An interface overhaul is necessary. As it stands now, steemians continue to struggle with follower acquisition, retention, and engagement. If the information overload problem isn't solved soon with improvements in content management, a mass exodus of unsatisfied early adopters is imminent.
I readily admit I've forgotten most of the people I follow already.
That isn't because they failed to continue to deliver quality content, those I've caught back up with are still putting really great work out there...pretty much all of them actually.
The reality of the situation is the only thing keeping me consuming your content is my feed page.
Well, when I have 100+ new posts in my feed daily it's little challenging, as the case is for many. Especially if you're posting at a time of day that you always end up #95 of the 100 posts that pop up, its a guarantee you're going to remain "out of sight, out of mind".
Solving this problem is make or break.
Successful solutions will require innovating in the space of social media. We can barrow a bit from the seminal ideas of other sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit but ultimately we're sailing fast through uncharted water and the cracks in the hull can't be ignored for much longer.
Complacency Will Sink the Ship
Let's be honest, for a beta steemit is a brilliant proof of a concept. As an asset or tool for content creators, it just isn't there yet.
Right now the pumps are keeping the ship afloat - the growth steemit has experienced has been made possible and sustained through community organized moderation and curation efforts. While these communities are necessary, the source of the problems needs to be addressed or they will be taxed beyond their limits.
Another admission I'll make is I don't know the solution in its entirety, I only a have a few ideas and they only may be a bandied solution.
That said, I believe the salient issue right now is what I'll call -
Feed Clutter
I'm perfectly happy reading an enormous amounts of articles everyday, so long as the information is well written and following at least a loose narrative that ties together to provide useful insight.
Here's the rub though:
Frequent posting/resteeming clutters up my channel and while all that content might be great, its taking away from my ability to keep up with others. Because I can't sort OR search by category in my Feed, less frequent posting content creators are highly disadvantaged. Not being able to sort and search the Feed in intuitive ways is exacerbating the information overload problem.
When visiting "Tags and Topics", content from those I follow doesn't stick out. Their content should either be highlighted or temporarily stickied at the top of various categories in the tags.... and/or give those a follow a category of their own like "trending" in the topic I'm looking at.
There is no tracking of so much important meta data. Last time I visited a person I follow, unread/read replies and stories, etc
The Feed Needs Order
I believe the way forward here is apps hosted on steemtools can serve as an aggressive proving grounds for content management solutions to deal with information overload. Improvements particularly to /feed need to be prioritized.
I don't really have much to offer as far as programming expertise is concerned right now... I am learning though and hopefully can be part of the solution in less technical capacities for now. If this isn't addressed, the veritable consequence of sustaining high effort and realizing low user engagement will come to light in the form of many shifting gears back into centralized social platforms.
The scope was confined to /feed here but I do have many other qualms. I think if we can at least add sorting and searching to /feed, content creators will see far more sustained engagement and growth in their follower base.
I believe in this platform, but I along with many others grow increasingly frustrated with the amount of upkeep and management work necessary to brute force past steemit's flaws.
Sources:
Extended Reading
http://www.businessinsider.com/google-feed-google-versus-facebook-news-feed-2017-7
http://gizmodo.com/reddit-raised-200-million-and-is-redesigning-to-look-m-1797407331