implemented within steemit that allows the people to vote on bots and then the tally could be taken into consideration and some final judgment made. This would require some kind of council or *coughs* witness of some sort.

I've got to be honest, this is my least favorite idea but I'm throwing it out there because why not.

Idea Two:

Similar to my first thought but modified to allow for a flagging system which is meant strictly for bots. Follow me here because the idea is more complex but the implementation would be simple.

1. See a bot, the bot is dumb... flag it, then block it.

2. There would be a ratio of posts to flags which would then trigger a temporary ban on that account. This could follow some 3 strikes you're out rule. But here is the thing, this could easily be abused by a group to gang up on an individual who is perhaps "not popular" and that person would be out of an account... or would they?

3. This would require some witness or trusted somebody (yet again) to monitor the bans and in fact confirm or deny the ban based on the evidence given. This would mean that in at least the vast majority of cases only actual annoying bots would get the boot.

How would it work?

This idea falls under a few assumptions and would require some things to be implemented which are not seemingly in place as of now.

I am aware that the 'system' could be abused but I firmly believe that the numbers would weigh in favor of anti-abuse provided the proper checks & balances along with an actual human being overseeing the entire thing were in place.

The majority of votes for those worthless & annoying bots would be evident and the votes for anything else would fall by the gutter. This is just a loose idea, not fleshed out in any real way but I'm posting it here to hopefully start a discussion to see if any interest is there and perhaps to open a discussion about it.

It may just be a pipe-dream but I think it's become evident that something should be done before steemit is overrun by bots. I have noticed there is already a mute & block feature which is great... for those who don't know it, when you see a post you don't like you can mute and essentially block that poster- though I don't know if it's actually functioning just yet, but the cosmetic pieces are in place.

Anyway, that's it. If you have more to add or detract from my idea please let us know, I for one am interested in hearing about it.

I also want to stress that if a bot is in place which does provide an obvious service I think it would wind up being embraced by the community so this would not necessarily spell the death to ALL bots... just the p.o.s. ones. ;]